Advanced Passenger Train
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The Advanced Passenger Train (APT) was a tilting
high speed train High-speed rail (HSR) is a type of rail system that runs significantly faster than traditional rail, using an integrated system of specialised rolling stock and dedicated tracks. While there is no single standard that applies worldwide, lines ...
developed by British Rail during the 1970s and early 1980s, for use on the
West Coast Main Line The West Coast Main Line (WCML) is one of the most important railway corridors in the United Kingdom, connecting the major cities of London and Glasgow with branches to Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester and Edinburgh. It is one of the busiest ...
(WCML). The WCML contained many curves, and the APT pioneered the concept of active tilting to address these, a feature that has since been copied on designs around the world. The experimental
APT-E The APT-E, for Advanced Passenger Train Experimental, was the prototype Advanced Passenger Train tilting train unit. It was powered by gas turbines, the only multiple unit so powered that was used by British Rail. The APT-E consisted of two ...
achieved a new British railway speed record on 10 August 1975 when it reached , only to be bested by the service prototype
APT-P British Rail's Class 370 tilting trains, also referred to as APT-P (meaning Advanced Passenger Train Prototype), were the pre-production Advanced Passenger Train units. Unlike the earlier experimental gas-turbine APT-E unit, these units were ...
at in December 1979. Development of the service prototypes dragged on, and by the late 1970s the design had been under construction for a decade and the trains were still not ready for service. The election of
Margaret Thatcher Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher (; 13 October 19258 April 2013) was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990 and Leader of the Conservative Party (UK), Leader of the Conservative Party from 1975 to 1990. S ...
brought matters to a head and she alluded to funding cuts for the project. Facing the possibility of cancellation, BR management decided to put the prototypes into service, with the first runs along the
London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...
-
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route taking place in December 1981. The result was a
media circus Media circus is a colloquial metaphor, or idiom, describing a news event for which the level of media coverage—measured by such factors as the number of reporters at the scene and the amount of material broadcast or published—is perceived to ...
when every problem large or small received front-page coverage and the entire project derided as an example of BR's incompetence. The trains were withdrawn from service again by the end of the month, to the great amusement of the press. The problems were eventually solved and the trains quietly reintroduced in 1984 with much greater success. By this time the competing
High Speed Train High-speed rail (HSR) is a type of rail system that runs significantly faster than traditional rail, using an integrated system of specialised rolling stock and dedicated tracks. While there is no single standard that applies worldwide, lines ...
, powered by a conventional diesel engine and lacking the APT's tilt and performance, had gone through development and testing at a rapid rate and was now forming the backbone of BR's passenger service. All support for the APT project collapsed as anyone in authority distanced themselves from what was being derided as a failure. Plans for a production version, APT-S, were abandoned, and the three APT-Ps ran for just over a year before being withdrawn again over the winter of 1985/6. Two of the three sets were broken up, and parts of the third sent to the
National Railway Museum The National Railway Museum is a museum in York forming part of the Science Museum Group. The museum tells the story of rail transport in Britain and its impact on society. It is the home of the national collection of historically significant r ...
where it joined the APT-E. In spite of the APT's troubled history, the design was highly influential and directly inspired other high speed trains such as the
Pendolino Pendolino (from Italian ''pendolo'' "pendulum", and ''-ino,'' a diminutive suffix) is an Italian family of tilting trains used in Italy, Spain, Germany, Poland, Portugal, Slovenia, Finland, Russia, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, the UK, the US, ...
. The considerable work on electrification that was carried out hand-in-hand with APT was put to good use with newer non-tilting designs like the
British Rail Class 91 The British Rail Class 91 is a high-speed electric locomotive, which produces power of ; it was ordered as a component of the East Coast Main Line modernisation and electrification programme of the late 1980s. The Class 91s were given the auxi ...
. The APT's tilt system was returned to the WCML on the
British Rail Class 390 The British Rail Class 390 ''Pendolino'' is a type of electric high-speed passenger train operated by Avanti West Coast in the United Kingdom, leased from Angel Trains. They are electric multiple units using Fiat Ferroviaria's tilting train ...
, based on the Fiat Ferroviaria tilting train design and built by
Alstom Alstom SA is a French multinational rolling stock manufacturer operating worldwide in rail transport markets, active in the fields of passenger transportation, signalling, and locomotives, with products including the AGV, TGV, Eurostar, Avelia ...
. Other features pioneered on APT, such as the hydrokinetic braking used to stop the train within existing separations, have not been adopted.


Background


BR research

Following nationalisation of the UK's railways in 1948,
British Railways British Railways (BR), which from 1965 traded as British Rail, was a state-owned company that operated most of the overground rail transport in Great Britain from 1948 to 1997. It was formed from the nationalisation of the Big Four British rai ...
, as it was then known, faced significant losses in passengers as the car rapidly became more popular through the 1950s and 60s. By 1970, passenger numbers were roughly half what they had been immediately before
World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
. In an attempt to maintain some level of profitability, the government commissioned a report that resulted in the abandonment of many lines as part of the 1963 " Beeching Axe". In spite of this significant restructuring, the company was still built on lines that were pre-war, with routings dating into the 1800s. Maintaining the network was a constant problem and derailments became increasingly common. In 1962 Dr. Sydney Jones was hired away from the weapons department at R.A.E. Farnborough with the eventual aim of having him take over as BR's research lead from Colin Ingles, who retired in 1964. Looking into the derailment problem, they found that much of the problem could be traced to a problem known as
hunting oscillation Hunting oscillation is a self-oscillation, usually unwanted, about an equilibrium. The expression came into use in the 19th century and describes how a system "hunts" for equilibrium. The expression is used to describe phenomena in such diverse ...
. This was well known in the railway world, but tended to happen only at high speeds. On the BR network, especially on freight cars with worn wheels, it was being seen at speeds as low as . Jones was convinced that hunting oscillation was an effect similar to the problem of
aeroelastic flutter Aeroelasticity is the branch of physics and engineering studying the interactions between the inertial, elastic, and aerodynamic forces occurring while an elastic body is exposed to a fluid flow. The study of aeroelasticity may be broadly classif ...
encountered in
aerodynamics Aerodynamics, from grc, ἀήρ ''aero'' (air) + grc, δυναμική (dynamics), is the study of the motion of air, particularly when affected by a solid object, such as an airplane wing. It involves topics covered in the field of fluid dyn ...
, and decided to hire someone from the aeronautics field to investigate it. In October 1962, Alan Wickens was given the position. Wickens was a dynamics expert who had previously worked at
Armstrong Whitworth Sir W G Armstrong Whitworth & Co Ltd was a major British manufacturing company of the early years of the 20th century. With headquarters in Elswick, Newcastle upon Tyne, Armstrong Whitworth built armaments, ships, locomotives, automobiles and a ...
on the
Sea Slug missile Seaslug was a first-generation surface-to-air missile designed by Armstrong Whitworth (later part of the Hawker Siddeley group) for use by the Royal Navy. Tracing its history as far back as 1943's LOPGAP design, it came into operational service in ...
and then for a period at
Canadair Canadair Ltd. was a civil and military aircraft manufacturer in Canada. In 1986, its assets were acquired by Bombardier Aerospace, the aviation division of Canadian transport conglomerate Bombardier Inc. Canadair's origins lie in the establishm ...
in Montreal before returning to the UK and joining the
Blue Steel missile The Avro Blue Steel was a British air-launched, rocket-propelled nuclear armed standoff missile, built to arm the V bomber force. It allowed the bomber to launch the missile against its target while still outside the range of surface-to-air ...
project. When the follow-on Blue Steel II was cancelled in favour of the US designed
Skybolt The Douglas GAM-87 Skybolt (AGM-48 under the 1962 Tri-service system) was an air-launched ballistic missile (ALBM) developed by the United States during the late 1950s. The basic concept was to allow US strategic bombers to launch their weapon ...
, Wickens left A. V. Roe because he "saw the writing on the wall". He answered an ad for BR, and during the interview, he replied that he had no knowledge of, and little interest in, railway bogie design. It was later revealed this was the reason he was hired. Over the next several years, Wickens' team carried out what is considered to be the most detailed study of the dynamics of steel wheels on rails ever conducted. Starting with incomplete work by F.W. Carter from 1930, the team studied conventional two-axle bogies and quickly discovered that, as Jones had suspected, the problem was dynamic instability. Out of this work came the concept of a critical speed at which point hunting would become a problem. This work was then extended to the unique two-axle bogieless car designs used on the BR freight network, where the problem was further modified by the dynamics of the entire vehicle. Wickens concluded that a properly damped suspension system could eliminate the problem. The key realization was that the suspension had to be both vertical, as it had been in the past when based on
leaf spring A leaf spring is a simple form of spring commonly used for the suspension in wheeled vehicles. Originally called a ''laminated'' or ''carriage spring'', and sometimes referred to as a semi-elliptical spring, elliptical spring, or cart spring, it ...
s, but also horizontally to avoid small displacements triggering oscillation. Computers were used to simulate the motion and develop rules for how much damping would be needed to avoid the problem for any given speed. By 1964 this work had produced the first High Speed Freight Vehicle, HSFV-1, a bogieless freight car capable of travelling safely at speeds up to . The same work suggested there was no practical upper limit to the achievable speeds in terms of dynamics, and that any limitations on maximum performance would be due to other factors like traction or wear on the lines. Eventually a series of six HSFV designs would be tested until 1976, and the last, HSFV-6, entered service that year.


Cant and tilting trains

During this period, BR's Passenger Business division produced a report suggesting rail could compete with road and air, but only if the trains ran faster. Studying the increase in ridership due to the introduction of the
British Rail Class 55 The British Rail Class 55, also known as a Deltic, or English Electric type 5, is a class of diesel locomotive built in 1961 and 1962 by English Electric for British Railways. They were designed for the high-speed express passenger services on t ...
"Deltic" engines on the
East Coast Main Line The East Coast Main Line (ECML) is a electrified railway between London and Edinburgh via Peterborough, Doncaster, York, Darlington, Durham and Newcastle. The line is a key transport artery on the eastern side of Great Britain running broa ...
, and the effects of electrification on the WCML which improved journey times 20 to 30%, they concluded that every increase in speed would result in a 1% increase in passengers. This basic rule was apparently proven in Japan, when the Tokyo-Osaka
Shinkansen The , colloquially known in English as the bullet train, is a network of high-speed railway lines in Japan. Initially, it was built to connect distant Japanese regions with Tokyo, the capital, to aid economic growth and development. Beyond l ...
line was operating from 1964 to huge success. The Shinkansen provided a smooth ride at speeds as high as by laying new lines dedicated to high speed travel. BR's most used route, the WCML, had in the order of 6 million passengers a year between
London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...
and
Manchester Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of Salford to the west. The t ...
, a far cry from the Tokyo-Osaka's 120 million. Funding for a new line for high speed use was highly unlikely given these passenger levels. This presented a problem for any sort of high-speed operation on the route because the existing line contained many turns and curves, and rounding these at high speed would cause lateral forces that would make walking difficult, and throw items off tables onto the floor. The traditional solution to this problem is to tilt the rails into the turns, an effect known as '' superelevation'' or ''cant''. This has the effect of making the lateral forces more inline with the floor, reducing sideways forces. Because larger amounts of cant are more difficult to construct and maintain, and also the need to account for slower-moving traffic or the possibility of a train coming to a stand within the curve (both of which cases would consequently experience a force to the inside of the curve, a condition known as ''cant excess''), long experience had shown that the maximum amount of cant that could be applied to lines with mixed traffic was 6.5 degrees. Given the curve radii typically encountered on the WCML, this meant that even with the maximum permissible amount of cant applied, speeds couldn't be increased much above the range without once again experiencing excessive lateral forces. Fortunately, the factor limiting speeds is ''not'' safety against derailing or overturning, but rather only passenger comfort. The solution to increasing speeds further is therefore having the train car bodies tilt as well – while this doesn't influence the forces acting at the wheel-rail level, it keeps the lateral forces experienced inside the passenger compartment at a comfortable level even at further increased speeds.
Talgo Talgo (officially Patentes Talgo, SAU) is a Spanish manufacturer of intercity, standard, and high-speed passenger trains. Corporate history TALGO, an abbreviation of Tren Articulado Ligero Goicoechea Oriol (English: ''Lightweight articulated tra ...
introduced the first practical design for a tilting carriage in the late 1950s. This consisted of a single bogie placed between the train cars with the car bodies suspended from an A-frame centred on the bogie with a pivot near the top. When the train rounded a bend, the centrifugal forces caused the car body to swing out like a pendulum, reaching the proper tilt angle naturally. However, this system had a distinct delay between entering the curve and the body swinging out, and then swung past this angle and then oscillated briefly until settling at the right angle. When traversing a series of curves, like in a switchyard, it tended to swing about alarmingly. Although a number of semi-experimental designs of the 1970s made use of it, like the
UAC TurboTrain The UAC TurboTrain was an early high-speed rail, high-speed, gas turbine train manufactured by United Aircraft that operated in Canada between 1968 and 1982 and in the United States between 1968 and 1976. Amtrak disposed of the trains in 1980. It ...
, the concept was not widely used.


APT's origins

In 1964, a number of BR's formerly-dispersed research groups were organised into the new Derby Research Division. It was here that the final work on Wickens' HSFV was being developed. At first there was some argument about whether or not a high-speed train would be supported; in the aftermath of the 1963 Beeching Axe it was not clear what size of network the government was willing to support, and whether a new design should be aimed at higher-speed intercity service, where a new locomotive would be needed to replace the ageing
Deltics Deltic may refer to: * Napier Deltic, a diesel engine ** British Rail DP1 ("Deltic") a prototype locomotive built by English Electric fitted with the Deltic Engine ** British Rail Class 55, production locomotives powered by Deltic engines ** Britis ...
anyway, or a simpler system for better performance in the suburbs. In 1965, Wickens had hired an intern, Dutch engineer A.J. Ispeert, and had him do some early work on active tilt systems. These would replace the passive pendulum-like Talgo system with a system using
hydraulic cylinder A hydraulic cylinder (also called a linear hydraulic motor) is a mechanical actuator that is used to give a unidirectional force through a unidirectional stroke. It has many applications, notably in construction equipment (engineering vehicles ...
s that would quickly drive the car to the proper angle and hold it there without any swinging. A major advantage for BR use was that the center of rotation could be through the middle of the car, instead of the top, meaning the total movement would fit within the smaller British
loading gauge A loading gauge is a diagram or physical structure that defines the maximum height and width dimensions in railway vehicles and their loads. Their purpose is to ensure that rail vehicles can pass safely through tunnels and under bridges, and ke ...
. Ispeert returned a report on the concept in August 1966. Wickens noted that BR's single-axle suspension system would have less drag at high speed, and that its lighter weight would make it more stable at high speeds than conventional dual-axle bogies. In November 1966 he wrote a report calling for a two-year programme to build and test a High Speed Passenger Vehicle, essentially an experimental car like HSFV-1 but for passenger use instead of freight. The original plans called for a single dummy body and two bogies to test the suspension and tilting system at high speed. They set the maximum tilt angle at 9 degrees, which could be added to any cant in the underlying railbed. The design programme was organised under Mike Newman, while Alastair Gilchrist headed the research side. Newman noted that a single car was unlikely to answer practical questions like how the train would operate as a complete unit, and that a dummy body would not answer the question of whether the tilt mechanism could really be built under the floor without projecting into the cabin. Accordingly, later that same November, Newman and Wickens drew up plans for a complete experimental train with the design goal to be not only to study the tilt system, but do so on actual lines. Wickens took the plans to Sydney Jones, who immediately took up the idea. They set the performance goal at the nicely rounded figure of . In keeping with BR management goals to provide quicker travel times rather than just faster speeds, they also required the train to round corners 40% faster. They named the proposal the Advanced Passenger Train. Jones took the proposal to the BR chairman, Stanley Raymond, who liked the idea. However, the board was unable to provide enough funding to develop it, and encouraged Jones to approach the
Ministry of Transport A ministry of transport or transportation is a ministry responsible for transportation within a country. It usually is administered by the ''minister for transport''. The term is also sometimes applied to the departments or other government age ...
for additional funding. Jones did so, and spent the next two years walking the corridors of
Whitehall Whitehall is a road and area in the City of Westminster, Central London. The road forms the first part of the A roads in Zone 3 of the Great Britain numbering scheme, A3212 road from Trafalgar Square to Chelsea, London, Chelsea. It is the main ...
when one civil servant after another agreed that it was a great idea but that it was really the job of someone else to approve it. In spite of being repeatedly put off, Jones persisted, especially with Government Chief Scientist,
Solly Zuckerman Solomon "Solly" Zuckerman, Baron Zuckerman (30 May 1904 – 1 April 1993) was a British public servant, zoologist and operational research pioneer. He is best remembered as a scientific advisor to the Allies on bombing strategy in the Second Wo ...
, to arrange a stable funding system for the entire topic of railway research. This was finalised as the Joint Programme between the Ministry of Transport and the British Railways Board, sharing the costs 50:50. The Programme would run sixteen years from January 1969 to March 1985. The first two programmes were APT and the Train Control Project.


Finalising the design

Another of Jones' many goals for the APT was that it would not cause additional wear on the lines. Instantaneous loads on the railbed vary with the square of speed, so a faster train would greatly increase road wear. Offsetting this effect required the train to meet stringent weight limits, and eliminated the possibility of using conventional
diesel engine The diesel engine, named after Rudolf Diesel, is an internal combustion engine in which ignition of the fuel is caused by the elevated temperature of the air in the cylinder due to mechanical compression; thus, the diesel engine is a so-call ...
s, which were simply too heavy. The team selected
gas turbine A gas turbine, also called a combustion turbine, is a type of continuous flow internal combustion engine. The main parts common to all gas turbine engines form the power-producing part (known as the gas generator or core) and are, in the directi ...
power as the solution, initially considering the
Rolls-Royce Dart The Rolls-Royce RB.53 Dart is a turboprop engine designed and manufactured by Rolls-Royce Limited. First run in 1946, it powered the Vickers Viscount on its maiden flight in 1948. A flight on July 29 of that year, which carried 14 paying passe ...
. When the funding was secured a number of design notes were still not finalised, so the timeline was stretched into July 1971 to provide extra time for the project definition stage. By May 1969 these issues had been decided and the final design emerged. The experimental train would have four cars; two power cars placed at either end, and two passenger cars between them filled with experimental measurement and recording systems. During the time Jones was arranging funding, an experimental engine built by Leyland for trucks became available, which was designed to be much less expensive. The Dart was dropped, and power would be supplied by four
Leyland 2S/350 gas turbine The Leyland 2S gas turbine was developed by British Leyland to power road vehicles. The original version, the 2S/150 was famous for its use in a series of racing cars in the 1960s. In 1968, the basic layout was used to develop the larger 2S/350 f ...
s in each power car, along with a fifth turbine connected to a generator to power the equipment in the passenger cars. During the testing period the engines were progressively upgraded to . After many months studying various transmission systems, with time on the definition phase ending they finally decided to use an electric transmission, like a diesel-electric locomotive. Finally, due to schedule pressure, it was decided not to use a single articulated bogie between the cars, and two conventional bogies would be used on each car. Jim Wildhamer, recently hired from
Westland Helicopters Westland Helicopters was a British aircraft manufacturer. Originally Westland Aircraft, the company focused on helicopters after the Second World War. It was amalgamated with several other British firms in 1960 and 1961. In 2000, it merged w ...
, designed a space-frame body for the power cars based on welded steel tube instead of the semi-monocoque construction used on the passenger cars. Contracts for the various parts of the design were sent out in July 1969.
Hawker Siddeley Dynamics Hawker or Hawkers may refer to: Places *Hawker, Australian Capital Territory, a suburb of Canberra *Hawker, South Australia, a town *Division of Hawker, an Electoral Division in South Australia *Hawker Island, Princess Elizabeth Land, Antarctica ...
won the contract for the suspensions and braking systems, GEC and
English Electric N.º UIC: 9094 110 1449-3 (Takargo Rail) The English Electric Company Limited (EE) was a British industrial manufacturer formed after the Armistice of 11 November 1918, armistice of World War I by amalgamating five businesses which, during th ...
won the contract for the trailer cars, and by this time Leyland had already been selected for the engines. Over time a number of these contracts were withdrawn and the teams took the design in-house, cancelling the suspensions contract with Hawker Siddeley in February 1970. Design of the bogies was taken over with the physical construction contracted to British Rail Engineering, while the power car construction was let to
Metro-Cammell Metro-Cammell, formally the Metropolitan Cammell Carriage and Wagon Company (MCCW), was an English manufacturer of railway carriages, locomotives and railway wagons, based in Saltley, and subsequently Washwood Heath, in Birmingham. Purchased ...
. While this work was underway, work on an experiential facility for the design also started. Sited behind the main offices at the Derby labs, Kelvin House, the new facilities included a roller rig for testing the engines, a brake dynamometer and various test rigs for testing the suspension and tilt systems. The new lab was opened on 26 October 1970. Additionally, a section of track between
Melton Mowbray Melton Mowbray () is a town in Leicestershire, England, north-east of Leicester, and south-east of Nottingham. It lies on the River Eye, known below Melton as the Wreake. The town had a population 27,670 in 2019. The town is sometimes promo ...
and Edwalton was purchased as a test track. This was originally the main line to
Nottingham Nottingham ( , East Midlands English, locally ) is a city status in the United Kingdom, city and Unitary authorities of England, unitary authority area in Nottinghamshire, East Midlands, England. It is located north-west of London, south-east ...
, but now redundant after the Beeching Axe. This contained a straight section, many curves, and several tight tunnels that would be useful for aerodynamics tests. A set of maintenance buildings was built along this line at Old Dalby, and the line as a whole became known as the
Old Dalby Test Track The Old Dalby Test Track is a railway in the United Kingdom which is used for testing new designs of trains and railway infrastructure. It runs between Melton Mowbray, Leicestershire and Edwalton, on the course of the Midland Railway's route betw ...
.


POP

Although construction of the train was relatively straightforward, a number of more serious problems appeared in the power and control systems. Thus the decision was made to build two additional power cars as unfinished frameworks with no power. These cars would instead be hauled by conventional locomotives to provide data on the tilting and braking systems as well as the dynamics of the vehicles. A contract for the additional two cars was sent out on 14 April 1970, and ran for the first time in September 1971. The name "POP" was assigned, an acronym for "power-zero-power", indicating the two power car layout with no passenger cars in the middle. The selection of a space frame design for the power cars turned out to be fortunate, as during construction the engineers concluded that the packaging of the various elements within the car would render it dynamically unstable. They needed more room to spread the parts out, so the decision was made to roughly double the length of the power cars. This turned out to be easy to do; the frameworks already under construction at Metro-Cammell simply had additional sections of steel tube inserted and construction was barely affected. The POP cars were skinless, topped with a space frame holding ballast to simulate the various parts of the prospective design. The "POP" acronym was soon rendered inaccurate when a passenger car was added to make a three-car train, at which time the power cars were also given bodies. The POP underwent a number of changes, notably trialling different bogie designs, over its lifetime.


APT-E

While POP was proving the basic concepts, construction of the test train continued at the Derby lab. The set was sufficiently complete by late 1971 for an official naming ceremony, where it became the
APT-E The APT-E, for Advanced Passenger Train Experimental, was the prototype Advanced Passenger Train tilting train unit. It was powered by gas turbines, the only multiple unit so powered that was used by British Rail. The APT-E consisted of two ...
(for Experimental). It made its first low-speed run from Derby to Duffield on 25 July 1972. Upon reaching Duffield, the
ASLEF The Associated Society of Locomotive Engineers and Firemen (ASLEF) is a British trade union representing train drivers. It is part of the International Transport Workers' Federation and the European Transport Workers' Federation. At the end of ...
union immediately "blacked" it, forbidding their members from doing any work involving the train. Their complaint was that the APT-E had a single operator's chair, which they took as evidence that BR was moving to single operator trains. A friendly inspector helped the team move the train back to Derby at night. This resulted in a one-day national strike that cost more than the entire APT-E project. By this point the POP had demonstrated a number of problems, and the engineers took the opportunity to start a major overhaul of the design. The main problem was the design of the non-driven bogies, which were not stable and could not be used for high speed runs. One power car was retained at the lab while the other and the two passenger cars were sent to the nearby
Derby Works The Derby Works comprised a number of British manufacturing facilities designing and building locomotives and rolling stock in Derby, England. The first of these was a group of three maintenance sheds opened around 1840 behind Derby station. Th ...
for modification. The main changes were to stiffen the power cars and replace the suspect bogies with a version of the powered bogie with the motors removed. Other changes included the removal of the ceramic
recuperator A recuperator is a special purpose counter-flow energy recovery heat exchanger positioned within the supply and exhaust air streams of an air handling system, or in the exhaust gases of an industrial process, in order to recover the waste heat. ...
s from the turbines for reliability reasons, although this dramatically increased fuel use, and the addition of a small seating area to the passenger car for VIP use. Contract negotiations over high speed rail had concluded in the summer of 1973, just in time for the modified three-car APT-E to emerge from the shop in August 1973. The train then started a testing series lasting eight months, covering details of the suspension, braking, curve performance and drag. However, reliability was a serious problem and it returned to the shops for a second overhaul in March 1974. Among the many changes for this round was the switching of the turbines formerly dedicated to power delivery for the passenger cars to add additional power to the traction motors, while at the same time replacing all of the turbines with an upgraded version, improving total power per car from . Other changes included new motor bearings and the return and similar modification of the second power car, formerly used at the lab. The rebuilt four car train returned to service in June 1974. On 10 August 1975 it hit on the Western Region between Swindon and Reading, setting the UK record. It then set the route record from Leicester to
London St. Pancras St Pancras railway station (), also known as London St Pancras or St Pancras International and officially since 2007 as London St Pancras International, is a central London railway terminus on Euston Road in the London Borough of Camden. It ...
in 58 minutes 30 seconds on 30 October 1975, at an average speed of just over through this twisty route. It was also tested extensively on the
Midland Main Line The Midland Main Line is a major railway line in England from London to Nottingham and Sheffield in the Midlands. It comprises the lines from London's St Pancras station via Leicester, Derby/Nottingham and Chesterfield in the East Midlands. ...
out of St. Pancras and on the Old Dalby Test Track, where in January 1976 it attained a speed of . APT-E testing ended in 1976, and the single train was sent directly to the
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in
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on 11 June 1976. During its testing it covered approximately , ending a career that is considered a success, but the train could not be said to have been extensively tested; in three years it covered less distance than the average family car would in that period. In comparison, the first
TGV The TGV (french: Train à Grande Vitesse, "high-speed train"; previously french: TurboTrain à Grande Vitesse, label=none) is France's intercity high-speed rail service, operated by SNCF. SNCF worked on a high-speed rail network from 1966 to 19 ...
prototype,
TGV 001 TGV 001 (''Train à Grande Vitesse 001'' ) was a high-speed railway train built in France. It was the first TGV prototype and was commissioned in 1969, to begin testing in 1972. The TGV 001 was an experimental gas turbine-electric locomotiv ...
, also powered by gas turbines, covered between 1972 and 1976.


Move to electrification

While APT-E was still under construction, the team was well into the design of a production version. Jones found an ally in Graham Calder, who had been promoted to become BR's chief mechanical engineer (CME) in 1971. At the time they envisioned building two new experimental trains; one was essentially a stretched version of the APT-E with turbine power, and the other was similar, but powered by overhead electrical lines via
pantograph A pantograph (, from their original use for copying writing) is a mechanical linkage connected in a manner based on parallelograms so that the movement of one pen, in tracing an image, produces identical movements in a second pen. If a line dr ...
(pan). As data flowed in from the POP and APT-E, a number of changes to the design were being made. Among the more problematic changes was Leyland's exit from the turbine market, having concluded that the concept of a turbine powered truck was not economically feasible. The company agreed to continue supporting the project anyway, including the release of a more powerful version, but made it clear a production design would have to find another solution. In November 1972, the plans changed to build four electric versions for operation on the WCML, and another two turbine versions. From that point the turbine versions fell progressively further behind, and were eventually cancelled. This may have been a blessing in disguise; the
1973 oil crisis The 1973 oil crisis or first oil crisis began in October 1973 when the members of the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries (OAPEC), led by Saudi Arabia, proclaimed an oil embargo. The embargo was targeted at nations that had supp ...
caused fuel prices to rise as much as three times, and turbine engines were notoriously thirsty; the TurboTrain used between 50 and 100% more fuel than conventional sets running on the same routes. Leyland's use of a recuperator improved this considerably, but proved a maintenance problem.


Design review

With the decision to move primarily to electrification made in November 1972, Jones began building a larger management team to carry the design forward to service. This resulted in the April 1973 transfer of the design from the research division to the Office of the Chief Mechanical and Electrical Engineer. A review was carried out by a joint team from the two divisions, led by David Boocock. As a result of this review a number of additional changes were made to the design. A major problem was the recent discovery that the overhead lines on the WCML were subject to the creation of large waves in the lines at speeds over . This was not a problem for two trains following each other with a spacing of several kilometers, but was a serious problem for a single train with pantographs at both ends. The obvious solution was to use a single pantograph at the front or back and then run the power between the cars, but this was outlawed by concerns over the presence of 25 kV power on the passenger cars. Some consideration was given to placing both engines back-to-back at one end of the train, but concerns were raised over excessive buckling forces when pushing the train at high speeds with the tilt feature active. So, finally, the design team chose to place the engines back-to-back in the centre of the train. The two engines would be identical and both would carry a pantograph to pick up power, but in normal operation only the rear of the two engines would raise its pantograph, and the other engine would be fed power through a coupling along the roof. Power was converted to
direct current Direct current (DC) is one-directional flow of electric charge. An electrochemical cell is a prime example of DC power. Direct current may flow through a conductor such as a wire, but can also flow through semiconductors, insulators, or even ...
by ASEA
thyristor A thyristor () is a solid-state semiconductor device with four layers of alternating P- and N-type materials used for high-power applications. It acts exclusively as a bistable switch (or a latch), conducting when the gate receives a current ...
s, supplying four DC traction motors mounted in each power car. The traction motors were moved from the bogies to inside the car body, thereby reducing unsprung weight. The motors transmitted their power through internal gearboxes, cardan shafts and quill final drives. Other changes suggested by experience on APT-E included changes to the vertical suspension from conventional hydraulic shock absorbers to air bags, which would both improve the ride quality and have lower maintenance requirements. For service reasons, the power cars were redesigned to have their own bogies in a Bo-Bo arrangement, so they could be easily removed from the train, unlike the former articulated design that connected adjacent cars together and made it difficult to split the train apart. The passenger cars retained the articulated design, but a number of changes were made due to experience on APT-E. Finally, a system that would cause the tilt system to fail into the upright position was desired, as APT-E had failed into a tilted position on several occasions. As part of the same review, the team noticed that a slight reduction in maximum speed would greatly simplify a number of design points, and eliminated the need for the hydrokinetic brakes. However, the decision was made to go ahead with the original specification in order to provide the maximum possible speed. The government agreed to pay 80% of the cost of eight trains.


HST vs. APT

It was during this time that other groups within BR began to agitate against APT, saying it was simply too large a step to make in a single design. They proposed building a much simpler design, powered by conventional diesels and lacking tilt, but capable of speeds of up to and able to run anywhere on the BR network. This emerged in 1970 as the
High Speed Train High-speed rail (HSR) is a type of rail system that runs significantly faster than traditional rail, using an integrated system of specialised rolling stock and dedicated tracks. While there is no single standard that applies worldwide, lines ...
(HST), and development proceeded rapidly. As the APT programme continued, management began infighting and a round of
empire building An empire is a "political unit" made up of several territories and peoples, "usually created by conquest, and divided between a dominant center and subordinate peripheries". The center of the empire (sometimes referred to as the metropole) ex ...
followed. Experienced engineering resources were withheld from the APT project, using them instead to press ahead as swiftly as possible with what they saw as a conventional rival to APT. As it appeared the HST would be a relatively sure bet, BR's board of directors dithered on the APT project, eventually cutting the number of trains to four. This was later cut to three by the government in a 1974 round of budget cuts.


APT-P

Although the centre-motor layout was the simplest in terms of solving the immediate technical problems, it would cause significant problems in operational terms. There was a passage through the power cars that connected the two-halves of the train, but it was noisy, cramped and not permitted for passengers. Instead, each end of the train now required its own dining car and similar facilities. The split design also presented problems in the stations, where only the two ends of the platforms could now be used, whereas normal equipment could park with the locomotives off the end of the platform. Although all auxiliary equipment such as lighting, air conditioning and air compressors was powered by motor alternators driven from the 25 kV overhead line, it was recognised that if there were a power failure, conditions in the passenger vehicles would quickly become unbearable and even unsafe. Each driving van trailer i.e. the leading and trailing vehicles, was equipped with a diesel-alternator generator capable of supplying the minimum requirement of auxiliary power. The diesel-alternators were started using air motors powered from the train's air system, since the APT carried few batteries. The APT was designed for faster running than existing trains on the same track. At the APT's design speeds, it was not possible for the operator to read the speed limits on trackside signs in time to slow down if needed. Instead, a new system using a transponder-based cab display was introduced called "C-APT". A radio signal from the train caused a track-mounted transponder to return the local speed limit. These sealed, unpowered transponders were placed at intervals of no more than 1 km. Approaching speed restrictions were provided at the appropriate distance, along with an audible alert; failure to acknowledge these alerts would result in an automatic brake application. C-APT was driven by a redundant onboard computer system using
Intel 4004 The Intel 4004 is a 4-bit central processing unit (CPU) released by Intel Corporation in 1971. Sold for US$60, it was the first commercially produced microprocessor, and the first in a long line of Intel CPUs. The 4004 was the first signific ...
microprocessors. The track units were essentially the same as the modern French
Balise A balise is an electronic beacon or transponder placed between the rails of a railway as part of an automatic train protection (ATP) system. The French word ''balise'' is used to distinguish these beacons from other kinds of beacons. Balises a ...
beacons. The hydrokinetic brake system was successful and reliable on the APT-E and was retained for the APT-P with a number of design improvements from the lessons learnt on APT-E. However, as an energy-cutting measure, the hydraulically actuated friction brakes used for low speed were modified to be fed by a passive hydraulic intensifier rather than a hydraulic power pack.


Service testing

Although APT-P used much of the technology developed on the APT-E, construction of the first APT-P was delayed several times. The first power car was delivered from the Derby locomotive works in June 1977, and the first passenger cars on 7 June 1978, a year late. The first complete train was not ready until May 1979. It entered testing soon after, and set the UK speed record at in December 1979, a record that stood until beaten by a Class 373
Eurostar Eurostar is an international high-speed rail service connecting the United Kingdom with France, Belgium and the Netherlands. Most Eurostar trains travel through the Channel Tunnel between the United Kingdom and France, owned and operated sep ...
in July 2003. Two additional examples were delivered, each with minor changes, one in late 1979, and the last in 1980. Initially proposed in the 1960s, and given the go-ahead in the early 1970s, the design was now significantly late. Long delays in the production of the prototype meant that the brake units had to be stored for an extended period before being installed. The change from oil to water-glycol mix required the cylinders to be covered internally with an anti-corrosion coating, which broke down during storage. In testing the cylinders repeatedly failed, and the loss of pressure caused the train to take nearly as long to slow from 25 mph to a standstill as it did to slow from 125 mph to 25 mph. During commissioning, because of this and other development issues, every axle on the trains was modified and exchanged. The compressed air systems that actuated the brakes and powered the doors and other moving parts was another source of problems. The air piping would normally be run in such a way that there were natural low points where water condensing out of the air would collect and could be removed. On APT these runs were tortuous, and resulted in numerous points where the water would collect, and in cold weather, freeze. The commissioning team found a Westinghouse designed solution that would eliminate the water being produced by the compressors, but the design team would not accept the solution. They stated that the problem would not occur with a full train formation, as opposed to the shorter formation used in commissioning. Finally, it was only discovered at the APT-P commissioning stage that parts of the WCML had been built in such a way that, if two APT-P trains with their tilt systems failed and the carriages stuck in the inward tilted position met, they would strike one another. The railway had not been built with tilting trains in mind, and the dynamic envelopes were too small for a tilted APT. The effect was not seen with conventional trains since, without tilt, their movements stayed well within the dynamic envelope. Adding to the problems, in 1980 another reorganisation resulted in the disbanding of the APT team, leaving responsibility for the project spread across several divisions.


In service


Queasy rider

While the commissioning team continued to report, and solve, problems in the APT design, BR management was under increasing pressure from the press. By the early 1980s the project had been running for over a decade and the trains were still not in service. ''
Private Eye ''Private Eye'' is a British fortnightly satire, satirical and current affairs (news format), current affairs news magazine, founded in 1961. It is published in London and has been edited by Ian Hislop since 1986. The publication is widely r ...
'' lampooned it with a timetable proclaiming "The APT arriving at Platform 4 is fifteen years late". Press pressure led to political pressure which led to management pressure, and the APT team was told to put the train into operation in spite of its ongoing problems. This led to one of the most infamous events in rail history. On 7 December 1981 the press was invited aboard APT for its first official run from Glasgow to London, during which it set a schedule record at 4 hours 15 minutes. The press proved uninterested in this success. Instead, they focused on a distinct sickening sensation from the tilt system, and nicknamed APT the "queasy rider". They also reported that the stewardess, Marie Docherty, suggested the solution was to "just stand with your feet apart." BR engineers did little to address the problem when one publicly suggested that the reporters were simply too drunk on BR's free alcohol. On its return trip from London the next day, one of the coaches became stuck in a rotated position when the tilt system failed, and this was heavily reported in the press. Two days later, the temperature dipped and the water in the hydrokinetic brakes froze, forcing the train to end service in
Crewe Crewe () is a railway town and civil parish in the unitary authority of Cheshire East in Cheshire, England. The Crewe built-up area had a total population of 75,556 in 2011, which also covers parts of the adjacent civil parishes of Willaston ...
. APT became the focus of a storm of negative press reporting, with every failure extensively reported on and continued claims that the entire project was a
white elephant A white elephant is a possession that its owner cannot dispose of, and whose cost, particularly that of maintenance, is out of proportion to its usefulness. In modern usage, it is a metaphor used to describe an object, construction project, sch ...
. For instance, when it was learned that only two of the three APT-Ps was in operation and the third would be out of service for overhaul and maintenance, the press dubbed it the "Accident Prone Train". This was not helped by the fact that BR also ran a second train 15 minutes behind it in case it failed. And since the train was mixed among existing traffic, speed was limited to 125 mph instead of its full speed. BR, desperate for some good publicity, hired former
Blue Peter ''Blue Peter'' is a British children's television entertainment programme created by John Hunter Blair. It is the longest-running children's TV show in the world, having been broadcast since October 1958. It was broadcast primarily from BBC Tel ...
presenter
Peter Purves Peter John Purves (; born 10 February 1939) is an English television presenter and actor. He played Steven Taylor in ''Doctor Who'' under the First Doctor, a role he continued to play in audio dramas for Big Finish Productions. He later became a ...
to make the journey from Glasgow. On arrival at Euston, Purves claimed to have had an "excellent breakfast in the most delightful surroundings", and when asked about the train, said "it's smooth, it's quiet, and an altogether delightful experience." However, as the last statement was uttered there was a slight shudder visible, and the sound of rattling dishes was clearly audible. Over the next month the air system proved perfectly capable of freezing up even on a full-length train. Doors repeatedly stuck, and the brake system could not be trusted. The trains were withdrawn from service at the end of the month.


Further development

In 1981, BR hired the consulting firm Ford & Dain Partners to produce a report on the APT project and make any suggestions to improve it. It produced an interim report in November 1981, and a final version that December. Their reports first suggested that the technical aspects of the design were largely complete, although they drew attention to the braking system, but that the management structure was a serious problem and there had to be a single manager in charge of the entire project. This resulted in the appointment of John Mitchell to the position of manager of the APT. Matters immediately improved. Among the improvements was a fix for the motion sickness being experienced by passengers. The commissioning team had been well aware of this problem before it entered service, but this was not mentioned to the press when it was noticed on the public runs. The problem was due to two effects. One was that the control system did not respond instantly, so the cars tended to not respond when the curve first started, and then reacted rapidly to make up for this lag. The fix for this was to take information on the tilt from the car in front, giving the system the slight time advantage it needed. The other problem was similar to
sea sickness Motion sickness occurs due to a difference between actual and expected motion. Symptoms commonly include nausea, vomiting, cold sweat, headache, dizziness, tiredness, loss of appetite, and increased salivation. Complications may rarely include d ...
, but in reverse. Sea sickness is caused when the body's
equilibrioception The sense of balance or equilibrioception is the perception of balance and spatial orientation. It helps prevent humans and nonhuman animals from falling over when standing or moving. Equilibrioception is the result of a number of sensory systems ...
system can feel movement, but inside a closed room this movement cannot be seen. On APT, one could easily see the tilting as the train entered turns, but there was no perception of this motion. The result was the same, a confusion between the visual and the equilibrioception system. The solution was almost trivial; slightly reducing the amount of tilt to be deliberately less than needed resulted in a small amount of leftover centrifugal force that was perceived by the equilibrioception system as being perfectly natural, which proved to cure the effect. This also led to a further embarrassing discovery. The work that suggested the amount of tilt needed to reduce the lateral forces to acceptable levels was eventually traced to a short series of studies carried out by a steam train on a branch line in northern Wales in 1949. A series of updated studies carried out in 1983 demonstrated less tilt was needed, about six degrees. This was within the range possible through superelevation, which suggested tilting might not be needed at all.


Re-entry, demise

The APT-P trains were quietly reintroduced into service in mid-1984, but not mentioned as such on any of the timetables; passengers would find out if they were taking APT only when it arrived at the platform. These trains proved to work well, the problems having apparently been corrected. However, the political and managerial will to continue the project and build the projected 140 mph capable APT-S production vehicles had evaporated. Meanwhile, HST entered service as the
InterCity 125 The InterCity 125 (originally Inter-City 125New trai ...
in 1976 and proved to be an all-round success. Its diesel operation and slightly lower speeds also meant it could operate on more of BR's network. Pressure to abandon APT in favour of HST was continual. Supporters of the APT were increasingly isolated, and the system was removed from service in the winter of 1985/6. This was made formal in 1987, when the trains were broken up and sent to museums. One APT-P set was kept at Glasgow Shields depot and found use once or twice as an
EMU The emu () (''Dromaius novaehollandiae'') is the second-tallest living bird after its ratite relative the ostrich. It is endemic to Australia where it is the largest native bird and the only extant member of the genus ''Dromaius''. The emu' ...
to take journalists from Glasgow Central to
Anderston railway station Anderston railway station serves Glasgow's financial district of Anderston and, across the M8 motorway, the housing schemes of both Anderston West and the Blythswood Court estate of the Anderston Centre. It is also close to both the Hilton and ...
and back, for the
Scottish Exhibition and Conference Centre The SEC Centre (originally known as the Scottish Exhibition and Conference Centre until 2017) is Scotland's largest exhibition centre, located ...
. A second APT-P was stored in a siding behind Crewe Works. The Glasgow APT-P and the third APT-P were scrapped without publicity.


Examination

The failure of the APT project saw extensive reporting in the 1980s, and has remained a topic of some discussion since then. Writers generally agree that the technical aspects of the design were largely solved by the time of their second service introduction, and put most of the blame for the delays on the shifting management structures and infighting within BR between APT and HST. There have also been concerns that carrying out development within BR was a major problem of its own, because this meant their industrial partners had no buy-in and their years of practical experience were being ignored. The development timeline is also a topic of considerable discussion. It is useful to contrast the APT project with the Canadian LRC; LRC began development at the same time as APT, developed a unique active tilting system of its own, and entered production in the late 1970s. Like APT, LRC also faced teething problems that took some time before they were solved, and was subject to some press chiding over these failures. Unlike APT, LRC had no competition and management was in a hurry to remove the
Turbo In an internal combustion engine, a turbocharger (often called a turbo) is a forced induction device that is powered by the flow of exhaust gases. It uses this energy to compress the intake gas, forcing more air into the engine in order to pro ...
from service. The system was given the time it needed to mature with no serious possibility of cancellation. The slow pace of APT development has been blamed on the shoestring budget of £50 million over 15 years, although the press of the era dismissed this as too high. This number has been compared to the roughly £100 million spent by
British Leyland British Leyland was an automotive engineering and manufacturing conglomerate formed in the United Kingdom in 1968 as British Leyland Motor Corporation Ltd (BLMC), following the merger of Leyland Motors and British Motor Holdings. It was partl ...
to develop the Austin Mini Metro, a project that was technically trivial in comparison to APT.


Legacy

Alan WilliamsWilliams (1985) notes that work continued on a new variant, the APT-U (APT-Update). This was essentially APT-P with the tilt system made optional and the engines repositioned at either end of the train with power couplings running between them. That project was later retitled InterCity 225 (IC225), perhaps to distance it from the bad publicity surrounding the APT-P. The
Mark 4 Mark 4 is the fourth chapter of the Gospel of Mark in the New Testament of the Christian Bible. It tells the parable of the Sower, with its explanation, and the parable of the Mustard Seed. Both of these parables are paralleled in Matthew ...
coach design that was introduced as part of the new IC225 sets for the
East Coast Main Line The East Coast Main Line (ECML) is a electrified railway between London and Edinburgh via Peterborough, Doncaster, York, Darlington, Durham and Newcastle. The line is a key transport artery on the eastern side of Great Britain running broa ...
electrification allowed the retrofitting of the tilt mechanism, although this was never implemented. The Class 91 locomotives that power the IC225s had design features "imported wholesale" from the APT-P power cars, including body- rather than bogie-mounted traction motors to reduce unsprung load, and having the transformer below rather than on top of the underframe to reduce the centre of gravity. Unlike the APT-P power cars, though, they were never intended to tilt. In 1976 Fiat Ferroviaria built the ETR 401 trainset, a tilting train using an active system with 10 degrees of tilting that used gyroscopes to detect the corner in its early phases in order to have a more punctual and comfortable inclination: this is why the FIAT project has been successful since the '70s. In 1982 FIAT bought some APT patents that were used to improve their technology for the ETR 450 trainsets. The introduction of the Squadron fleet designated APT-S did not occur as had been originally envisaged. The APT project succumbed to an insufficient political will in the United Kingdom to persist in solving the teething difficulties experienced with the many immature technologies necessary for a groundbreaking project of this nature. The decision not to proceed was made against a backdrop of negative public perceptions shaped by media coverage of the time.Potter (1987)Gourvish (2004), Chapter 3: ''Operations, Productivity and Technological Change''. The APT is acknowledged as a milestone in the development of the current generation of tilting high speed trains. 25 years later on an upgraded infrastructure the Class 390 Pendolinos now match the APT's scheduled timings. The London to Glasgow route by APT (1980/81 timetable) was 4hrs 10min, the same time as the fastest
Pendolino Pendolino (from Italian ''pendolo'' "pendulum", and ''-ino,'' a diminutive suffix) is an Italian family of tilting trains used in Italy, Spain, Germany, Poland, Portugal, Slovenia, Finland, Russia, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, the UK, the US, ...
timing (December 2008 timetable). In 2006, on a one off non-stop run for charity, a Pendolino completed the Glasgow to London journey in 3hrs 55min, whereas the APT completed the opposite London to Glasgow journey in 3hrs 52min in 1984. On 17 June 2021, a Pendolino named Royal Scot and operated by Avanti West Coast ran an attempt to beat the record but fell short of the record time by only 21 seconds. The nine-carriage train travelled non-stop at an average speed of 103 mph on the 401-mile route. Continued analysis of the data collected during the project led to a better understanding of the causes of track wear and the need to reduce unsprung mass rather than reduce the overall weight of the carriage. This led to the development of the BREL P3/T3 for the
British Rail Class 365 The British Rail Class 365 ''Networker Express'' were dual-voltage ( and 750 V DC) electric multiple-unit passenger trains built by ABB at Holgate Road Carriage Works in 1994 and 1995 to operate services in South East England and on the Great ...
and
British Rail Class 465 The British Rail Class 465 '' Networker'' is a class of 147 electric multiple units built by Metro-Cammell, British Rail Engineering Limited (BREL) and ABB Rail between 1991 and 1994. Originally operated by Network South East, these units are ...
, which among other improvements featured smaller radius wheels. BREL further developed the concept to produce the Advanced Suburban Bogie which was a factor in
ABB ABB Ltd. is a Swedish- Swiss multinational corporation headquartered in Zürich, Switzerland. The company was formed in 1988 when Sweden's Allmänna Svenska Elektriska Aktiebolaget (ASEA) and Switzerland's Brown, Boveri & Cie merged to crea ...
acquisition of BREL.


APT today

The APT-E unit is now owned by the
National Railway Museum The National Railway Museum is a museum in York forming part of the Science Museum Group. The museum tells the story of rail transport in Britain and its impact on society. It is the home of the national collection of historically significant r ...
and is on display at its ''Locomotion'' museum at
Shildon Shildon is a town and civil parish in County Durham (district), County Durham, in England. The population taken at the 2011 Census was 9,976. The town has the Locomotion Museum, due to it having the first , built in 1825, and locomotive works on ...
in
County Durham County Durham ( ), officially simply Durham,UK General Acts 1997 c. 23Lieutenancies Act 1997 Schedule 1(3). From legislation.gov.uk, retrieved 6 April 2022. is a ceremonial county in North East England.North East Assembly About North East E ...
. An APT-P unit is now on display at
Crewe Heritage Centre Crewe Heritage Centre is a railway museum located in Crewe, England. Managed by the Crewe Heritage Trust, the museum is located between the railway station and the town centre; the site was the location of the 'Old Works' which was demolished i ...
and can be seen from trains passing on the adjacent
West Coast Main Line The West Coast Main Line (WCML) is one of the most important railway corridors in the United Kingdom, connecting the major cities of London and Glasgow with branches to Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester and Edinburgh. It is one of the busiest ...
along with APT-P power car number 49006 which arrived in March 2018 after 7 years at the
Electric Railway Museum, Warwickshire The Electric Railway Museum (formerly the Coventry Railway Centre) was located in Warwickshire, south-east of Coventry, near the village of Baginton. The heritage railway centre was immediately adjacent to Coventry Airport and so it was also kn ...
in Coventry During special events, the driving trailer 370003 offers a "tilt" experience which involves tilting the coach when it is static.


Notes


References


Citations


Bibliography

* * Gourvish, Terry (2002). ''British Rail: 1974–97: From Integration to Privatisation''. Oxford: Oxford University Press. . * Potter, Stephen (1987). ''On the Right Lines?: The limits of technological innovation''. London: Frances Pinter (Publishers). . * * Body, Geoffrey, (1981). ''Advanced Passenger Train: The official illustrated account of British Rail's revolutionary new 155 mph train''. Weston-super-Mare: Avon-Anglia Publications & Services. . * Nock, O.S. (1980). ''Two Miles a Minute''. London: Patrick Stephens Limited. *
British Transport Films British Transport Films was an organisation set up in 1949 to make documentary films on the general subject of British transport. Its work included internal training films, travelogues (extolling the virtues of places that could be visited via th ...
(1975) ''E for Experimental''. Republished 2006 by the
British Film Institute The British Film Institute (BFI) is a film and television charitable organisation which promotes and preserves film-making and television in the United Kingdom. The BFI uses funds provided by the National Lottery to encourage film production, ...
on
DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kind ...
as part of ''British Transport Films Collection (Vol. 3): Running A Railway.'' * *


External links


APT-E

APT-P





Advanced Passenger Train Info Site



Advanced Passenger Train
at the
Crewe Heritage Centre Crewe Heritage Centre is a railway museum located in Crewe, England. Managed by the Crewe Heritage Trust, the museum is located between the railway station and the town centre; the site was the location of the 'Old Works' which was demolished i ...
{{High-speed rail experimental British Rail brands High-speed trains of the United Kingdom Tilting trains Articulated passenger trains Abandoned rail transport projects in the United Kingdom United Kingdom streamliner trains Train-related introductions in 1972 Train-related introductions in 1980