19:00 to Cork (04/12/06) left at 20:30
 

I caught the 7 o'clock train home last night and only got into Portlaoise at 21:30. What a service. The train didn't board until 7 o'clock. It didn't leave initially we were told because they were cleaning up glass from a broken internal door before leaving due to health and safety regulations. This did happen. A guy was boarding the train and entering the dining car at the non shop end and the internal door closed on top of him and his luggage caused the door to shatter into 7 million pieces all over him. The dining car staff just stood and stared and called nobody. I went into the 1st class carriage and found an off duty ticket checker who got the whole thing sorted fair play to him. Long after the glass had been cleaned up we were told that there was a problem with the brakes and that an engineer was looking at it. They opened the bar (again fair play) long before there was any sign of movement. In the end we were all taken off the train and moved from platform 5 to platform 3 to wait for an old reliable manual door train. We were moved at 8pm but were made to queue for a while and then moved onto the train which left at 8:30pm. Teas and coffees were free although there was no announcement to that effect. The train manager went around telling people to go and have a cup of tea or coffee and was letting people ring home on his mobile. Apparently the train that broke down had had problems in limerick junction before it arrived in Heuston. Why wasn't another train made available?

edit:they handed out refund forms when we were standing queuing at platform 3

The spare train is actually used to cover for the 10:30 ex Cork and 14:00 return so there is no spare

Brakes are a problem, consistently again no one seems to know why

And the doors have been known to shatter and in theory you need the doors working before entering service since they are part of the fire barrier

so they shouldn't use that train again until the door is replaced? I don't see that happening! Especially if there is no spare train!

Those end doors were always a huge problem on the MK3s too. I don't think that 2-second delay is very intuitive either and does tend to result in customers pushing the doors open against the mechanism.

There should be a pressure sensor in the door that prevents it from crushing things / smashing the door!

Seems like yet more odd teething troubles.

Most European trains use push-button or handle operated internal doors. These trains seem to have copied the "MK3" pressure mat design.

There is seems to be some unwritten requirement that the door will only open once the person approaching has stopped this avoids confusion for partially sighted with a moving object. It might be a optical based sensor we don't know

The TGV has a handle you turn but the door will close on you if you are not quick about it, its painful

In the event of a fire or smoke entering the cabin the train manager can seal each coach and shut down the external air conditioning that requires the partition doors to close so you really shouldn't leave a terminus with a shattered door

Owing to serious issues raised in recent accidents in the UK where passengers where unable to break through the partition doors, they now have to be breakable and also that the partitions slide in opposite directions at each end so if the train rolls over at least one slides or is easily openable

I've already experienced these doors trying to squeeze the life out of me and saw the same thing happen this morning to a guy on the 5:30, door just kept closing on him, I assume the people behind made the door open.

I caught the 19:00 last night and the door is missing - not surprising really as it smashed into a million pieces the night before surely the dining car is one of the more likely carriages to have a fire so they should probably get it fixed??