Title: Pacer (British Rail) - Wikipedia
Headings: Pacer (British Rail)
Pacer (British Rail)
Contents
Features
Background
Class 140
Class 141
Class 142
Class 143 and Class 144
Analysis
Replacements
CAF Civity
Vivarail D-Train
"144e Evolution"
Preservation
References
Further reading

Content: The two-car Class 140 was a prototype vehicle that was built in 1980 at British Rail Engineering Limited (BREL)'s Derby Litchurch Lane Works. This prototype was introduced with much fanfare during June 1981. During its trial period, the Class 140 toured various lines across the UK. It later functioned as a demonstration unit for the incoming fleet based on the type, the Class 141. By 1985, the unit was in use as a driver training vehicle. From September 1986, the sole Class 140 was allocated to Neville Hill. Initial testing with the Class 140 uncovered several issues, such as difficulty detecting the type via track circuits, this was reliably resolved by swapping the material of the brake blocks from a composite to iron. Two less easily addressable drawbacks were the high level of noise generated during transit, particularly on older jointed rails, which was a consequence of the railbus's direct connection between the underframe and suspension with the body that transmitted impact forces across the body. It was also observed that the inclusion of strengthening members in the mass-produced bus body added significantly to the overall production cost, which eliminated much of the cost advantage that was the primarily goal of the type. The original traction power train of the Class 140 consisted of a Leyland TL11 200 HP engine, a Self-Changing Gears mechanical automatic gearbox and a Gmeinder final drive unit on each car driving only a single axle.