best noise on the underground!

That and cam-shaft 1972 stocks

One of the best noises of all time

The Siemens Taurus is a good one on that note 🎶🎵🎶🎶

No.

PMSL, it is.

I associate the noise with school trips to central,

Paddy Kingsland and the Radiophonic workshop beckon!

I like it for the exact same reason, it just sounds so cool. that and i associate it with fun days out.

hi this is so true

Frr

Omg I thought it just me haha😂

Deeeeoooowww deeeeooooooooooow deep!

I would prefer a sound of Boris Johnson singing glory britannia

You'll love travelling Munich's undergrounds on the S Bahn then!

I think the Keikyu N1000 series trains (whose motors are also manufactured by Siemens) sound better since they are tuned to the more familiar Ionian mode: kzfaq.info/get/bejne/aM5plNehs52Zkmg.html

Those pesky japanese one upping everyone again!

To delve more deeply into this ... actually the Keikyu N1000 sound is either the Myxolydian mode (if you base it on the first note) or the Aeolian mode (if you base it on the final, top note). There are 9 notes altogether, i.e. an octave +1. Going back to the Taurus trains, again the mode depends on which note you base it on. If the last note, it's Dorian, and if the first note, it's Myxolidian. The issue is that the so-called church modes are all related to each other in that they're each an 8-note section of the same extended scale, but they each start on a different note.

I have spent many years travelling on the trains in Austria and love their musical hum as they depart.

What sounds more satisfying than a starting Taurus? Exactly: A starting Taurus on a slippery rail (the Taurus has four independent inverter-motor-groups all of them can wheelslip independently as well): kzfaq.info/get/bejne/n7OJpLp506udp6s.html or kzfaq.info/get/bejne/h8WSeZSIx8XUg3k.html

Sorry what did you just say ? I couldn't hear you 'cos of those blasted noisy tube trains!! 🤣🤣

​@@stephenpegum9776well that's the thing, isn't it. If my grandfather is anything to go by, in 20 years I'll be as deaf as post and watching the news at 120 dB, so they'll actually sound exactly the same to me.

One looks forward to a Triple Concerto for 3 Tuned Thyristors and Chamber Orchestra. Move over, Leroy Anderson.

Sometimes motors do get louder as they age

WHAT?

Real tube nerds already know the reason

@@OffTheRailsUK Do they? Would they know what material the linings of station personnel caps are made of, or which brand of lamps are used in the running lights? If they could answer that - without google - then their nerdship is consummate.

​@@Deebz270yeah but there are many rolling stock which have a similar sort of noise and you start to notice the link

Tube Nerds AKA Terds by TfL staff lol

@@mariemccann5895 I hang around with a lot of drivers and station staff. I have *never* heard them refer to us as "terds".

That's exactly what it's doing. It's regulating the torque to avoid wheel spin and also provide a gradual increase in acceleration instead of a big jolt.

Traction control

Same even though I’m from the USI’m just seeing about London

Same!

Same! These days I’ve taken the tube more, not the jubilee and wondered what happened to the noise. I didn’t know how to search it up Didn’t realise it was only the jubilee line that made that noise. Makes sense why it was so familiar since as a child it was a line I took more regularly

Personally, I think you just answered your own question 😄 The clue's in the location, after all!

Most of London was reconstructed after ww2 and during the cold war

Possibly because it is 😂

Theres an extended version of this sound in Singapore on the Northeast line, on the C751A

@@trickymisterpringlesThe newer C751C & C851E rolling stock sound similar at low speeds too despite using more modern propulsion systems

Glad to see a fellow Torontonian here!

Was going to post the exact same thing!

Yup! I heard it and had a moment of 'OH HEY HANG ON!'

Singapore's C751A rolling stock make a higher-pitched version of the same noise but apparently use IGBT instead & were built only between 2001-2, while the C751C & C851Es built in 2014 & 2021 do too at low speeds but at even higher pitches, but at higher speeds they sound like C830(C)s instead (built 2006-8 & in 2014, & which at low speeds sound like the '95 stock instead), which use 750V 3rd rail instead of 1.5kV overhead wires (which I guess is why they sound different)

I was five when the Helsinki metro opened. The VFD whine is the sound of my childhood.

I went looking for a sample of the Helsinki metro sound on KZfaq and found this educational film from 1982: kzfaq.info/get/bejne/jaicg9igzJ3KemQ.html Now _that's_ some nostalgia… Also, apparently someone recorded the sound directly off the engines with an induction coil: kzfaq.info/get/bejne/m5mBqsumysnGc2g.html 😯

Huh, interesting.

I used to work for a company that installed large industrial electric motors with variable-frequency soft-start drives, and I will never forget the "WHOOOOP!" of those starting up. Sounds like a starship getting ready to go into hyperspace or something. ;)

I did encounter a video of one while researching this!

@@JagoHazzard There's a relatively well known video called "Taurus Mackt Music" of one such locomotive moving off with a heavy freight train during a snow storm. As the weels slip the motors rotate at different speeds to eachother at it sounds like some kind of alien music piece.

There's also the Montreal Jeumont trains which do a I-IV-I arpeggio

*macht Musik

Beno went quite in depth about the sounds of EMU motors. Can't remember which video though

Oh yes, its the same with old german sub urban trains. All I have known as a child where running until 20 yrs ago. Now only one train is preserved, whenever I hear it at the station, I can say its the museum train without seeing it. The electric motors of these old trains have their own sound and are louder than the new ones...

I remember the sound of the old destination boards and the slamming of the slam-door trains, and honestly, those sounds are nearly as nostalgic for me as the puff-puff-puff of a steam train... Maybe more so, because I don't know anywhere that uses those old style destination boards, and you can at least visit a heritage railway to satisfy the need to hear/see/smell a steam train.

@@Teverell I'm with you on the destination boards. There was something glorious about being at London Victoria and hearing the shuffling of the boards as a train departed or a new train was put onto the board. Sadly they're just too big for a heritage installation - except maybe at the National Railway Museum? Hopefully they can do something along those lines...

I missed the sound of the old flip-card destination boards so much that I bought something called a Vestaboard for my house. I'm ashamed at the cost despite getting a much cheaper refurbished unit, but the joy it brings me every day is immeasurable, along with the Eastern European two-sided station clock it hangs next to.

Growing up in se London I thought all trains sounded like this too 😂😂

I read that Japan Railways' 201 series from 1979 was another early adopter of similar technology too (from Mitsubishi), but they sound significantly quieter

A lot of Berlin trains make this type of sound.

In the US of A, the Long Island Rail Road (yes its properly spelled that way, with a space) trains make the same sound, as do some of the Washington Metro fleet.

Sadly, the noise represents an inefficiency, which causes more power to be used driving the train, which adds heat, meaning that (if ever fitted) aircon would have to work harder, generating yet more heat. An upgrade would almost certainly eliminate the qualities of the noise. Thyristor control is kinda crude, chopping the DC up into square wave AC, instead of nice smooth sinusoidal AC. What you're hearing is the square wave AC causing bits of motor (field windings) to hammer themselves sharply into their housings, resulting in a sound that some might see as pleasing, or at least characterful! Sinusoidal AC speed control doesn't cause such abrupt mechanical loads on the motor components, so the noise is softer. The square wave AC means that, at parts of the cycle of the waveform, current is flowing through the field windings producing magnetic flux that isn't actually having much effect, so that just wasted power. More modern power control that gets closer to the ideal sinusoidal output is more efficient, delivering only as much current to the field windings as is needed during the cycle. The "gear change" is I think due to the fact that the thyristors used top out at about 1kHz switching speeds. To go faster I think the square wave AC voltage is stepped up (more power), but the thyristor frequency is stepped back down (to match the power to what was being produced just now and avoid a jolt). At the new increased voltage the frequency can be ramped up again, to smoothly increase the delivered power.

@@abarratt8869 Why on Earth did you write that essay 😂

@@timelordgeek16 Thoroughness. I could barely constrain myself from explaining about the necessity of having isotopically pure silicon used as the base material in the manufacture of the thyristors, and how that is related to the recent replacement of The Grand K as the reference kilogram in Paris!

@@timelordgeek16 because it's interesting. especially to people subscribed to this channel

@@abarratt8869 legend

I think the class 466 two car units still have the original traction equipment so still have the original sounds

"WhirrhWhirrh... !"

This all is true. Though we can go a bit deeper. The class 465s were built by 2 companies: BREL and Metro-Cammell (or Met-Cam for short). All BREL-built units had their traction equipment changed to the Hitachi ones, but the Met-Cams retained their old equipment. A good way to know which one you have is to look at the numbers. BREL built the so-called/0s and 1s and Met-Cam built /2s and 466s. Some /2s got converted into/9s, so they're Met-Cams and make 'the noise'. And just for clarity, /0s are all 465s numbered 4650xx, /1s 4651xx, /2s 4652xx and /9s 4659xx.

The alstom /metro caammel built units kept their original whilst the BREL/ABB got their traction systems modified ..not everything was replaced, but the igbt inverters were replaced for sure. The funny thing is the alstom /metro cammel acceleration is still alot more reliable. They are faster to max speed than the hitachi types

​@jopu7004 it's also good to note metro cammels cab fronts are slightly more rounded and have an AC Installed on the "forehead" of the cab. The windows are also slightly bigger . And the door windows have smooth black outlines on the windows. Just other stuff. BREL/ABBs also have weird ventilator grills on the side.

Yup, I remember exactly the same when I got the train to school - and it was specifically the Class 465s that did it.

You are on point, thyristors are quite slow and low power required quite short pulses - so at lower power, they lower frequency to increase length of the pulses. IGBT can switch much faster, which is why modern trains make much higher pitched noise.

coil hum yup.

That is not minor. A transistor is a gate - on and off - that is why they are used in computing as they use digital maths 1 and 0 (on and off).

@@johnburns4017 Of course, the minor I was referring to is that it was a single word that was wrong, rather than the functional details.

Yes IGBT transistors,used in electric cars also.

And might you argue that a transistor isn’t necessarily bipolar, hence its use in amplification, in contrast to a thyristor?

@@cachebangwallop3482 It's the semiconductor junction that's bipolar, rather than the component itself, but I see what you're saying.

Lol

Not to worry, they’ll still be around in Manchester

And Jubliee from London Bridge to Canary wharf, and Northern Line under the river.

And much of the Victoria line.

endured that screeching for years-and wondered why it hadn't (or couldn't i suppose) be fixed.

@arnaudbertrand4808 I suspect the screeching can't be remedied. It sounds like wheelsets grinding on curves. Poor track alignment and design. Back in the day, it would be lifted and re-laid. But now, I think it's been set in concrete. No longer a quick fix. I'm surprised TFL hasn't been taken to the courts, as the noise regularly exceeds permitted levels.

@@debsmith5520 nope it can be, slower trains, better track maintenance etc. it never used to be that bad in the past. I'm equally shocked nobody decided to do a test case... I suppose all the city *ankers find alternative means or use noise cancelling headphones...

a lot of the madrid metro lines in general sound like it, i got nostalgia instantly to línea 7 when hearing the noise again first time in this video

The new tmb series 7000 and 8000 here in Barcelona makes this sound loud and proud and it's so satisfying

I’ve travelled on the Malaga to Fuengirola line and I agree they make a very similar sound

Same in Vienna

dope!

Yes! I immediately thought of the Helsinki metro when I heard that sound

I also thought of Helsinki Metro! I almost heard the lovely bilingual announcement "Mellunmäki, pääteasema. Matkustajat olkaa hyvät ja poistukaa junasta. Mellungsbacka, ändstation. Bästa passagerare, var god och stig av tåget!"... :D

The Helsinki Metro opened in 1982, long delayed and monstrously over budget, and the trains were no longer new, having done 'test runs' for many years, to the frustration of people stuck in traffic on the main road to the east of the city centre, alongside the surface section of the metro line. The M100 stock is still in service today (refurbished, of course), 40 years later, alongside the much newer M200 and M300 stock.

I thought the same! i love that sound though

i believe the S1, S2, and S3 stock on the amsterdam metro are also pretty similar. definitly one of my favorite sounding trains

It isn't.

@@mariemccann5895I am unaware of trains that make a similar noise.

The new trains are much quieter, sadly. The legacy C cars used to be really loud when doing it, since they were never updated, especially when they came blasting into the station.

It's a shame that the LISA doesn't make that noise. Sorry was that a bad pun?

You bear me to it. A more melodic noise (5 distinct “notes”) could be heard on some of the older trains of the Montreal Metro.

Yup, exactly!

sounds like the class 458’s, they also sound epic :)

You don't need to know the little details. Just that there's an electronic box that makes a lot of noise.

They should honestly add speakers to play the sound on new Jubilee Line trains if new trains will not make the noise themselves

I believe the Jubilee Line trains, Networkers and Class 323s also have specifically three phase ac motors, and that this was the answer given when people started asking in the 1990s why their new trains had this strange sound.

Yes, the motors (or something) step up in increments of 60 or 120 Hz, and the most audible frequencies are 180, 240, and 360 Hz; those are the 3 notes one hears (kind of a flat F-Bb-F). This is only on the second generation (MR-73) rolling stock, but the note sequence has been reused (with frequencies closer to A440) for the door close chime on both the MR-73 and MPM-10 trains. I’m going to miss the original sound when it eventually gets phased out…

Yeah, it's the MR-73 cars on the Green (and Blue?) Line that play the first three notes of Aaron Copland's "Fanfare for the Common Man". It sounds beautiful echoing up and down the tunnels.

I'll add that the reason for the frequency chopping on the MR-73 stock is to limit in-rush current on their DC motors. Thus the designers chose constant tones that made the electronic circuit simple and reliable rather than the sweeping tones heard on AC motor controllers like in this video.

I was gonna say, as someone who was born and raised in the West Mids it sounds a lot like the old 323 trains that run the regular routes for West Mids Trains

Met Cam didn’t actually build the 323s. It was a company called Hunslet Transport which was formed of ex Met Cam staff. Completely independent from met cam

good example is the met cam 465 as well

Some off the early 350s (350/1) have a similar quieter noise.

Class 323s and VIRM have similar noise aswell

@@OfficialJoxhie Hunslet TPL (Transportation Projects Ltd) for the pedantic. I'll be sad to see the Yorkshire 323 tech retired, too

I too was thinking that the Jubilee trains' sounds reminded me strongly of the Class 323, and at the time I thought of it as a "modern" noise showing that ac motors had arrived in place of the traditional dc. I hadn't spotted that recent trains had lost it, or don't have it to the same extent.

Absolutely love the sound of a Class 323... reminds me of travelling by train in the Midlands as a kid!

I knew I’d heard it more northerly, Class 323s out of M/CR Piccadilly

AC motors don't require field diverts. It's a frequency shift (variable voltage-variable frequency) that is required for controlling output speed of the motors e;g speeding up or slowing down with regenerative or dynamic braking. GTOs "chop" the frequency in a much more square wave like fashion which is what causes the sound to be more tonal as opposed to the IGBTs "hiss" or "whine" which is more sine-wavy and much more rapid in frequency. The benefit is finer motor control for adhesion purposes.

I couldn't remember what class it was, but I remember the sound from some trips to Birmingham in the late 90s. Always reminds me of an arcade racing car.

i love the trap joke

An IGBT is not a thyristor. A thyristor is a latching current controlled device, which stays on after it is triggered until the current though the device drops to zero or (in the case of an MCT) the device is force commutated with the gate turn off mechanism. An IGBT doesn't latch, the gate must be driven for current to flow.

@@ke7eha It is a variant, sure. But it is not a "transmitter" as stated in the video!

@@karhukivi nope. A thyristor is a PNPN junction at its core. An IGBT is a darlington pair of a MOSFET with a BJT (NMOS with PNP, PMOS with NPN). Completely different device physics and drive requirements. NMCT uses a positive voltage on the gate to trigger, has normal thyristor behavior at zero voltage on the gate, force commutates with negative voltage on the gate. The IGBT is on with voltage on the gate, off with zero voltage on the gate.

@@ke7ehaI know how they work and I use them. The point was that in the video the device was called a "TRANSMITTER!!

Digitalisation of gearing maybe

VVVF technology. Variable voltage variable frequency. The voltage controls the torque, the frequency controls the speed. That's why the Electrostars noise changes when they go into a wheelspin on acceleration. When the wheel spins, the voltage is reduced (torque) to regain traction but the frequency is maintained to keep the wheels rotating then the voltage is reapplied.

Get educated.

It performs the task of gears, without using gears

@@JobForAMaxboy Precisely.

? He calls a train a broom broom ? I've only ever referred to a motor car as a broom-broom myself, but now you come to mention it, these trains do make a sort of broom broom noise! Every day is a school day :-)

I used to harmonise with engine noises at that age too. Well, I still do, 27 years on from that!

@@daveash9572 yeah he int a year and a half old yet so I'm not really holding it against him, basically anything that moves seems to be a broom broom, when he saw a lady in a wheel chair and said it i decided were going to have to learn the difference, he knows car and sometimes train now though

@@robertcourtney9907 Bless his little socks! 🙂

defs feel like i was familiar with it from München, too

I was looking for this comment. I remember I lived in Germany at age 10-14, and the sound was so distinct and melodic and I loved it so much, but wondered what actually gave it that sound and melody.

Was just away to comment saying it is very similar to the sound of the trains on the Berlin U-Bahn, guess they work in a similar way. Come to think of it, most of the metros I have been on make this noise, the other lines in London that don't would be the exception rather than the rule I think?

A single version of older trams here in Braunschweig also make this sound but not as melodic.

Delhi metro also has it

The announcement also says Willesden Green really excitedly - probably the happiest anyone's ever been going there!

Wiiiiiilsden Green 😂 makes it sound whimsical and magical 😊

The Xtrapolis and C751A use the Onix propulsion, while the C830C uses the newer Optonix.

It's an illusion of sorts, not an actual gear change, just the Inverter pulsing at different frequencies in the initial phase of acceleration. You are right the echoing of the magnetic harmonics are what make that sound via the coils and air between the Infrustructure of the motor/inverter modules. I'm not major expert but I also know these trains can be programmed to "pulse" at different frequencies.

@@bb-3653 Yes, what I call "logical gear shift" is kind of purely electrical switching. It is done similar like how it was done in italian FS Class E 550 and FS Class E 432. Of course we don't use mechanical drum switches today but static semi-conductors. But it's not only that you can change the frequency of the AC, which the italians did not because the AC came from the catenary, you can also re-group your coils, which the italians did, depending how many coils you have in your motors. If your electronics is able to produce the full range of frequencies, you can make it easy and use 3 coils per motor without "shifting gears". If your motors have 6 coils, you start with [1,2,3,1,2,3] by switching opposed coils together, and at higher speeds you shift to [1,1,2,2,3,3] by switching neighboring coils together. You get even more possible "logical gears" if you use 12, 18 or 24 coils. That's what the italians did, so they got 4 speeds out of their fixed frequency in the catenary with a lot of wheelslip when switching.

Well done Jago for tackling a technical subject that you would normally shy away from - more would be welcomed. As for magnetic circuits and noise, it is usually magnetostriction of the motor and/or controller that generates the sound. This is where the magnetic materials undergo small dimensional changes at the frequency (and associated harmonics) of the driving electronics. These small dimensional changes can couple to surrounding bodywork and get amplified.

@BigA1 in other words the harmonics resonate through the metal materials and the air etc.

@@doctorhabilthcjesus4610 makes sense ,makes sense