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cms206

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Posts posted by cms206

  1. 13 hours ago, busmansholiday said:

    As for @Yossand @Leyland Worldmaster, trust me, some of the things that got sent on Nasty Excess to the smoke when you ran out of "decent" vehicles would make you cringe. Nobody would send a bus seated National, from up north, would they??????.

     

    Says the man who had a National on a National Holidays trip.

    The London services were hallowed territory for Eastern & Western Scottish, long service men on well appointed kit.

     

    Summer Blackpools? You'd be lucky to get a panoramic Y-type Leopard with bus seats and forced air. At least they had boots 😂

  2. 18 hours ago, warren t claim said:

    One interesting question is do I feel safer driving a hack fitted with a partition and bandit screen as opposed to a Mondeo PH car?

    I find that a punter riding in the back of a hack feels safer giving the driver some verbal shit as he knows that the driver can't reach over and give him a slap.

    In all my years of driving a PH car I wasn't attacked once.

    Never been a taxi driver but I will say that in the sixteen years I've been driving buses, be it on days, nights, lates, earlies, whatever; I've never once had a problem driving at any time without a bandit screen, but with a bandit screen it's open season for every tit and their granny to have a go.

  3. 2 minutes ago, big_al_granvia said:

    But stagecoach are struggling for drivers in Ayrshire, sounds like a good gig, Travelodge is dossable

    Not struggling enough; nine days to even get a response from Killie then lost my application. Cumbernauld were next day to arrange an interview, and even that was on a holiday Monday.

  4. 15 minutes ago, 83C said:

    Fack, are Stagecoach really that desperate for drivers to pay people to do stuff like that?? Is it local stuff or long distance work?

    All domestic work, no EU; Cumbernauld is predominantly an EU depot so only three domestic routes up here, and all red bus in London. No megabus, no Citylink, no National. £47k a year it works out before overtime.

    Similar gigs on across the company, Kilmarnock, Dumfries and Stranraer depots also taking part.

  5. It's a split working arrangement; minimum 39 hours at my home base (Cumbernauld in this case) and 50 hours in London, both over five days. Scotland rate is £12.59/hr rising to £13.13/hr, London is £17.45/hr at present.

    The rota is a ten week rotation; 3 weeks London, 3 weeks Cumbernauld, 3 weeks London, 1 week holiday. Stagecoach pay travel (by train, plus a shift travelling each way), accomodation (Travelodge apparantly) and £262 per week expenses on the weeks you are away from home. This is before overtime which is paid at an enhanced rate again.

    In terms of my costs, my commute is up from an average of 37 miles per day to a maximum of 52 miles per day, but this is more than balanced out by the actual commuting itself only being three weeks in ten rather than ten in ten - 2600 miles every ten weeks just now compared to around 1100 every ten weeks going forward.

    Hopefully things work out and the gig keeps going for a while yet.

  6. 6 hours ago, High Jetter said:

    Yup. That will do it. Good luck, the pay is probably for a reason, hope I'm wrong.

    I've a few mates from up here doing it just now and without exception they're loving it, though I daresay the wage increase helps with that too.

  7. 20 minutes ago, Crackers said:

    Anyone know what Plaxton body this is?

    I saw a similar white one at Brands a few years ago which had been totally gutted in the rear and had a hydraulic ramped garage in the back of it, workshop kit in the side lockers and sleeping quarters in the remaining area of the pass compartment. Very jealous.

    This one's an Excalibur.

  8. 1 hour ago, LightBulbFun said:

    its a Daimler Fleetline with MCW Bodywork

    http://www.countrybus.org/DMS/DMS1.htm 

    London Transport's failed attempt to replace RT and Routemaster with an off the peg bus

    (and tbh something I dont think they really succeeded in ever doing)

    LT never managed to succeed in replacing the Routemaster because they didn't want to. London wanted to London, rather than getting with the program.

     

    As my learned colleague @Inspector Morose states, LT moved the goalposts so many times on the DM/DMS that BL stood next to fuck all chance of getting anywhere near what LT thought they deserved. In the process, LT deprived operators who actually wanted Fleetlines of chassis that they too desperately needed. IIRC reading comments that some unfulfilled Fleetline orders, north of the border anyway, would have seen production continue until the late 1980s.

    FWIW I've driven both DM/DMS type Fleetlines and standard examples with NCME, Alexander and ECW bodies; by far the DM/DMS was by far the nicest of the first generation rear engined deckers to drive, far nicer than a "standard" Fleetline and much closer to something like a Metrobus than an Atlantean.

    London's loss was everyone else's gain; the DM/DMS operated worldwide - even vastly overloaded in Hong Kong - without issue for decades. Fantastic machines.

  9. In the likelyhood I can do this...

     

    1) Sunny Jim - off site - Sunday Breakfast 

    2) Binhoker668 - Both nights camping - Sunday Breakfast

    3) HillmanImp - Both nights camping - Sunday Breakfast

    4) Ghosty  - Both nights camping - Sunday Breakfast

    5) HorribleMercedes  - Both nights camping - Sunday Breakfast

    6) Jim Bell - Off site - No breakfast

    7) MondeoBlues - Saturday night camping - Sunday Breakfast

    8 Catsinthewelder - Both nights camping - Sunday Breakfast (1 to 4)

    9) Aldo135  - Both nights camping - Sunday Breakfast x4

    10) AnnoyingPentium - Both nights camping - Sunday Breakfast - TBC

    11) Brownnova: both nights camping plus square breakfastage. 

    12) Captain_70s - Both nights camping, Sunday breakfast.

    13) cms206 - two nights camping, all of the food

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