Bus Shite

[Crackers]

As posted in my thread - some nice old Ex-Berlin BVG MAN SD202s floating about Nuremberg today. Red one is a D87 and the yellow is a D88 still in its late BVG colours. 

Both were really tidy and they've aged well - to an outsider you'd never guess these are 35 year old machines. 

[mk2_craig]

Potential bus futureshite.

Mellor Sigma.  I had a sniff around it today, either the industry will love it and they'll shift bucketloads of them, or it'll turn out not to be so well screwed-together with total sales of about 7.

[martc]

I've had a quick look around Mellors website and they are in the same group (WNVTech) as Coleman-Milne and Binz of hearse fame, Treka a name often seen on special mobility buses and VCS who make ambulances and police cars.

Although Mellors are based in Rochdale, and there's discussion about their extensive factory a lot of the photo's of the electric buses are obviously around Scarborough, home of Plaxtons. I wonder if they are involved in the producing the bodies for them? Otherwise why drag them out to Scarborough (home of an arch rival) to take the photo's rather than somewhere nearer to Rochdale?

[martc]

Wangey Road, Chadwell Heath, 1959...

2023

[Zelandeth]

14 hours ago, mk2_craig said:

Potential bus futureshite.

Mellor Sigma.  I had a sniff around it today, either the industry will love it and they'll shift bucketloads of them, or it'll turn out not to be so well screwed-together with total sales of about 7.

If anything like the Mellor bodied minibuses we had at the council back aroud 2010 - expect bits to fall off before they've left the factory and perpetual water ingress issues that makes Northern Counties buses look well sealed.

It's also got to be a contender for inclusion on the list of top ten ugliest front ends ever put on a bus...

We'd had one of them for just over three years when I left and they still hadn't been able to get the heating working.

[egg]

Faversham, 1982

[Yoss]

6 hours ago, egg said:

Faversham, 1982

Bonus points for the Chrysler 180.

[cms206]

21 hours ago, martc said:

I've had a quick look around Mellors website and they are in the same group (WNVTech) as Coleman-Milne and Binz of hearse fame, Treka a name often seen on special mobility buses and VCS who make ambulances and police cars.

Although Mellors are based in Rochdale, and there's discussion about their extensive factory a lot of the photo's of the electric buses are obviously around Scarborough, home of Plaxtons. I wonder if they are involved in the producing the bodies for them? Otherwise why drag them out to Scarborough (home of an arch rival) to take the photo's rather than somewhere nearer to Rochdale?

Mellor have a factory in Scarborough to produce the Sigma range.

 

https://itthub.net/coach-bus-minibus/mellors-new-scarborough-site-is-central-to-all-electric-sigma-bus-range/

[MiniMinorMk3]

 

[martc]

On 7/15/2023 at 8:05 AM, cms206 said:

Mellor have a factory in Scarborough to produce the Sigma range.

 

https://itthub.net/coach-bus-minibus/mellors-new-scarborough-site-is-central-to-all-electric-sigma-bus-range/

Must make Scarborough the bus building epicentre of the UK. I guess Mellors are hoping to poach staff from Plaxtons.

[martc]

On the night of 14/15 July 1913, London’s first all-night motor bus service began operating on route 94, from Cricklewood Garage to Liverpool Street. Little did the 24 passengers on board know they were part of a pioneering service that would become a vital and iconic part of London's transport landscape.

[cms206]

The results are in... off to London on Sunday for my first three weeks at Bow Garage.

Off today and tomorrow, X19s Wed/Thu/Fri, X25s on Saturday then train to That London Sunday.

[NorthernMonkey]

1 hour ago, cms206 said:

The results are in... off to London on Sunday for my first three weeks at Bow Garage.

Off today and tomorrow, X19s Wed/Thu/Fri, X25s on Saturday then train to That London Sunday.

You’ll be good. I did quite a bit of driver training for several garages down there on the then newly introduced bendies…far easier to drive around in a bus than a private car as other buses and the black cabs tend to give way to you where possible and cyclists are generally switched on enough to keep out of your way.

[Remspoor]

Whilst strolling through the internet I came across this interesting read.

The Impact of the Atlantean in the South and West. It can be downloaded.

https://www.mdsbooks.co.uk/pub/media/wysiwyg/Impact_of_the_Atlantean.pdf

 

and there is more...

https://www.mdsbooks.co.uk/downloads/

 

 

[LightBulbFun]

I was going to say this looks like the result of @Inspector Morose getting board one sunday morning, but he would probably make it still drivable somehow!  

https://flic.kr/p/9ZgqWJ

 

[brownnova]

This has popped up in a local bus depot to me. Jazzy paint scheme on an 80s DAF! 

[Zelandeth]

10 minutes ago, brownnova said:

This has popped up in a local bus depot to me. Jazzy paint scheme on an 80s DAF! 

We had an early B10M with that body on as one of our reserve school buses.  It was *painfully* slow.  Even the Bedford YMT would leave it for dead!

[Zelandeth]

44 minutes ago, 83C said:

Must have been something not quite right with that, early B10Ms were usually solid performers. My regular machine 15 years ago was a B10M/Jonckheere Deauville and although it was a bit tatty compared to the shiny later one it was also a much better hill-climber. The Driver on the shiny motor was most upset that I’d stomped past him with a full load on compared to his half load on going uphill.

Best one we had was a Supreme IV on a B10M (GIB7513) which went like greased lightning.  We did a trip down to Alton Towers on that (this would have been around 2000), and basically spent the whole trip down in the outside lane on the motorway.  We got there a good two hours before the guys in the nearly new Plaxton Premiere that left with us and actually had a speed limiter...

Great old coach that one was, was eventually canned from our contract when the council put age limits on things.  Was exported to Ireland and promptly written off when someone drove into it.

[quicksilver]

2 hours ago, brownnova said:

This has popped up in a local bus depot to me. Jazzy paint scheme on an 80s DAF! 

One of the Goodwin family's toys from Manchester so I wonder what it's doing over your way. It's the 20th different vehicle to carry the reg WSV 553!

[brownnova]

1 hour ago, quicksilver said:

One of the Goodwin family's toys from Manchester so I wonder what it's doing over your way. It's the 20th different vehicle to carry the reg WSV 553!

Good wins have just bought out the company which used to be at that depot A.N. Andrew. 

[martc]

Ikarus 280 bendy bus. Did I tell you about the one I was riding in in Berlin, Haupstadt der DDR? No? Well I was stood in the bellows as it was chockerbloc full. The bellows where split from top to bottom and as it turned left a gigantic gapping chasm would open up before me. Nice.

[cms206]

On 7/20/2023 at 1:53 PM, 83C said:

Must have been something not quite right with that, early B10Ms were usually solid performers. My regular machine 15 years ago was a B10M/Jonckheere Deauville and although it was a bit tatty compared to the shiny later one it was also a much better hill-climber. The Driver on the shiny motor was most upset that I’d stomped past him with a full load on compared to his half load on going uphill.

Oddly enough my regular machine not far off that was an M-reg Deauville B10M! I rated it higher than our Van Hools due in part to the Deauville having a bigger cab ans bigger shithouse, but also because it remains to this day the fastest B10M I've ever driven, closely followed by an ex TGM low driver Van Hool B10M.

Neither of them had limiters either... 😂

[High Jetter]

3 hours ago, martc said:

gigantic gapping chasm would open up before me. 

I had a girl there once, sounds familiar...

[Datsuncog]

Neoplan?

No visible numberplates, and parked up in an extremely dodgy location which precluded further investigation.

[quicksilver]

Yep, a fairly late Neoplan Skyliner. Looks like one of the ex National Express batch that were all withdrawn after one tipped over on a motorway slip road.

[andyberg]

1 minute ago, quicksilver said:

Yep, a fairly late Neoplan Skyliner. Looks like one of the ex National Express batch that were all withdrawn after one tipped over on a motorway slip road.

After the driver may* have had a sherbert or two.

[Yoss]

Watching the Hungarian GP on telly. They're only doing the drivers parade in a bloody Ikarus!

I didn't know quite what it was so did some googling. This could be the very same one.

And found one still with its roof on.

Going to Keleti according to the blinds. What a great way to arrive at one of Europe's great stations.

[Inspector Morose]

Back from Amsterdam and they seem to be almost there with the switch over to electric propulsion for their bus fleet. I must have seen only a handful of diesel buses in the week I was there.

A lot of the electrics are artics too. But surely an electric bus of that weight can't have enough capacity? Well, this is their answer.

Let's have a closer look, shall we?

A simple pantograph mounted on the bus extends up to a pole mounted contact so that opportunity charging can take place when the bus stops for more than a minute or two. Unlike the system we've been using over here with the charging pantograph moving from the station to meet contacts on the bus (as promoted by Volvo), this is lighter weight, less visually intrusive, and can be installed more frequently along the route for a similar cost of one of the more complex stations. Here at Sloterdijk, not only are charging stations mounted at lay-over points, they are also positioned at the stops as well to serve through routes. 

It won't be too far in the future now that Amsterdam region will have (near as dammit) a 100% electrically powered integrated public transport system, consisting of train, tram, metro, and bus.

Bloody impressive.

 

[Dyslexic Viking]

A 1967 AEC imported from the UK has come up for sale here in Norway. And thought it was worth sharing as some may know it or where it came from.

Old UK pictures of it according to the seller but the registration number is different?

 

Now in Norway

https://www.finn.no/b2b/bus/ad.html?finnkode=118916106

[Leyland Worldmaster]

Right. Let's spend a bit of time in The Potteries: