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Felly Magic

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Oh the fun we had at Tets with the Spam Javelin/Excalibur, the front was so rotten that it cracked 3 windscreens in the same number of weeks, hope you don't have those issues Andy. When I download my mobile, I will show you the high quality* vehicle our local municipal arms length cowboy is operating, and it isn't the only example in the fleet either. 

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Apparently Aberystwyth did investigate the use of flywheel buses, or trams. I'm not sure exactly when, but I know someone who has always been a bit mad for alternative tech who was on the council at some point. I say investigate, he probably means he mentioned it in a meeting once...

 

I have been on a hybrid bus in London a couple of years ago and thought it was a flywheel-assist one. Was odd as it'd pull away before the engine started. Seemed sensible to me, as it stopped the engine idling unnecessarily.

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Hybrid buses are not faring (sorry for the pun) well, battery life is very short, and the batteries are proving too expensive to replace, and the Borismasters are having opening windows fitted due to the HVAC putting extra strain on the hybrid powertrain

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Hybrid buses are not faring (sorry for the pun) well, battery life is very short, and the batteries are proving too expensive to replace, and the Borismasters are having opening windows fitted due to the HVAC putting extra strain on the hybrid powertrain

 

did they not learn with FRM1 on the opening windows thing?!

 

fun how history repeats it self

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Apparently Aberystwyth did investigate the use of flywheel buses, or trams. I'm not sure exactly when, but I know someone who has always been a bit mad for alternative tech who was on the council at some point. I say investigate, he probably means he mentioned it in a meeting once...

They did and were quite keen at one point but it all came to naught as the great god funding got in the way as usual (yet another life I led). I don’t know if I should admit this but a lot of the interior and systems of the 139 (apart from the hybrid system) was partially my fault. Did I get recognition? Was I even acknowledged? Hell no. Am I bitter over the whole experience? Hmm, I’ll get back to you on that.

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How many times has history repeated its self in LT's case, buses unsuited to the city withdrawn very quickly seems to be a big issue, Merlin/Swift. DMS, Citaro bendy... Ops would love to ditch the Borismaster, due to reliability woes and serious build issues, plus the 3 door twin staircase design robs passenger capacity for the vehicle length. 

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Are modern buses CVT or old school automatic? the 68 plate Optares seem to be automatic and love changing down with some force which seems to resist braking when approaching stops ( run the 464 route if you want to see ) 

 

Old school auto with anything up to 8 speed these days, Optares use Allison automatics most of the time, normally 4 or 5 speed, and they aren't the smoothest of boxes and to 'save fuel', many ops these days go for the hold gear delete, meaning boxes can be swapping cogs alarmingly regularly under load, especially if the kickdown has been removed, and whoever came up with the Urban90 seat should be shot from a cannon in to the blades of a huge industrial mincing machine

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How many times has history repeated its self in LT's case, buses unsuited to the city withdrawn very quickly seems to be a big issue, Merlin/Swift. DMS, Citaro bendy... Ops would love to ditch the Borismaster, due to reliability woes and serious build issues, plus the 3 door twin staircase design robs passenger capacity for the vehicle length. 

 

aye yeah, what are the build issues on the Borris buses got something for me to read and humour myself with? :) (id heard about all the other issues, but not the build ones, i shouldn't be surprised tho LOL)

 

all the more reason why they should of just kept the Routemaster in service IMHO  :mrgreen:

 

I wonder how well the FRM would of done if put intro production and not killed off by Leyland when they took over AEC....

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Often seems with some drivers that under 10mph just before stopping the box drops a cog and shoves the bus forward in resistance to the braking, must be annoying when driving I imagine.

It's likely the retarder is too strong for the bus and the driver is having most of their brakes drop out just before coming to a halt, hence the surge. At least that's what happens on Streetlites. They're much easier to drive if you break the ABS as the retarder is deactivated completely.

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On Volvos, the kick below 10 mph is the ABS bizarrely kicking in, I remember the fault all too clearly on post 06 B7TLs, and the ZF 6 speed auto was far from smooth shifting.

 

Anyhow here is the super kwalitee ex Carters and Slavecoach Dennis Tridump. The offside was a mess. This really isn't the sort of image a former municipal should be showing.

 

 

 

post-5211-0-33054000-1555532818_thumb.jpg

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And re the Borismasters, just look at how many have been 'runaways' with the throttles jam wide open. TfL and DAF have tried to gloss over these incidents, but a court case proved TfL and DAF were hiding something.

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Oh the fun we had at Tets with the Spam Javelin/Excalibur, the front was so rotten that it cracked 3 windscreens in the same number of weeks, hope you don't have those issues Andy. When I download my mobile, I will show you the high quality* vehicle our local municipal arms length cowboy is operating, and it isn't the only example in the fleet either. 

 

 

This one is an ex Oxford X90 Volvo B10M; R9 OXF from memory; other than the usual Plaxtonitis around the back wheeltubs it's proved remarkably solid, certainly much moreso at the age of 22 than our then nineteen year old 1990 Plaxton Paramount 3500s were back in 2009. No blown windows, solid floor, floor mounted freshwater toilet and young Mr Fowler has even fitted a Hanover screen to it. Should look good when it's back on the road.

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On Volvos, the kick below 10 mph is the ABS bizarrely kicking in, I remember the fault all too clearly on post 06 B7TLs, and the ZF 6 speed auto was far from smooth shifting.

 

Anyhow here is the super kwalitee ex Carters and Slavecoach Dennis Tridump. The offside was a mess. This really isn't the sort of image a former municipal should be showing.

 

 

 

attachicon.gifIMG_20190416_104517.jpg

 

haha :)

 

the ALX400/Trident is one of the few if not the only modern low floor bus I like, in my ideal garage id have one that ran on my local routes :)

 

saying that the first ones are almost or are over 20 years old now!

 

 

And re the Borismasters, just look at how many have been 'runaways' with the throttles jam wide open. TfL and DAF have tried to gloss over these incidents, but a court case proved TfL and DAF were hiding something.

 

oh thats fun*, dont think iv heard about jamming throttles, got any links on that? :)

 

I wonder how many poor bus drivers got thrown under the bus (pun intended) because of it?

 

(I imagine if you said "the throttle jammed open!" not many people would believe you initially)

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I remember driving a DAF rear engined coach (SB3200??) some years ago in roadworks on the M5 when just that happened.

 

Turns out that if the throttle return spring on the fuel pump breaks then the weight of the linkage causes it to go into fully open, ie max revs. Gives you a fucking nasty shock and doesn't half get the brakes warm.

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Yep, I think this one is the first - ?

 

East_London_bus_TA1_%28S801_BWC%29%2C_20

 

Complete with metal bench seats!

 

indeed, I remember riding TA1 in service, the Routemaster style seats always stood out to me, as the rest had modern plastic seats :) (it also had the grey with rainbow stripe down the middle seat fabric, where as the rest had normal stagecoach style stuff)

 

a while back ians bus stop did a page on them

 

http://www.countrybus.org/TA_Stagecoach/TA_1.htm

 

made me feel mighty old that did LOL

 

(its a shame how it seems like most of the early ones have been opened topped, but its also amazing how well all the East London Tridents have survived so far!)

 

I remember them so fondly, as the most local bus stop to me was for just 3 routes the 26 48 and 55, all of which where operated by Stagecoach where they ran Tridents :)

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The most annoying thing I've seen with regards to gearboxes/retarders etc was on an 05 plate Volvo B7R Plaxton Profile (WA05UNE If memory serves...which I almost hope it doesn't!) that First Aberdeen had for a while.

 

You know how the ZF boxes of that era kick into neutral when stationary to save fuel?  Yeah...The problem with this one was that it did that about 0.5mph before you came to a halt.  Downhill or on the level this wasn't a problem - but coming to a halt uphill invariably resulted in a horrible lurch when drive was suddenly completely cut.  Usually enough to make the angry orange light on the drive green monitor flash menacingly at you recording a "harsh braking event."  Which believe me, when you've been out for nearly four hours including rush hour traffic in Aberdeen, even having been dragged around Haudagin roundabout and through Old Aberdeen with a totally clean sheet is really annoying when it does that as you roll up to the bloody entrance barrier at the depot!

 

That coach also had a horrendous boost leak the whole time it was in the area, any attempt to use more than 1/2 throttle just produced massive clouds of black smoke and loud hissing without any actual increase in power.  It was reported a bunch of times but was never sorted during the course of the year or so it was in Aberdeen before it disappeared back south.

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Those Japanese buses all have massive displacement engines and manual gearboxes. Been on some out there, very clunky riding experience.

 

That AD I posted before reminded me of the pre-CCTV period where the driver would have a periscope and series of mirrors and lenses to keep an eye on the upper deck.

 

I used to get told off for peering down the periscope and into the drivers cabin  :mrgreen:

 

ahh memories LOL

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Hybrid buses are not faring (sorry for the pun) well, battery life is very short, and the batteries are proving too expensive to replace, and the Borismasters are having opening windows fitted due to the HVAC putting extra strain on the hybrid powertrain

The company I work for bought 10 hybrids in 2011 and partly due to battery replacement cost and partly due to reliability they were converted to conventional diesel power in 2016-2017. Reliability improved but they are now gutless as hell.

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Nottingham Park and Ride (operated by the city council) has a fleet of BYD electric buses. I thought they were quite good - a bit noisy, but quick enough. Build quality seems a bit iffy, the drivers have started swerving around certain potholes that they know will twist the emergency door and set the buzzer off (they're 18 plate I think). But they did the job and were quite a brave use of full electric rather than hybrid.

 

Can't have been making a profit though as the council has just passed the P&R sites over to Nottingham City Transport as part of 2019/2020 cost savings who are bringing in some Biogas buses. The electric buses will be "saved for use elsewhere". The press release is full of fluff about how "NCC have set up a profitable scheme and now it's time to let NCT build on it" but clearly if there was money in it they'd still be running it.

 

(Edit: just remembered that two massive charging sites were built at the P&R stop we use, that doesn't look good financially if they're going to biogas! Perhaps they'll install a shitload of electric car charging points to use the infrastructure, they currently only have 4 for a 600-ish space carpark)

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