Shite bus ownership - gen me up

[Inspector Morose]

Possibly.  

 

Nationals? Worked on a few dozen myself.

[Peter Patina]

 

 

Nationals? Worked on a few dozen myself.

 

Ah, Nationals.

 

*Rosytintyvision Alert*

 

I remember when first I beheld one of the Alder Valley Mk. 1s at night with its bright blue interior lighting and monumentally ace rear pod.... a pod! A pod in 1973! Cor! Bet it does something really fab and important wiv cooling da engine an stuff or feeding it the rarified air from an 11' altitude or ... oh... it's the heater? My 8 year-old self had already had it on pretty good awforrity that heat rises so consequently, maybe, under the seats might work better for that? But still... a pod!

 

Then, of course, the siren-like 510 racket. Distinct from anything else on the road before or since. This was NBC's Concorde and it was not at all bashful about announcing its presence. The wail of a departing National, accompanied by billowing black plumes of clagtasticness, gave each farewell a sense of occasion.

 

They were well into final-owner territory by the time I got to drive them, with many being, by then, not averse to a wee squirty or seven of Easy-Start to wake them of a morning. Our best one, a real flier, had coach seats and a pretty severe manifestation of the over-fuelling ishoo, which resulted in complaints from following traffic who claimed they couldn't see past the smoke to overtake. Tch, excuses. National just had mo' beans.

[Felly Magic]

Short wheelbase tickle you?

 

 

Short wheelbase tickle you?

 

The LHS! Nasty little buggers in the wet, I know from experience, as I used to drive my mates. On a run though 25mpg was easy to get. It used less juice to get to Llandudno & back than his diesel Discovery, and it would sit at 65 on the motorway all day.

[Felly Magic]

Felly would be a good person to ask. He used to own a Leyland National 1, which is now in a museum.

 

 

T'was a Mk2 Partridge mate, aka the rusty moneypit. Nearly 12 years on and it's still not on the road. Storage is one of the biggest ballaches tbh, you are looking at £60-80 per month at least now, and if you store it on a farm and we have another outbreak of OMFG foot & mouth, you are fecked going anywhere near it, plus odds on the barn won't have running water, or leccy. Going for something that is mechanically as complex as a knife & fork is the best bet, and yes step entry Darts do fall into that, but watch for rot. the Cummins B in em when set up properly can be nippy as buggery,( 65 easily on the flat) but the brakes on em require a hefty shove to stop, a common Dennis thing, as Lances & Javelins have piss poor brakes too. Avoid Plaxton coach bodied stuff unless you are an expert welder, or in Panoramas & Supremes, a carpenter, Plaxton & Duple stuff rot for a laugh tbh. One downside with owning a bus is the 'Lesser spotted busvegetable' aka 'The Rivet Counter', armchair enthusiasts who can't even drive a car, who will pick fault at everything! 

 

Lots of buses have entered preservation by people who mean well, but are inept, and don't really get what they've bought, and when the slightest thing goes wrong, they aint a clue what to do, so call in a professional PCV mechanic, and when they quote a fair few hundred for a minor repair, one of the Barnsley yards is phoned up, and the bus is sent for scrap.

 

Oh and a bus to avoid, the Leyland Lynx, a bus that came with factory fitted chassis and frame rot. My mate Adam owns one, and so far he's spent well over £30k on it, and it's still not right, as the last 2 MOT's have cost him well over a grand in welding, and the body frame required replacing, as when the outer skin was removed, there was red powder & fresh air where the frame used to be.

[Partridge]

The LHS! Nasty little buggers in the wet, I know from experience, as I used to drive my mates. On a run though 25mpg was easy to get. It used less juice to get to Llandudno & back than his diesel Discovery, and it would sit at 65 on the motorway all day.

Is it me or does it look like a loaf of bread?

[Partridge]

RE Bus ownership, I'd never think that foot and mouth could effect a Leyland National.

It's a shame about the Lynxs, I like them.

[oman5]

T'was a Mk2 Partridge mate, aka the rusty moneypit. Nearly 12 years on and it's still not on the road. Storage is one of the biggest ballaches tbh, you are looking at £60-80 per month at least now, and if you store it on a farm and we have another outbreak of OMFG foot & mouth, you are fecked going anywhere near it, plus odds on the barn won't have running water, or leccy. Going for something that is mechanically as complex as a knife & fork is the best bet, and yes step entry Darts do fall into that, but watch for rot. the Cummins B in em when set up properly can be nippy as buggery,( 65 easily on the flat) but the brakes on em require a hefty shove to stop, a common Dennis thing, as Lances & Javelins have piss poor brakes too. Avoid Plaxton coach bodied stuff unless you are an expert welder, or in Panoramas & Supremes, a carpenter, Plaxton & Duple stuff rot for a laugh tbh. One downside with owning a bus is the 'Lesser spotted busvegetable' aka 'The Rivet Counter', armchair enthusiasts who can't even drive a car, who will pick fault at everything! 

 

Lots of buses have entered preservation by people who mean well, but are inept, and don't really get what they've bought, and when the slightest thing goes wrong, they aint a clue what to do, so call in a professional PCV mechanic, and when they quote a fair few hundred for a minor repair, one of the Barnsley yards is phoned up, and the bus is sent for scrap.

 

Oh and a bus to avoid, the Leyland Lynx, a bus that came with factory fitted chassis and frame rot. My mate Adam owns one, and so far he's spent well over £30k on it, and it's still not right, as the last 2 MOT's have cost him well over a grand in welding, and the body frame required replacing, as when the outer skin was removed, there was red powder & fresh air where the frame used to be.

Very informative and interesting! I'm DEFINITELY not buying a bus. To a layman looking at something like "bus and coach preservation" it must look tempting as feck seeing buses for sale for less than a 10 year old mondeo. 

what do you reckon on those Alexander bodied Leopards? they seemed to be very hardy and long lasting.

[Felly Magic]

Y type Leopards, beast of a bus, and true knife & fork engineering, which is why they were well loved in Scotland, good ones generally get snapped up quite quickly if they come to market. Came close to buying one, but it had been twatted in the front by careless idiots at PVS, both front pillars were pushed in, and the platform step was twisted, screen was cracked too, plus several windows were smashed, and the interior was an absolute mess, and neither emergency doors wanted to open, showing signs all was not straight with the bodywork at the back either. Pissed me off, as it had been my school bus!

 

Volvo B10M/Alexander PS' are starting to drop in price, and are pretty tough buses, but arse end sag is the weakness, which many ops have sorted, ( the giveaway is the emergency door buzzer going off all the damn time) and later ones do suffer from engine management computer issues, and these are the true successors to the Y type Leopard, ZF box ones are pretty nippy too, but fairly rare, many have 'DP' seats, so nice and comfy for your passengers. So easy to drive too, point and squirt push button badermatic.. 

 

Don't go in 'halves' for a bus with other people though, because if there is a fall out, that is when problems occur, but if you do get a bus yourself, and it's a good 'un, and you can keep up to it, you can find it rewarding. I've met some very good friends via the preservation movement, some of which are coming up to the 20 year mark of knowing, which frankly scares the hell out of me, as it makes me feel bleedin old, and I've had some right laughs driving my mate's now sold LHS which now lives in Scouserland, plus I've helped save a couple of other buses from impending doom, shame one of em is owned by a feckwit, as its a corker to drive and does *cough* mph flat out, and its only an Olympian. The look on a Sheerings driver's face when I cruised past him on the M18 going to Sandtoft as I was doing about 75, steering got floaty above 60 though.

 

It does all boil down to cost, most buses do struggle to double figure MPG, so a little jaunt out is a hundred quid's worth of juice, and you have your storage fees, as well as the road tax, and the insurance, and you cannot drive a bus under 30 years old without holding a PCV, and even if the bus is over 30, you are limited to just 8 people on board. Here's a few photos anyway 

 

 

 

[Volksy]

 

I've heard horrors about these Blue Birds, but I think they're pretty cool.

 

 

And my fave coach/bus of evar, Shorty Setra, would even choose one over a National

[wuvvum]

I loved the noise those old Setras made (at least the full sized ones).  Merc V8 iirc?  Used to go well too.  The later ones all seemed to have an 8-speed manual, which I thought was daft - they spent more time between gears than actually accelerating.

 

75mph in an Olympian?  Feck me...

[Felly Magic]

That very bus a driver was clocked at 90 mph on Leeds inner Ring Road by plod, he got banned as the limit on there is a lowly 40. It has a high speed diff/tall axle and a 245bhp Leyland TL11 in it, and was new as a 'dual purpose' bus with high back coach seating in 'Metrocoach' livery, and when new could legally do 70 mph. It was also the very first double decker that Optare built. Likes to drink though, and the engine is sounding a bit chattery now, and its got a habit of putting oil out of the exhaust, whenever it goes out, there is a fine spray of engine oil all up the back, sadly it's owner is another one of these inept idiots, and although he's been warned that TL11's like to go bang without much warning, he doesn't seem to care, esp when I had a D reg example do that to me outside Elland Road, engine chattering, then a loud rumble from the bottom end then a loud BANG, and silence as I coasted to a halt. Large puddle and trail of engine oil and bits of crank case & conrod on the floor. Popped the bonney, a nice large hole in the side of the block. Yay, a leg out of bed. Bus went for scrap the next day

[Tre3]

Why has no-one bought a bus yet and shortened it?

[catsinthewelder]

XUA73X looks like an old United bus,  It surely can't be 20 years since I first used to catch one of they're Nationals home on the 6 run to Bishop Auckland.  It was 30p from town to my dads house near the Cock o the North.

[Inspector Morose]

Why has no-one bought a bus yet and shortened it?

Long:

 

 

 

 

Shortened:

 

 

 

 

 

Done by Midland Red in Birmingham.

[Felly Magic]

XUA73X looks like an old United bus,  It surely can't be 20 years since I first used to catch one of they're Nationals home on the 6 run to Bishop Auckland.  It was 30p from town to my dads house near the Cock o the North.

 

Yup, it was ex United, West Riding dumped a load of their Mk2s on them in the mid 1990's when the Lances & B10B's arrived, it was rescued from North East Bus Breakers of Annfield Plain, and I've heard this weekend its nearly ready for MOT after 13 years of stalled restorations

[dollywobbler]

I've gone off this idea, I must admit. It's been a very enjoyable read though!

[scruff]

Tell me this is a shiter taken the leap....

 

 

[londonm]

Some had engines in the front, the Leyland DAB on that top gear episode and some van hool things still in production, but rear engine is more commensurable with low floor access. What Boris didn't say when he got rid of the bend buses was that only a fraction could be sold, and for peanuts at that, as he wasted millions buying unnecessary new replacements.

I think that's a matter of opinion tbh.