Multinational People Movers feat Decker Dave and the Jolly Green Giants

[320touring]

Got a pic of the tensioner?

Sounds like the tensioner is in your pants..

[RichL]

More recently, there's not much else to report; C45 HNF is currently VOR awaiting an alternator belt tensioner. Not normally an insurmountable problem but as it's been repowered with an entirely different engine it's proving complicated to find the right one as we don't know what the engine came out of; the fuel pump has at least been identified as a Volvo-geared Bosch inline pump from a DAF SB220, rather than a DB250 as originally thought.

 

 

I must admit I have been wondering about parts supply for these beasts.

 

Can't help it really as Parts has been my trade for the last 20 years and experience tells me the older vehicles get the more stuff gets changed/and or modified, usually without any thought to possible future replacement of components.

 

I used to hate trying to find odd,possibly obsolete or specialist stuff. Now I find it a challenge, fuck knows why...

 

Hope it gets sorted soon!

[cms206]

 

 

Got a pic of the tensioner?

Not to hand, no; our local branch of Dingbro appear to have taken it hostage.

 

I must admit I have been wondering about parts supply for these beasts.

 

Can't help it really as Parts has been my trade for the last 20 years and experience tells me the older vehicles get the more stuff gets changed/and or modified, usually without any thought to possible future replacement of components.

 

I used to hate trying to find odd,possibly obsolete or specialist stuff. Now I find it a challenge, fuck knows why...

 

Hope it gets sorted soon!

Parts aren't actually too bad because the Olympian continued as a Volvo product, albeit with some modifications, until 2000; compared to our 1992 Leyland Tigers (export chassis, with only four supplied to the UK market of an even remotely similar specification) parts supply is a breeze. The issue with C45 HNF is that it's a 1986 Leyland chassis which originally had a Gardner 6LXCT hanging off the arse end - at some point in the last few years it's ended up with a bastardised Volvo TD102 engine out of a much newer Volvo Olympian... normally not an issue but we don't know what the powerpack came out of!

 

The Tigers are hellish for some stuff - we needed wheel studs which came from Australia IIRC, and draglinks were NLA; we ended up getting an engineering shop to remanufacture the ones for ours.

 

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[cms206]

After a four week break, I returned to work on Monday to an absolute shitstorm. I hate taking time off at the best of times as it takes me longer to get things back on track than it does to just do it right the first time round, but this time we've had another issue... it looks like we're about to see the end of the Jolly Green Giants. 

The Scottish Government have ruled that all buses used for dedicated home to school contracts in Scotland must be fitted with seatbelts by 2021. Previously this was a requirement left to local authorities to decide rather than the lawmakers at Holyrood but it was expected. What was not expected was our neighbouring council decreeing that they will require all buses used on their contracts to be fitted with seatbelts by the time the schools go back after Christmas on January 3rd. None of the Jolly Green Giants are so fitted, and it's not looking like fitting them would be either economically doable or indeed doable within the next five weeks or so. We have made our position on the matter clear to the council so we are more or less waiting to hear what the score will be.

On the subject elsewhere of blatant ringers, it appears that our fairly original, Gardner powered ex-KMB 3BL59 is not, in fact, 3BL59, but one of the batch 3BL112-161... further investigation required!

Here is (or isn't) 3BL59 this morning returning from a school.

Swift Coaches - MIL 5574 by Andy Campbell, on Flickr

[hairnet]

yeah right blame the cooncil

 

get yir airse back to work

 

 

did the wee man get a shot of a bus yet??

 

or will he mess with you and like trains

[Felly Magic]

Wouldn't cattle trucks be better purposed for some of the little 'dahlings'?

[dollywobbler]

To be fair, I was staggered to find out that seatbelts were not already required. I'd assumed that was standard across the country. Not so it seems!

[DodgeRover]

What's the chances of getting kids to wear seatbelts and not try to garrotte their mates with them?

I would think even getting them to stay sat down would be a minor miracle.

[cms206]

To be fair, I was staggered to find out that seatbelts were not already required. I'd assumed that was standard across the country. Not so it seems!

Still not law in England, Wales or NI; that said, NI has a blanket 20 year age limit fod school buses which none of the other three have.

What's the chances of getting kids to wear seatbelts and not try to garrotte their mates with them?

I would think even getting them to stay sat down would be a minor miracle.

If I could get the little bastards to stop tying them in knots it'd be a start; it's a particularly rough school and I'd need to have a backshift fitter on at night purely to repair and/or replace 120 fucked seatbelts every night.

 

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[Pillock]

I thought of this thread recently as I came home from an unexpected school run (eldest left the house at 8.05 to catch the 8.04 school bus and was astonished to find it had already gone).

 

Dropped her off at school, came back down the road and was greeted with a bright green double decker with too many wheels. I made a mental note of the reg number and instantly forgot it, natch. It was a Norn Iron plate though.

 

Not sure who the operator is, but it was in deepest darkest Coalville.

[cms206]

Updates.

 

This week has been a fucking shit week.

 

With a mere 230,000 miles on the clock, our seven year old MAN-powered Neoplan Tourliner has lunched it's engine oil cooler. It was booked on a London but thankfully was in the garage when it deposited the contents of the sump onto the yard. After a mad panic, three gallons of 0W30 brought the level back onto the dipstick to move it inside before it dropped that, too.

 

Clearly going out in sympathy, our seven year old Paccar-powered VDL Futura has lunched it's crank seal - an engine out job.

 

That was followed by the eldest of the four Volvo B7s blowing all the seals on the thermostat housing, one of the jolly green giants eating it's compressor and the eldest of the three JGGs literally blowing it's brand new starter motor to bits - shattered the case, the lot. I'll need to get pictures of that in the morning.

 

Have a gratuitous picture of some oily concrete.

 

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[cms206]

The remains of the starter, and the bracket it also destroyed...

 

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[cms206]

Tgat last picture isn't showing on my phone... lets try again.

 

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[320touring]

It's done a proper job!

[oldcars]

Bad news. What happens when stuff breaks, do you have spare coaches or do you need to get stuff fixed and back out quick.

[Soap Distant]

Fan, organic nitrates interface.

That's the pressure of PSV operation.. Sure there might be some spare but when the shit really hits, you hope to god that the team you have can pull something out of the bag.

If all else fails, the old "code" between operators was that you'll always help one another out. In these cut throat days, I fear it's not as dignified as it once was.

[cms206]

Bad news. What happens when stuff breaks, do you have spare coaches or do you need to get stuff fixed and back out quick.

I'm waaaaaay over capacity on spare buses normally but we've had a run of bad luck recently...

Fan, organic nitrates interface.

That's the pressure of PSV operation.. Sure there might be some spare but when the shit really hits, you hope to god that the team you have can pull something out of the bag.

If all else fails, the old "code" between operators was that you'll always help one another out. In these cut throat days, I fear it's not as dignified as it once was.

... bringing us to Soap's comment. Thankfully we've been bailed out the shite this week by some friends in industry; so far stolen an Alexander-bodied Merc 709D, a Caetano-bodied Dennis Javelin and a PS-type B10M in the past few days, plus a couple of Temsa Safaris from HQ in Edinburgh; a couple more operators didn't have spare motors at school time, but thankfully could manage to cover a couple of school trips today while we ran around like twats all day.

 

The running around worked; managed three back in service plus a clean Class VI MOT pass today and the mechanics are coming in tomorrow morning to hopefully give me another back for Monday.

 

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[chaseracer]

I'm waaaaaay over capacity on spare buses normally but we've had a run of bad luck recently...

 

This concept is no longer strange to me.  Clearly, I have the right friends... 

[Zelandeth]

Hard to go wrong with a B10M PS...noisy, rattly, uncomfortable...but always useful and difficult to kill.

[cms206]

Fuck. Sake.

 

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[DodgeRover]

Not good

 

What's become of the councils decision on compulsory seat belts on school busses?

[Eddie Honda]

Not good

Naw, it's good as it's no raining.

[cms206]

 

 

What's become of the councils decision on compulsory seat belts on school busses?

"The Government has ruled that all single deck operated Primary School contracts must be seatbelted by August 2018."

 

"All well and good, but this is a 'decker operated high school contract."

 

"Oh? Errr... we'll get back to you."

 

 

That was yesterday at 3.30pm.

 

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[Zelandeth]

What's broken this time?

 

Never touched a Futura other than as a passenger.  Didn't the early ones suffer from horrendous problems with rot around the rear end?

[cms206]

What's broken this time?

 

Never touched a Futura other than as a passenger. Didn't the early ones suffer from horrendous problems with rot around the rear end?

Burst silicone hose from the Webasto; thankfully they have stopcocks so isolated the supply/return pipes, topped the bus up with antifreeze and away it went.

 

Earlier Futuras used to break their back just ahead of the rear axle, a local operator hit a particularly heavy pothole in his L-reg example and wondered why he couldn't get the last set of locker doors open any more...

 

Futuras are generally pretty robust (ours are fairly late Futura Classics, 2 09s and 1 60-plate). Sump gaskets are replaced every second or third dock - the sump itself is only held on by eight bolts or something stupid - and fuel tanks are a service item. Our three are all ZF auto with the Paccar 9.6-litre PR265 engine.

 

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[Felly Magic]

Sounds like your place has caught the curse of Bub. Leeds is shafting everyone in 2020 with a Euro6 LEZ that is most of the city & suburbs, no E6, that'll be £100 per day, a few ops yards actually fall inside the LEZ too, so they have no choice but to update their fleets

[cms206]

Hard to go wrong with a B10M PS...noisy, rattly, uncomfortable...but always useful and difficult to kill.

The PS in question, and a former fleetmember of ours; 60-seater, Voith 3-speed auto, cab stereo and volcanic heaters. I'm a pretty odd shape but PS's have always fitted me well, never had a comfort issue

 

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[bramz7]

Man I miss getting the PS to college back in 2008-10, I was lucky* to live in a rural location that Stagecoach sent all the old stuff to, the best journey ever was in the snow in one, weaving out of frozen bus stops.

You could tell how much the more experienced drivers loved them as they'd be hitting high speeds on the NSL bits!

[Felly Magic]

Used to have an ex Nottingham ZF box'd PS to play with for a school contract, went like a stabbed rat & was DP seated, but had very bad arse end issues, emergency door buzzer constantly playing up as the arse end flexed, mechanically unkillable, saw it in Retford a couple of years later looking decidedly ropey

[Zelandeth]

Was meaning comfort issues for the passengers more than the driver!  Only driven two myself and liked both of them.  One was a B10M with a 3-speed ZF box that ran out of revs at about 45mph - but could out drag cars away from the lights.  The other was a Scania K.113 based example which both sounded utterly epic and went like a bat out of hell, I've no idea what power unit or gearbox it was running - but I'm simply going to state that the maximum speed was somewhere around 7 o'clock. 

 

The Volvo did have one issue though, and that's that it leaked like a sieve.  Not fluids...Rain water!  Pretty sure that there was more running down the inside of the windscreen than the outside the day I drove it.

 

That's not an ex Stagecoach Bluebird bus is it?  Reg number seems oddly familiar.