They got so lucky with the brakes not being seized on
What engine would that of had
Gardener ?
Leyland fixed head 500 series.
1 Like
Tim & Tim both very experienced on these old buses.
1 Like
They were a nasty shock after the pleasant buses of the '60s. The new-fangled Leyland National was noisy, jerky, uncomfortable and tinny compared with most of its predecessors. Give me a Park Royal bodied AEC Reliance or Leyland Leopard any day.
My preference would be a Bristol RE. Whatever, lots of fans of and operators of Leyland and AEC single deckers admit (grudgingly) that the National didnât rot as badly as their beloved Leopards/ Tigers/ Reliances. Like them or loathe them, after de-regulation, Nationals carried on with independents for years.
Yes: their forte is older LT stuff (RT, RM) but theyâre quite capable of resuscitating a Gardner 6LXB in a Bristol VR.
0.510 in this case.
First Hants had them well in to the early 2000âs inherited from the take over of peoples provincial in Gosport
2 examples new in 1984 to Hoeford and withdrawn in August 2003
The provincial society also has the only ACE cougar in existence
http://www.provincialsociety.org/survivors.htm
Looks like a National, presumably it had an AEC motor and possibly gearbox. Any idea what?
According to Wiki , a Perkins with an Alison transmission
1 Like
Cheers BE.
Donât think anything to date is as comfortable as the RM.Although I liked the Volvos used on some London routes now being replaced by EVs which also arenât bad.
While the recent Alexander Dennis single deckers on our local routes are laughably abysmal more comfortable to stand than sit on the hard seats and seemingly no fit for purpose suspension at all especially the front axle.
How did the AEC Swift compare with the National ?.I can remember the Kingston to Heathrow 285 route using single deckers and mistakenly thought was the National but seems to have been the Swift.
TBH after circa 1970 everything seemed to go out of the window and it seemed to me at the time that most service buses were built for discomfort on all levels: noise, seats, ride - the lot.
How did the Swift compare with the National? The easiest answer would be to compare both types on âIanâs Bus Stopâ. The lines in this other link about British Leyland having just one design on its mind, staff being set in their ways and just too many changes being introduced in a rush are telling.
The Swift was first introduced to London, it was basically an AEC version of the Leyland Panther chassis; there were several versions. Neither regarded as a sccessful design. Other operators managed to make the Swift work, LT didnât and it was withdrawn early because of the difficulties of making it fit into its Aldenham Works Overhaul system.
In only one are of operation was it a success in London, that being the Red Arrow service on selected routes using the long wheelbase, large engine âMerlinâ version. On others it was simply too long and the underpowered, small engine, short wheelbase Swift failed. BL as stated had little interest in modifications to overcome engineering problems;- and they were numerous, a belt driven angle drive for a short propshaft for the fan which failed, resulting in overheating, buses with dipsticks which were so long they ran flat along the bottom of the sump, chassis flexing, problems with the roof and many many more. None of this helped by passenger resistance to automatic fare collection equipment.
The National was a product of the BL attitude of âwe know best, youâll have what we say you wantâ. This meant one body design and as far as LT went initially buses delivered in the wrong shade of red and when begrudgingly altered incomplete detailing. More at Ianâs Bus Stop.
1 Like
A significant part of that was the establishment of the NBC (National Bus Company). Over the years all NBC operators (and there were many) had to phase out their preferred types and adopt the standardised offerings - a take-it-or-leave deal. Not that the Bristol VR was a bad design, nor was the National in its later versions (National 2 particularly). Itâs a shame nonetheless that so many decent bus designs got the chop.
At the risk of repeating myself, export markets (particularly British colonies) were a big money-maker for Leyland (Truck & Bus). In its various state-owned guises, Sydney bought well over 600 Leopard bus chassis in the 60s and 70s (as well as some Atlanteans). By the early 70s, Sydney wanted to order more Leopards but in essence Leyland said âyou can have the National or nothingâ (and the export 10.9m variant only). Obviously there wouldâve been a lot of to-and-fro, but in the end the state-owned bus operator said âshove itâ to Leyland and put out tenders to other bus manufacturers. As a result, Sydney awarded the contract to M-B and its O305, which they bought in the thousands and which was (by all accounts) one of the most reliable and durable buses they ever operated. A handful of Australian operators bought the (10.9m export) National, but they were never common here, and it seems that Singapore and HK werenât keen on them either (Singapore used DD versions of the MB O305).
I forgot to mention UnZud (NZ). Christchurch (Auckland?) had a long history of using Leyland bus chassis too, including Leopards and later the Bristol RE. When they wanted more RE chassis, Leyland (who by this time had bought out BCV) tried to flog the National to them and ChCh refused: in a compromise, Leyland supplied them the RE chassis with the Fixed Head Wonder (0.500), which is why you get oddities like this:
South Australia operated AEC Swifts. Brisbane City Council operated a variety of Leylands and AECs prior to my memory. By the early 60s theyâd settled on a mix of AEC 590 and Leopard, which were superseded by the largest fleet of Panthers in the world. When these were aproaching replacement, National was the only Leyland offering. BCC bought one to try and didnât like it, it served its term as an orphaned oddball. Volvo became the next supplier.
I only used the 285 to commute to work very rarely during the period between leaving school and passing driving my test.
It was a hopeless unfit for purpose route with lack of frequency combined with long journey times.
It was single deck only at that time and I can remember thinking how strange the thing was when I was more familiar with the old still in service RFâs on single decker routes and preferred to use the far more frequent and convenient 65, 281 and 235 routes to get to Feltham from Chessington.Using three buses and going via Hounslow bus station was still usually quicker than waiting for the 285 direct from Kingston.
My main memory and reference point was the change from RT to RM on the 65 route.Like the 65 v 281 before that.I was also familiar with RMC on some local Green Line routes.
Most of what came after the RM seemed retrograde in terms of convenience and comfort to me and the RM fleet still seemed as good as new in the 1970âs so great durability.
But strangely the Swift, if thatâs what the 285 was, didnât seem to go or sound anything like an AEC engine powered bus.It sounded like a rattling bag of nails.My memory also always thought it was the National when I see it since but definitely remember it having the two sets of doors not one.With period photos showing it was Swift not National.
Strange.
I used the 285 occasionally as a child at the other end of the route, when it was first introduced with brand new RMs as a replacement for Trolleybus route 605, from Raynes Park to Wimbledon. The odd RT appeared on Sundays. None of the routes which ran that section 131, 285 or 286 were very reliable.