For those interested in old buses (and coaches)

[PhilJ W]

25 minutes ago, runs as required said:

 

We moved from NE London to Brum on the day of Princess Elizabeth and Philips’ wedding in 1947. Going to school, I entered a world of seemingly futuristic  Midland Red front-entrance S series underfloor engined buses, from 1930 petrol engined single deckers on route 250 Epping-Hornchurch - and Victoria-Abridge, on route10, even older open staircase AEC (ST ?) buses

It seemed years before LT and Tilling caught up with BMMO

 

 

They would have been 6 wheel LT's on the 10 and only the odd one would be open staircase. In 1947 the first post-war RT's began arriving and you would have just missed them. They replaced most of the older buses and had made considerable inroads into the utility buses within five years. You only just missed the post war TD class Leyland Tigers (1948) on the 250 though these still had the half cab and the engine up front.

[runs as required]

Thanks Phil for that note on wartime and after LT buses. 

Yes I realise we only just missed the RTs -  for we still had both sets of grandparents left in SW and E Essex - and spent a fair amount of school hols shuttling north-south either on the A5 or Oxford via Victoria coach station

What I've been trying to remember was the difference between the 10A from Epping - Leytonstone and the much longer 10  Abridge - Victoria journey.

I'd say both were four wheelers - the 10A I recollect had an enclosed straight stair (with a very straight backed body) - similar to the six wheeler green Country buses  (LTs ?) in Epping Garage.

I thought the 10 was also four, not six, wheeled with an open curved sweep of staircase; this I particularly remember because I was made to spit out of them back into the wind by the scary older boys 

The irony was that the most modern of all - the elegant trolleybuses never got past the Wake Arms in Epping Forest along the concrete New Road as far as Epping.

 

The journey to Grandma's family of goats out in the sticks was always exciting - it might on rare occasions include enormous brown City coaches with twin front wheels - Leyland Gnus ?

dh

[PhilJ W]

The open back ST's were the Tilling ones that were mostly confined to south of the Thames. The first 50 LGOC LT's had open staircases but the ones after that were fitted with the straight staircase bodies the same as the ST's. The LT's lasted longer as some were later fitted with diesel engines whereas the ST's kept their petrol engines.

[Metr0Land]

8 hours ago, runs as required said:

What I've been trying to remember was the difference between the 10A from Epping - Leytonstone and the much longer 10  Abridge - Victoria journey.

 

 

Allocations here:

 

https://www.londonbuses.co.uk/_routes/withdrawn/010-1.html

https://www.londonbuses.co.uk/_routes/withdrawn/010a-34.html

[runs as required]

On 14/01/2020 at 09:25, Metr0Land said:

Allocations here:

https://www.londonbuses.co.uk/_routes/withdrawn/010-1.html

https://www.londonbuses.co.uk/_routes/withdrawn/010a-34.html

Many thanks for that pair of links, most interesting information. It does prove one can't rely on memory - I was sure the open stair Abridge buses were not 6 wheelers.

What was a STD ? Was it a diesel engined ST - or  a version of an STL? 

I had no idea the route 10 from tiny Abridge to Victoria actually crossed into South London over London Bridge to LB station and (via the Elephant & Castle on Sundays) crossed back over Lambeth Bridge up to Victoria station. We never rode it past Aldgate.

dh

[PhilJ W]

The STD was an all Leyland Titan TD7 introduced c. 1937. The Leyland bodies were modified to resemble an STL.

[Metr0Land]

7 hours ago, runs as required said:

 

What was a STD ?

 

http://www.countrybus.org/STD/STD.html

 

If you remember the old Dinky bus, this was very similar to an STD

[Rugd1022]

Crystal Palace...

[Oldddudders]

That Screaming Alice shot is lovely! 

[Gwiwer]

4 hours ago, Oldddudders said:

That Screaming Alice shot is lovely! 

 

It is indeed.  And it is how I remember that place from my early visits.  Lines of Routemasters having arrived from many parts including some lengthy cross-London routes such as the 2 from distant Golders Green and the slightly shorter 3 from Camden Town.  

 

I missed the trolleybuses on Anerley Hill but have fond recollections of warm Routemasters plodding their way gamely up the gentler slopes from Norwood or Dulwich and fighting to pull away into traffic when well loaded.  The RFs on the 227 were the last crew-worked examples in London and gave way to one-man SMS Swifts which lacked the same ambience and also lacked some guts on the final ascent sometimes expiring halfway up.  

 

You will still find a good line-up of buses along there some of which are the "New Routemasters" on the 3 and which, given a decent charge, will still get you up the hill on electric power though not in the same way as the trolleys.  

[Rugd1022]

The no.22 to Putney Common, March 1971 which is when 'Get Carter' was released in cinemas...

 

 

Edited January 18, 2020 by Rugd1022

[Oldddudders]

17 hours ago, Gwiwer said:

 The RFs on the 227 were the last crew-worked examples in London 

I almost had an altercation with a 227, circa 1982. I was driving the office Avenger (XHV849T - once a trainspotter, always a....) back to Beckenham, when at Penge a 227 pulled out from the kerbside without indicating. I braked sharply and all was well, but the next time he stopped an arm came out of the window to apologise. Ridiculous the things we remember!

[PhilJ W]

1 hour ago, Rugd1022 said:

The no.22 to Putney Common, March 1971 which is when 'Get Carter' was released in cinemas...

 

 

Another good way to date a photograph, if there isn't a cinema in the shot.

[Gwiwer]

1 hour ago, Oldddudders said:

I almost had an altercation with a 227, circa 1982. I was driving the office Avenger (XHV849T - once a trainspotter, always a....) back to Beckenham, when at Penge a 227 pulled out from the kerbside without indicating. I braked sharply and all was well, but the next time he stopped an arm came out of the window to apologise. Ridiculous the things we remember!

 

I had the opposite while driving near St. Ives.  In charge of a bus which was stopped in a lay-by and having to make a right turn immediately upon pulling away I reinforced the right-hand side indicators with an arm extended from the window.  The car behind me slowed and left some room into which I pulled out and made my turn.  He followed.  He followed me all the way into St. Ives including around the residential roads we were at the time obliged to negotiate.  

 

Upon the approach to St. Ives and before I was able to turn into the Malakoff bus station there this driver accelerated around me on the wrong side of the road, caused oncoming traffic to stop smartly, and pulled across my front end police-style.  A large, somewhat unsteady and obviously angered driver bailed from his car and attempted to pull me from the cab window, then (having failed) tried to board by the passenger door which - perhaps fortunately - in that spot was inches from a high stone wall and gave him nowhere to go.  He continued his tirade until several of the oncoming motorists combined to restrain him and persuade him to drive on.  

 

What ever had upset him I shall never know but during my layover in the bus station he returned, drove slowly past and made an obscene gesture in my direction.  Five minutes later I departed.  Five more minutes later along the road I found him pulled over by police.  

 

Never forgotten that one.  

[Enterprisingwestern]

 

Whilst rummaging around in the garage I came across a cardboard box of slides, buried since my move.

I thought I'd chuck them on here to gauge popularity, if you want more then shout up.

They are all in random order because I haven't got around to cataloguing them by any means.

The first few are from the Sheffield/Rotherham/Doncaster area, and are from the early 70's as best as I can remember.

If you have any specific queries then ask, I'll be relying on memory though, so don't hold out much hope.

There are plenty more where they came from, and from all over the country, so, watch this space.

 

Mike.

 

[A Murphy]

Excellent snaps and I for one would love to see more. Thank you and best wishes,

 

Alastair M.

[Clive Mortimore]

On 13/01/2020 at 22:31, petethemole said:

"Was there really once an Eastern Coach Works  droopy windscreened coach body on a Foden chassis or was that a very “special” yellow breakdown rescue vehicle project?"

It's an AEC Matador conversion, by Eastern National, later with Crosville.

From memory it use to reside in the corner of Chelmsford bus station in a very nice Tilling Green and Cream dual purpose livery. 

[RANGERS]

There were a number of these built using ECW parts by THC/ NBC subsidiaries.

 

Trent had a very attractive AEC O854 (6 x6 version of the Matador) with a body built from late Bristol RE body parts.

[leopardml2341]

2 hours ago, Enterprisingwestern said:

 

I thought I'd chuck them on here to gauge popularity, if you want more then shout up.

 

Mike.

 

Thanks Mike, more o' them there blue uns please, but then I bet you guessed I'd say that.

[durham light infantry]

Was "Videmat" similar to "Autofare" of blessed memory?

 

Mike

[PhilJ W]

2 hours ago, RANGERS said:

There were a number of these built using ECW parts by THC/ NBC subsidiaries.

 

Trent had a very attractive AEC O854 (6 x6 version of the Matador) with a body built from late Bristol RE body parts.

That was the post war Militant with the AV690 engine.

[pH]

2 hours ago, durham light infantry said:

Was "Videmat" similar to "Autofare" of blessed memory?

 

I've never seen an Autofare machine but, from the internet, it seems to have been one which electronically  counted coins put in and printed a ticket which included that total. 

 

I did use Videmat machines on Sheffield buses in the mid-1970s. Those machines produced a ticket with a rubbing of the coins that had been put in. There was one on the right of the entry door, and the driver (to the left) had a manual machine. They were popular with passengers - I've seen a driver sitting doing nothing while a lineup of passengers waited to use the Videmat. Of course, the aim was to use as many coins as possible for the fare, in order to get as long a ticket as possible.

[RANGERS]

6 hours ago, PhilJ W said:

That was the post war Militant with the AV690 engine.

It was! I was thinking that one was a lot older than it actually was.

 

Lincs Road Car had a Matador with a similar body which may have been a rebody of an earlier one they had with a very stylish version based on ECW Queen Mary lines. 
 

Southern Vectis had one which was more bespoke but used ECW glazing, the screens were from an early Bristol LS, and there was at least one with the front end from the early RE coach.

[leopardml2341]

6 hours ago, pH said:

 

I did use Videmat machines on Sheffield buses in the mid-1970s. Those machines produced a ticket with a rubbing of the coins that had been put in.

 

Of course, the aim was to use as many coins as possible for the fare, in order to get as long a ticket as possible.

The image of each coin was a mirror image IIRC.

 

As for tickets, 2 adult fares 7p each and 2 child fares 2p each all paid in 1/2p coins produced a very long ticket indeed

 

i was about 12yrs old at the time; I recall the driver, following passengers and parents being distinctly annoyed - I'd planned this for weeks, collecting 1/2p coins without disclosing my idea 

[Johann Marsbar]

Not a brilliant photo, but this is the Gloucester recovery vehicle in May 1985...