The City of Oxford Motor Services
1958
AEC Regent V LD3RA
Park Royal H65R
The Regent V was in production from 1954 until 1968 there was a prototype Regent IV which had an underfloor engine but there was not much interest so it never went into production. According to research the only difference between the Regent III chassis and the Regent V was that the latter’s rear springs were ½ inch wider.
There was two differences though the first being the obvious cosmetic one of the introduction of the AEC wide-bonnet front end with the more square traditional AEC radiator. The former exposed radiator style was still available until 1960 and quite a lot were built that way.
The second but not so obvious was the direct selection epicyclic gearbox to replace the preselective gearbox of the earlier Regents, although about 100 were built with preselect gearboxes for a few operators, the normal clutch and synchromesh was also available.
Engine wise the Regent V had the usual AEC 7·7 and 9·6 engines and in 1966 a 11·3 litre version became available, for some reason in 1955-56 the Gardner 5LW or 6LW was available no 5LW were built but a few operators took some 6LWs.
A full list of Regent V codes can be seen here.
This vehicle was subsequently acquired by Provincial in 1970, becoming their no.80. It was one of seven purchased, the others being 970/2/5-7 CWL.
Stephen Didymus
05/08/19 – 07:14
May I respectfully correct a detail in your Regent V Chassis code panel?
The ‘D’ is always for ‘Double-Deck’. So MD3RV is Medium/ Double-deck/ Synchro box/ RHD/ Vacuum brakes. ‘D’ is NOT part of ‘Medium’!
Barry Hitchcox