Northampton Corporation – Daimler CWD6 – VV 8934 – 129

Copyright Ken Jones

Northampton Corporation
1945
Daimler CWD6
Duple H30/26R

VV 8934 is a Daimler CWD6 with Duple Utility body and is seen in service during Coventry City Transport centenary event in May this year (2012). The vehicle was new to Northampton Transport in 1945 as fleet number 129. Restoration was completed in 2011 and I think this is the only Daimler with utility body left running. It is owned by a member of the Lincolnshire Vintage Vehicle Society and should be at their event in November.

Photograph and Copy contributed by Ken Jones


07/10/12 – 08:46

What about the Huddersfield one, masquerading as a London vehicle which is (was?) owned by Stephen Morris?

David Oldfield


07/10/12 – 10:24

The question is whether this is the only (rare) CWD6 in preservation: The London/Huddersfield CW is an A, I think.

Joe


07/10/12 – 10:35

Huddersfield 217 (CCX 777) is indeed a CWA6. It too was new in 1945 and also carries a Duple body but of the lowbridge variety. It appears in Huddersfield, PMT and London Transport liveries on this posting.

Eric Bawden


07/10/12 – 11:39

You can’t make a silk purse out of a sows ear, but Corporate livery ‘experts’ would do well to take note, a good simple livery with no gimmicks will enhance the appearance of even the most basic of vehicles, and this one could hold its head high alongside any of today’s eyesore’s

Ronnie Hoye


07/10/12 – 14:48

Probably the only preserved CWD6, but as well as the Huddersfield lowbridge example, there is, or was, a highbridge Duple CWA6 from Douglas Corporation in preservation. See the cover of Alan Townsin`s TPC book on utility buses.

John Whitaker


07/10/12 – 18:03

This is, to my mind, a handsome vehicle. This is what a bus should look like! A fantastically good restoration…all credit to those responsible who have done a superb job. I know absolutely nothing about these vehicles, but having driven RT’s and RML’s etc on LT, and LKH’s on E.C.O.C., this photo only makes me wish I could have driven one of these as well !!—with pride….

Norman Long


07/10/12 – 18:22

Another Daimler CWD6 in preservation is Aberdeen Corporation 155. The bus currently resides at the Scottish Vintage Bus Museum at Lathalmond in Fife.
155 is now painted in the earlier livery of dark green and white.

Stephen Bloomfield


08/10/12 – 08:23

Magnificent, and to think that the modern equivalent will be in shades of pink and grey. YUK!

Pete Davies


08/10/12 – 11:35

I have come across a short video of this vehicle and it can be seen and heard from the OB Sounds page

Chris Hebbron

Quick link to the OB Sounds page and it should take you directly to the clip.


08/10/12 – 11:38

To confirm that CWD6 Northampton 129 will be in service at the LVVS Open Day on Sunday November 4th. Please see www.lvvs.org.uk  for the list of vehicles in service. May be as many as 35. A great day out.

John Child


10/10/12 – 13:22


Copyright John Child

John Child thought you maybe interested in this picture as a before and after shot pertaining to my shot above. The picture was taken by John at Molesworth in 1990 prior to restoration. Makes an interesting comparison to my shot don’t you think?

Ken Jones


05/11/12 – 17:00

VV 8934_2_lr
VV 8934_4_lr
VV 8934_3_lr

At Lincoln yesterday I was given access to photograph interior of VV 8934 without the crowds and a private trip round the block thanks to the owner John Childs and the crew of the vehicle.

Ken Jones


06/11/12 – 15:26

I was also at the LVVS do at Whisby Road, and rode upstairs on an almost full VV 8934. I imagined that progress would be fairly sedate, but thanks to the fine mechanical condition of this bus, matching its immaculate bodywork, and to the skill of the man in the cab, it positively flew along. Gearchanges and braking were wonderfully smooth and the sound effects a real delight.
Thames Travel, based at Wallingford, Berks, who run a very good if tightly-timed service between Oxford and Reading, are just about to get rid of some MCV single deckers. It’s almost unbelievable that these tinny, bouncy, deafening vehicles with their cramped 27″ seat spacing, are 6 decades newer than the magnificent Northampton Daimler.
The standard of restoration and driving of every vehicle I rode on was very impressive, but their original design has hardly been improved on. I admit that heaters are better today and seats are wider, and that low floors and kneeling suspension now make buses available to all—a piece of real progress, that—but the overpowered engines, fierce brakes and inescapable din from air-circulating systems assault the senses from all sides.
The LVVS day was like a return to sanity!

Ian Thompson


07/11/12 – 06:54

Be careful Ian – the thought police will get you!

Stephen Ford


07/11/12 – 08:46

S*d the thought police, Stephen, I’m with Ian.

David Oldfield


07/11/12 – 10:25

I agree entirely, Ian. Things to add to the “comforts” of modern bus travel are moulded plastic passenger seats, snatching retarders and howling differentials. Why are back axles so much noisier these days?

Roger Cox


07/11/12

All these, plus the noisy overrun on the engine when changing down when slowing!

Chris Hebbron


08/11/12 – 07:13

Can I dare to say that the whole design of modern buses is flawed: the rear engine is yards away from the driver, and gets abused by the driver’s lack of sensitivity at this distance, and by the remoteness of the controls. The weight at the rear seems to make them unmanageable in ice and snow. If you stand to leave, the braking pitches you forward, whereas it is safer to be pulled back. Why o Why, when passenger numbers are falling, do we go for megabuses all the time? They clog up lanes and streets. Just a few thoughts on why that Daimler doesn’t seem ridiculous at all. Bring back the Q!

Joe


08/11/12 – 14:53

Joe, I entirely agree. The whole point of front entrance/rear engine seems to have been to facilitate one man operation. (The thought police will get ME for that!) But the effect was to give a thumping great bus the balance characteristics of a caravan. I recall a seasick-making journey from Ipswich to Hadleigh 30 years ago on an ECOC Bristol VR (by no means the worst offenders in the soggy suspension stakes). It was like a fairground white knuckle ride. Then also, using high capacity buses to reduce frequency while maintaining the appearance of service provision expressed as seats per hour makes the service less attractive, and for many people totally useless – and this when everyone is used to the infinite flexibility of getting into a car when they want to. Add to that the long delays at each stop while passengers fumble for their money or pass, and it is obvious why busy and impatient people regard the bus as transport of the last resort. I am a great fan of the continental “honesty” system for fare collection on city networks – passes or books of tickets bought at newsagents, and self-validated on board, with flying squads of inspectors charging about 25 times the standard fare for evasion. This removes time-consuming revenue collection from the driver and keeps the bus moving. It also cancels the need for a bus design with passenger access alongside the driver. (In other words, the wheels can revert to the front instead of being somewhere in the middle where they give the seesaw effect.) In some of our rougher cities it would be a positive advantage for the driver to be in his own secure cab, and not to be exposed to the verbal and physical abuse of the great unwashed public.

Well, that should be good for a few rejoinders!

Stephen Ford


09/11/12 – 07:44

Stephen there is much sense in what you say about fare collection although the dear “Public” are probably rather less honest than in Europe..well they used to be perhaps!
I would make things even more simple..within city boundaries defined clearly, I would make all bus travel completely free. How?…we squander tens of millions on “surveys” and “planning” trying to make badly flawed ideas work here in Bristol. Just now £20M has been chucked away after scrapping plans for a “bendy bus” network that is now thought to be better if operated by..single deck buses 36″ long…that’ll be a stroke of genius! So, rather than continue to fumble about any more, just make travel free and use the funds lost in trying to get people to catch the bus to make using one a VERY good idea. The operating costs being taken care of from Government funding currently set aside for a multitude of “solutions”.
Free things always work. Greater minds than mine on here will have a better understanding on how possible this is but it would be a big help if free say 6 – 9 am and 4-7pm..less cars, less pedal cycles ridden by madmen, less traffic hold ups and a younger passenger base becoming more used to buses than most of us older bods for whom the car is vastly preferable and who don’t fancy standing in the rain for ages waiting to ride home sat next to a loony with a cold!
Now…anyone think the idea has..wheels??

Richard Leaman


09/11/12 – 16:57

I think the maths of the Continental honesty system goes like this : there will be some people who will never bother to get a ticket. OK, that doesn’t matter so long as they get caught about one journey in every 25 – because the fine will reimburse all the previous unpaid journeys.

Stephen Ford


10/11/12 – 06:42

I can remember the first Atlanteans with the Northern General Group, I would have been about 14ish at the time, anyway, about two or three weeks after they came into service I was speaking to a friend of my Dads who was a driver, I asked him what he thought of them and he said he hated them, why? I asked, and he replied that as well as being an abortion to drive, as soon as you pull up at a stop and open the doors all you get is, where’s the bus in front, you’re early/late, do you, don’t you, what time, how long, is it, will it, wont it, what bus goes here, how do I get there, and after 20 odd years on buses he finally knew what conductors were moaning about.

Ronnie Hoye


10/11/12 – 06:43

In the past, some British operators used to have honesty boxes on buses and trams. Glasgow was one, and, I think, Brighton Corporation. I wonder who supervised the emptying of these receptacles. One of the reasons why London Country (for one) discontinued the use of fareboxes was the opportunities they afforded for unauthorised access to the contents of the coin vaults by the designated removal staff during the small hours.

Roger Cox


10/11/12 – 09:17

Huddersfield Corporation/JOC also had honesty boxes certainly until the late 60’s.

John Stringer


10/11/12 – 10:18

Of course, inspectors are few and far between nowadays, too, although one did get on my bus the other day and did his stuff thoroughly. As for abroad, I do recall, about 8 years ago, travelling on a Lille tram and, at one point notably as we stopped at a college/Uni, a hoard of traffic staff blocking the tram doorways and checking for evidence of valid travel for those descending (mainly students), several offenders being caught. Then, a couple stayed aboard to the next stop, checking the remainder of passengers and catching about four more. I recall they caught quite a few offenders! There were no honesty boxes, but it’s doubtful if they’d have worked there!

Chris Hebbron


10/11/12 – 10:22

I am by no means certain but I think Huddersfield’s honesty boxes ceased to be fitted to new buses in 1967 with the arrival of the first Fleetlines but as far as I can remember those already fitted stayed with the bus until it was withdrawn.
Perhaps someone who remembers the Huddersfield PD3A’s in service with OK can tell us if they were still fitted then?

Eric Bawden


10/11/12 – 11:30

Nottingham City Transport had them too – though I don’t ever remember seeing anyone put anything in them. I guess the thought was “If the conductor hasn’t collected the fare by the time I reach the platform to get off – tough!”

Stephen Ford


11/11/12 – 07:34

Grimsby-Cleethorpes used them, the only time I ever saw them being used was when my driver inadvertently left me at Riby Square and I had to be taken to the bus by patrol van.

Philip Carlton


16/03/17 – 06:28

I look forward to conducting Northampton Daimler 129 again on the LVVS spring running day Sunday 16th April 2017. The owner is a Mr. John Child and all tickets issued are Child tickets for obvious reasons. One little known fact about the war time utility buses is that they do not have a conductor platform repeater bell. When the motor is running the conductor cannot hear the bell ring in the drivers cab so he has to give the thumbs up to indicate he heard the bell. Northampton Corporation never got around to installing a bell post war. It is a joy to conduct this bus which is in first class condition.

Bob Perrin


04/04/17 – 07:23

No, it is not the only CWD in preservation. Aberdeen 155 (BRS37) is a 1945 example, fully restored at SVBM at Lathalmond, near Dunfermline.

Mr Anon


Vehicle reminder shot for this posting


24/04/17 – 07:15

As a kid growing up in Northampton with relatives working on the buses I achieved a goal of every bus in service. That included fleet # 129.

John Cummins

Northampton Corporation – Daimler CV – JVV 267G – 267

Northampton Corporation - Daimler CV - JVV 267G - 267

Northampton Corporation
1968
Daimler CVG6DD
Roe H33/26R

This former Northampton 267, JVV 267G, is seen here on a running day at Wellingborough on 22/4/17.
This was the last CVG6 for the UK market, the last bus with pre-selector transmission, the last teak framed Roe body and, I believe, the last open rear platform bus delivered in the UK.

Photograph and Copy contributed by Tony Martin


01/05/17 – 07:12

What a gem!

Joe


02/05/17 – 07:19

Last time I saw 267 it was looking a bit down at heel but in this shot it looks superb. Well done to the owner(s). I was led to believe that Northampton took the first post-war CVG6 to be built and as the caption states took the last one some twenty years later. All purchases in between were of the same mark and I understand all had Roe bodies. A great tribute to the products of these two companies and to standardisation. Also the shade of red is just awesome!

Philip Halstead


09/05/17 – 07:42

Sadly the modern digital photography has played havoc with the colouring! Although 267 is indeed very smartly turned out nowadays it is nowhere near as garish as this picture suggests. The Northampton red was actually Vermilion, which is an orangy red quite unique to Northanpton as far as I know. Several preserved Ex Northampton buses sport an assortment of shades but not all successfully capture it in my opinion.

Andrew Goodwin


09/05/17 – 17:39

JVV263G

A less gaudy photo of one of the same batch!
The Drapery, Northampton.

Tony Martin


23/07/17 – 07:03

Just a small correction – the three buses in Tony Martin’s photo (09/05/17) are in fact in Mercers Row. NCT bought almost exclusively Daimler buses, there was also a small batch of Crossleys, one of which has been preserved. www.flickr.com/photos/

Norman


26/07/17 – 15:50

All the ‘lasts’ are correct except the last for which the credit goes to Stockport Corporation PD3 fleet number 91 registered on 1 January 1969.

Orla Nutting

Northampton Corporation – Crossley – VV 9146 – 146

Northampton Corporation - Crossley - VV 9146 - 146

Northampton Corporation
1946
Crossley DD42/3
Roe H31/25R

Although Northampton were well known for their liking of the Daimler/Roe combination, in the 1930s they had purchased several batches of Crossleys, so perhaps it is not surprising that they purchased a batch of ten DD42/3 chassis with Roe bodies in 1946.
One of them, fleet number 146, VV 9146, has survived into preservation and is seen here in Great Houghton on an Heritage Weekend service, 9/9/17.

Photograph and Copy contributed by Tony Martin


02/10/17 – 07:31

To put it mildly, this was a heap of junk before the present owners (one of whom is a former Crossley employee) started work on it. The dedication involving in restoring it to its present condition is unbelievable. It has to be said though, it isn’t very fast!

Nigel Turner


03/10/17 – 05:58

Plenty of opportunities to sample it here: www.youtube.com/

Peter Williamson


20/10/17 – 07:00

Two Crossleys in succession is quite a treat. Greatly enjoyed Peter W’s Youtube link, where the induction noise is more noticeable than on the Reading Crossleys, but the gearbox music is just the same.
Superb piece of restoration, this Northampton bus. One of my very favourite bodies on what—despite its engine woes—is also a favourite chassis. Nice steering, brakes and clutch, dead easy gearbox. A real pity that the management didn’t fork out and pay Saurer the licence fees, but even then the weak crankshaft would still have posed problems, and the much lighter Morris-Saurer engines fitted to Hants and Dorset’s Morris-Commercials were apparently not that successful. I remember seeing them at Lymington, but never got a ride. Do any MC-Saurers (from any operator) survive?

Ian Thompson


23/10/17 – 06:02

I recall going into a shed in the 1980’s,which was part of Botley’s Park Hospital, Ottershaw, Surrey (which, like many mental institutions, had a farm, but long closed by then). I found three old vehicles in there, two complete and one being just a chassis, with Armstrong-Saurer on it. It looked more lorry than bus, but who knows. I reported them all to a vehicle preservation organisation and six months later, all were gone, but to where? So Saurer vehicles were made here on Tyneside for a period, from 1930-1937, according to Grace’s Guide.

Chris Hebbron


28/10/17 – 16:49

The Swiss firm of Saurer had a modest impact upon the British automotive industry. In the late 1930s the Crossley company embarked upon the design of a completely new passenger chassis that was to become the DD/SD 42. The company’s Chief Engine Designer, W.C. Worrall, was then diagnosed with tuberculosis, a very serious disease at the time, treatment for which entailed taking up residence in a completely unpolluted atmosphere. Industrial Manchester fell somewhat short of the qualities sought from a health resort, and Worrall was sent to recuperate in Switzerland, where he had worked previously for Saurer. Whilst there he visited the works of his former employer and was thereby stimulated to incorporate features of the Saurer four valve cylinder head design in his new Crossley HOE7 engine. The sad subsequent story of what happened later after Worrall’s return to Manchester, when Crossley Motors MD Arthur Hubble refused to pay a Saurer licence fee, is well known, and therein lay the essence of the company’s decline and demise.
The only link between the Morris Commercial built Saurer diesel engines of 1948 onwards (which intimately became the Leyland 4/98 and 6/98 ranges) and the earlier Armstrong Saurer range of lorries was the licensed manufacture of engines to Saurer design. The Armstrong Whitworth saga is rather complicated. In 1904, Sir W.G. Armstrong Whitworth (primarily an armaments and shipbuilding company) took over the manufacture of the Wilson-Pilcher car which continued to be available until 1907, but the firm introduced its own car and commercial models from 1906, powered by engines between 2.4 and 7.6 litres. About 20 Armstrong Whitworth 32hp buses were delivered in 1906 to the Motor Omnibus Company of Walthamstow, better known by its trading name of Vanguard. This chassis type, which had a four speed crash gearbox and chain final drive, was also available as a three ton lorry, later uprated to four tons. By 1914 a one ton van with worm final drive had been added to the catalogue (figures refer to the payload, not, as today, the gross vehicle weight), but the firm’s commitment to automobile production was less than wholehearted. During the Great War Armstrong Whitworth concentrated on ships, armaments and aircraft – the aeroplane division was formed in 1912 – and from 1919 adapted its Newcastle Scotswood works for a determined assault into railway locomotive and road roller manufacturing. In 1927 Armstrong Whitworth merged several of its engineering interests with Vickers, when the aircraft and motor divisions of the former AW concern were sold off to J.D. Siddeley as Armstrong Siddeley. (Vickers already had its own aircraft manufacturing arm.) Armstrong Whitworth had earlier entered into a licence arrangement with Saurer of Switzerland in 1919 for the manufacture of diesel engines which were first fitted to diesel locomotives and railcars, but, in 1930, the firm decided to re-enter the automotive market with the Armstrong-Saurer range of lorries built at Scotswood. These massive looking, normal or forward control machines were available with four or six cylinder indirect injection engines coupled with four speed gearboxes in four, six or eight wheeled versions. Air brakes, overdrive or Maybach auxiliary gearboxes and double reduction final drives were optional. The main emphasis was on the diesel engined models which had names beginning with the letter “D” (Diligent, Defiant, Dauntless, Dominant, Durable, Dynamic, though later models were called Active, Effective and Samson), the much rarer petrol versions using “P” as the initial letter (Pioneer, Persistent, Powerful). Very few were bodied as buses or coaches, but, in 1932, a 13ft 2ins wheelbase, normal control Dauntless with the 6 cylinder diesel of 8.55 litres, producing 90 bhp at 1800 rpm (the alternative four cylinder engine developed 52 bhp from 6.8 litres) was fitted with a luxuriously appointed Ransomes, Sims and Jeffries single deck body for demonstration purposes. In 1933, Armstrong -Saurer declared that it was considering entering the single and double deck passenger vehicle market, but later that year the Armstrong-Saurer diesel engines were offered as options in the Dennis Lancet and Lance chassis. New direct injection versions of the Saurer engine appeared in 1934, a 5.7 litre four cylinder of 70 bhp and a 8.55 litre six of 120 bhp at 1800 rpm, and ten single deck Daimler COS4 and one double deck COS6 thus powered were delivered to Newcastle Corporation in 1935. They were converted to AEC engines during WW2. In 1934 Dennis produced its own direct injection four cylinder O4 diesel of 6.5 litres, which, like the Saurer, had four valves per cylinder, though the design must have differed from the Saurer patents because no license fee was ever paid by the Guildford firm.
Despite its premium prices, the Armstrong-Saurer range earned a solid reputation with hauliers for quality, but sales were a struggle in the depressed 1930s. Railway locomotive production was also in decline, and the Scotswood workforce fell from some 3000 in the early 1920s to just 500 by 1935. Rumours concerning the future of Armstrong-Saurer production at Scotswood began circulating in that year. Despite official denials, these proved to be well founded, and the entire Armstrong-Saurer range was withdrawn in 1937 when the Admiralty bought the Scotswood works and leased them back to Vickers-Armstrongs in order to concentrate on military work in the rapidly worsening political climate of the period.

Roger Cox


31/10/17 – 07:10

I have challenged before, and will challenge again, the widespread notion that Crossley failed because of its engine problems. In the early postwar years, Crossleys sold as well as they did because there was a high demand for buses. When they became part of the ACV group, AEC engineers quickly sorted out the HOE7 engine, and if the demand had still been there, word would have got around and they would have continued to sell. But the fact is that the bottom dropped out of the bus market in 1950, resulting in over-capacity in the industry, and in that situation Crossley were uniquely vulnerable because buses were their only product. Daimler made cars, Bristol were protected by a guaranteed market, and every other bus manufacturer was also a lorry builder. Crossley were totally dependent on the shrunken bus market, and that is why they failed.

Peter Williamson


01/11/17 – 07:07

The Crossley DD/SD42 was a very sound chassis design, but quickly revealed deficiencies in the engine department and in its steering, which was very heavy. In the immediate post war period the demand for passenger chassis was exceptionally high, and, on the strength of the performance of the HOE7 “Saurer head” engine, orders for Crossley chassis poured in. 3119 chassis were built between 1945 and 1951, but the concentration of production was in the years before the weaknesses of the HOE7 engine became widely apparent. It is true that the demand for new buses fell off sharply after 1949, but I maintain that the poor reputation of the engine did contribute to the decline of the Crossley Motors company, particularly in the double deck field. Somewhat surprisingly, since Crossley had not been a significant player in the pre war coach market, the single deck SD42 sold quite well to independent coach firms, whose operations were less punishing than all day stop start work on heavily laden municipal bus routes, and whose drivers tended to be rather more respectful towards their machinery. The Crossley Motors board did read the market trends accurately from 1945, and seeking a more secure foothold, entered into negotiations with Maudslay in 1946, which dragged on into 1947 when AEC expressed an interest. In 1948 AEC took control and began reshaping the business in line with its own procedures, which were not entirely to the liking of the Crossley directors and employees. There is surely no doubt that the long term continuation of independent Crossley models was not part of the AEC plan. In the meantime, early purchasers of the DD42 were becoming more than a trifle disenchanted with their buses, and did not offer repeat orders. Notably Manchester, potentially a very valuable customer, did not come back again after its 1946/47 deliveries. Stockport, in whose area the Crossley new Errwood Park factory was located, strongly resisted taking any more vehicles from the firm, but eventually and reluctantly conceded another order after a rather suspect tendering process in which Crossley slightly undercut Leyland. Yes, in frustration over Crossley’s lack of progress in sorting out the HOE7’s problems, AEC did come up with the downdraught engine, but hardly quickly, for this did not appear, and then only spasmodically, until 1950, by which time the Southall die had been cast against the passenger vehicle dependent Crossley marque.

Roger Cox


04/02/18 – 07:13

I remember visiting a bus museum near Hall i’ th’ Wood in Bolton some time in the mid 1980s and a Northampton Crossley was one of the buses there, in unrestored condition. I donâ’t know which one it was, could it have been this one?

David Pomfret


05/02/18 – 16:57

Only just seen your post of 1/11/17, Roger. Although you only mention the directors of Crossley, Roger, I can only assume the Arthur Hubble was still there after the AEC takeover, since I recall you saying elsewhere that he caused friction with Gardner’s management at much the same time. I’m surprised that the senior management were allowed to stay when AEC took over, but, perhaps, it was more common then. Nowadays, they go willingly with a good handout, but then it was less likely, I imagine. But I’m sure in the bus industry, that Hubble’s truculent and mean-spirited attitude was well-enough known to have justified arranging for his rapid departure!

Chris Hebbron


06/02/18 – 13:39

Only really of relevance to those close to Colchester, a former Crossley employee (and joint owner of VV 9146) will be giving a talk on Feb 9th about his time with the company which promises to be very interesting. I doubt that there are many ex employees still around given how long it is since the company’s demise..

Nigel Turner


07/02/18 – 05:48

Chris, all the original Crossley Motors directors were of advancing years by 1948. Sir Kenneth Crossley was almost 70, Arthur Hubble 60, T.D. Wishart (chassis designer) retired in that year, Major Eric Crossley retired in 1948 and died in the following year. No doubt AEC retained the residual management at Crossley to see out the production of existing models, which, hopefully, faced a better future with the AEC designed downdraught engine of 1949. AEC’s longer term plan for Crossley can be only conjectured, but I doubt that the Stockport firm was seen as a continued supplier of complete vehicles in a declining market. As with Leyland then and later, the absorption of other companies was an exercise in reducing competition as much as expanding productive capacity.

Roger Cox


07/02/18 – 16:32

Nigel: many thanks for mentioning Tony Melia’s talk at Friends’ Meeting House, Colchester, 7:15pm Friday Feb 9. Sounds unmissable—well worth travelling the 220 miles from Oxford to Colchester and back. (By train and not in one day, of course!)

Ian Thompson


09/02/18 – 07:08

Thx, Roger. One wonders if the improved engine stimulated demand for a period. Whatever happened, at least the profits went to AEC.

Chris Hebbron


09/02/18 – 17:06

I see that we get again that all the Leyland closures were to reduce competition- try amending that to reducing losses and concentrating investment to compete against the rest of the world-which we still failed to do.
As you can see from the Crossley thread there was precious little new engine development (as against evolving product) even pre-war as they bought in overseas development

Roger Burdett


18/02/18 – 06:17

Thanks again to Nigel Turner for mentioning Tony Melia’s talk on his time at Crossley Motors. Spellbinding! Not just Tony’s perfect recall of the works and vehicles, but a wonderful insight into how apprentices were treated in those days, how fairly inexperienced workers were expected to use their initiative to get round any problem that might crop up and—of course—a total lack of Health & Safety. Some good character studies, too. Plenty of laughs.
Any Bus Enthusiasts’s Society lucky enough to secure Tony Melia for an evening has a real treat in store.

Ian Thompson


18/02/18 – 17:01

It was good to meet Ian Thompson at Colchester and I’m glad he enjoyed the talk by Tony Melia, actually I’m sure that everybody there did so.
Despite being in his ninetieth year, Tony spoke fluently for two hours which is no mean feat. Some of his stories about road testing the bare chassis over the Snake Pass make you wonder how he survived to his thirtieth birthday let alone his ninetieth.

Nigel Turner