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Mansfield District – Bristol LS6G – PNN 774 – 205

Mansfield & District  Bristol LS6G

Mansfield District Traction Company Limited
1954
Bristol LS6G
ECW C39F

This shot is a touch on the yellow side but I think it is worth posting as this vehicle had quite a history having had six owners in its lifetime that I have been able to find out about.

Thanks to the Bristol SU website for the following information.

06/54 -  Mansfield District Traction fleet no 205

01/68 -  Eastern Counties Omnibus fleet no LS998

02/72 -  Gosport & Fareham Omnibus fleet no 33

02/74 -  North Downs Rural Transport

07/74 -  Ives Weston-on-Trent

02/75 -  Kingfisher Weston-on-Trent

02/76 -  Out of service I presume it went to scrap at this point although I could be wrong, if I am please leave a comment.

Either way just short of 22 years service was a good innings, just goes to show how well built buses were back then “they don’t build them like that anymore I’m afraid”. It would be interesting to know how many miles were on the clock and whether it still had its original engine even if it had been rebuilt a few times.

To view a list of Bristol vehicle abbreviations click here.

Portsmouth Corporation – Crossley DD42/7T – EBK 572 – 35

Portsmouth Corporation Crossley  DD42/7T

Portsmouth Corporation
1949
Crossley  DD42/7T
Crossley H28/26R

Not many Crossley buses ever found themselves too far from their natural habitat of the North-West, but a sprinkling of them worked on the South Coast. Having bought mainly Leyland TD’s during the 1930’s, and PD’s after the war, too, Portsmouth Corporation dabbled in Crossley DD42’s briefly. Four DD42/5T’s were acquired in 1948, with locally-built Reading bodies. Another two of these arrived in 1949, followed in quick succession by a further 17 DD42/7T’s, all with Crossley bodies with two stepped side windows – very stylish!

The T suffix indicated that they were fitted with Brockhouse Turbo-converters, which performed rather like the Leyland Gearless buses in the 1930’s. I never knew why they were purchased without conventional gearboxes, because the trams were scrapped in the mid-30’s and the trolleybuses not until 1963, so the purchase was not catering to drivers without skills of gear-changing! When the buses pulled away, the engine note would rise up to the governor and stay there until the driver approached a bus stop. He would then take his foot off the throttle, the engine would then tick over and the bus would coast, freewheel-style, until the brakes were applied to stop. I never knew if these vehicles had a direct-drive ‘top’ gear which could be engaged – maybe the bus stops were too close to each other and the terrain too flat for drivers ever to engage it ‘anyone know?’. Crossley buses always gave out a rather ‘woolly’ engine note, as if being slightly strangled in some way. When pre-war Leyland TD4’s were being withdrawn in the late 1950’s, their 20 year old engines and gearboxes were transplanted into the Crossleys, which made them sound very odd after that. It surely improved fuel-consumption, though! Seating was initially H28/26R, but most became H32/26R in 1959/60, the very time the Crossley 100bhp engines were replaced by the 93bhp Leyland engines! Good job all the routes were as flat as a pancake, bar one railway bridge! They were mainly withdrawn in 1966 and 1967, the engines being 30 years old by then!

Here is No. 35 (EBK572) in Edinburgh Road, just off the main shopping centre of Commercial Road, in 1965, by which time these buses were usually relegated to peak-time extras.

Photograph and Copy contributed by Chris Hebbron

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The Turbo-Transmitter fitted to some Crossley DD42s did have a direct-drive top gear, but it was engaged automatically rather than by the driver.

Peter Williamson

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Crossleys were, indeed, strangled, or at least the engines were. An innovative firm with no idea how to fully exploit this commercially, Crossley designed a very good engine for post-war production using Swiss Saurer technology. Crossley realised they needed to pay Saurer for the license to do so but were either unwilling or unable to do so. They took away the Swiss technology – to do with the "breathing" and fuel injection system – and ended up with a "dog".
This had a domino effect. People only bought Crossleys, post-war, because they were available and people were desperate for anything in the late forties. It also led to their demise and take over by AEC. Birmingham Corporation were happy with their late Crossleys but they had had the benefit of AEC engineers modifying the engine.
Nevertheless, AEC still thought highly enough of Crossley to give them the task of developing the Bridgemaster. Not only that, the Crossley Coachworks – which outlasted the engineering by eight years – produced bodies of high quality. Latterly this was to Park Royal design and, like Roe, subcontracted from Park Royal to help when the London branch was already busy. (This included a batch of Diesel Multiple Units for British Rail which are known as the Park Royal class but were built for them by Crossley at Stockport.)
Many Crossleys, particularly in Manchester, were re-engined by Leyland power – often second hand. This extended their lives to a ripe old age.

David Oldfield

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Perhaps worthwhile to mention that Crossley had another foray into the railway scene, with its 8-cylinder low-speed two-stroke engine fitted in the infamous "Metro-Vick" diesel electrics, which would have been Class 28 in BR terminology if they had lasted long enough. The locos were peculiar unbalanced machines with a six wheel bogie at one end and a four wheel at the other. I remember them working in pairs during the early 60s on St Pancras – Manchester expresses. Sadly they covered themselves in infamy, being afflicted with more problems that most, and having a tendency, as I recall, to burst into flames spontaneously! They were withdrawn after a service life of only 9 years.

Stephen Ford

Halifax Corporation – Leyland Titan PD2/37 – CJX 323C – 283

Halifax Corporation Leyland Titan PD2/37
Photograph by ‘unknown’ if you took this photo please go to the copyright page.

Halifax Corporation Transport and Joint Omnibus Committee
1965
Leyland Titan PD2/37
Weymann H36/28F

Here we have one of Halifax corporations work horse Titans on a winters day. If memory serves me correctly they had very good heaters and were usually very warm although they did have a tendency to steam up a bit. Where I lived as a lad was at the terminus of the bus route and in those days the bus would stand there for anything from 5 to 10 minutes depending on its out-bound journey before starting back to town. When the weather was cold the driver would keep the engine running to keep the bus warm and I remember what a fantastic sound the engines of these Titans had on tick-over, very calming. The best sounding diesel engine on tick-over ever in my opinion though was the miniature train that ran between ‘Peasholm Park’ and ‘Scalby Mills’ at Scarboroughs north bay. I am not sure the number of cylinders 3 or 4 and probably water not air cooled but I am fairly sure it was a Lister engine, it could only be described as ‘music to the ears’.

To know what the PD2/37 code stood for and all Leyland Titan abbreviation codes click here.