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Bristol L6B/ECW #1218

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Sat, 18 May 2013 15:15:24 +0200

2013-5-5 Redhill, Surrey (UK) - Brighton Road. This bus was built in 1948 with a body by Beadle, but was lengthened and rebodied with a body from Eastern Coachworks in 1958. A BET company, Southern National were only permitted to buy buses from Bristol/ECW, so their fleet was quite standardised by this time. The bus remained in service until 1970 and was then used elsewhere until 1988, when it was preserved in its original colours.

Guy FBB/Vickers #1268

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Sat, 18 May 2013 15:13:35 +0200

2013-5-5 Redhill, Surrey (UK) - Brighton Road. Operated by the Great Western Railway, this 1927 Guy bus is the only survivor from over 600 operated by them in country areas, mostly in the far West of England.I don’t know of any other surviving Vickers bus body, either. This was its first trip to Brighton after restoration. Note the oil headlamps.

Leyland Titan PD2/Leyland #4031

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Sat, 18 May 2013 15:11:54 +0200

2013-5-5 Redhill, Surrey (UK) - Brighton Road. The huge Midland Red bus company (also known as the Birmingham and Midland Motor Omnibus Company, or BMMO) operated throughout the English Midlands and built lots of its own buses to very advanced designs in its own workshops. This particular bus wasn’t home made, however, but came ready-built from Leyland, although to a BMMO design – much as AEC built the LT-designed Routemaster buses for London.

Leyland Comet/Leyland Orient #MHY765

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Thu, 16 May 2013 18:12:21 +0200

2013-5-5 Redhill, Surrey (UK) - Brighton Road. A 1950 Leyland Comet coach – we call this type of vehicle ‘normal control’, where the driver sits behind a full-width bonnet. The Leyland Comet was introduced in 1947 as an export-only model, but a few were later sold in the UK and this was the first one. New to a coach operator in Bristol, it is now owned by a preservationist in Sheffield, South Yorkshire.

AEC Regent III/Park Royal #RT1702

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Thu, 16 May 2013 18:07:44 +0200

2013-5-5 Redhill, Surrey (UK) - Brighton Road. Lots of ex-London Transport RT buses are preserved, but this one has a special claim to fame, as it travelled to Europe for a trade visit when new, visiting Scandinavia and the Low Countries for three months. It was withdrawn from normal service in 1972 and has been a regular rally performer for a number of years.

Dennis Ace/Dennis #3650

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Thu, 16 May 2013 18:02:38 +0200

2013-5-5 Redhill, Surrey (UK) - Brighton Road. More from the 2013 HCVS London to Brighton rally. Here is a Dennis Ace of 1934, one of several built on small chassis at the time. This bus served on country routes in the west of England until it was sold out of service and converted – to a fish and chip shop! Happily, it was rescued on 1969 and fully restored to the Southern National colours it had worn when new.

Renault TN4 #3276

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Thu, 16 May 2013 17:59:20 +0200

2013-4-21 Brooklands, Weybridge, Surrey (UK) – London Bus Museum. At the annual bus rally in the grounds of Brooklands museum is one of the three ex-Paris buses owned by celebrated transport writer Robert Jowitt. Robert has owned these buses for a number of years and they now live in the Isle of Wight, although this one often appears at events in mainland England. With their open rear platforms (a Paris speciality until the 1960s) these are great fun to travel on.

AEC Reliance/Willowbrook #RW3

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Sat, 11 May 2013 17:01:00 +0200

2013-4-28 Weybridge, Surrey (UK) – London Bus Museum, Brooklands. London Transport bought just three of these experimental AEC Reliance buses in 1960 to test the two-door, one-man layout for single-deck vehicles. After just three years in service they were all sold to Chesterfield Corporation in Derbyshire and this is the sole survivor. It was stored for over 20 years before being restored recently.

DMS Type #DMS1515

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Sat, 11 May 2013 16:59:13 +0200

2013-4-28 Weybridge, Surrey (UK) – London Bus Museum, Brooklands. The rear of the Supercar, showing the two train sections. Does this belong in TWB Bus or TWB Rail, I wonder.......?

DMS Type #DMS1515

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Sat, 11 May 2013 16:57:44 +0200

2013-4-28 Weybridge, Surrey (UK) – London Bus Museum, Brooklands. Where shall we start? A bus or a train? In fact, this crazy thing (called the Supercar) was built to advertise London go-anywhere Travelcards, using the front of a Daimler Fleetline bus, the middle section from a 1973 Underground Tube train and a cab section from a Networker overground train. Believe it or not, it actually runs and has seats inside. It’s now owned by a group who are restoring an old LT Underground line.

AEC Reliance/Burlingham #200APB

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Sat, 11 May 2013 16:54:19 +0200

2013-4-28 Weybridge, Surrey (UK) – London Bus Museum, Brooklands. A very pretty AEC Reliance saloon of 1956, first owned by Safeguard Coaches of Guildford, Surrey, a very long-standing independent bus company still operating in the area. Safeguard sold the bus after only four years, but it was bought back by the present owners of the company in 2003 and fully restored.

CR Type #CR16

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Sat, 11 May 2013 16:52:02 +0200

2013-4-28 Weybridge, Surrey (UK) – London Bus Museum, Brooklands. This 1939 Leyland Cub was intended for transfer work between Central London railway stations, but war intervened and it did not see much service until sold and exported to Cyprus in 1949. It was found in a scrap yard there and brought back to England, where it was fully restored and now lives in the London Bus Museum. These buses are noteworthy as they were among the first to have their engine at the rear, although the half-cab layout and sliding door meant that one-person operation would be many years away.

CF1/Plaxton Mini Supreme #CNR274T

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Thu, 09 May 2013 19:25:25 +0200

2013-5-5 Redhill, Surrey (GB) – Brighton Road. A delightful 17-seat Bedford coach with Plaxton bodywork – just the thing to keep in your bedroom! This little jewel of a bus must surely be one of the smallest in preservation and is just like a big coach in miniature. It was supplied new to a company in Nottinghamshire and was later used in Devon, but was offered for sale in 2011 and I’m not sure who owns it now.

G7/Short Brothers #135

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Thu, 09 May 2013 19:22:54 +0200

2013-5-5 Redhill, Surrey (GB) – Brighton Road. Another ex-Southdown bus, this time from 1922. The Leyland G& chassis was quite popular in the 1920s and this one served with Southdown until 1934, when it was sold to Provincial, another bus company in southern England and was set aside for preservation in 1946, making this one of the earliest preserved buses in the country. Believe it or not, it is now owned by Stagecoach!

Tilling Stevens Express/Short Bros #705

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Thu, 09 May 2013 19:21:02 +0200

2013-5-5 Redhill, Surrey (GB) – Brighton Road. A rare Tilling-Stevens single deck bus from 1930, which normally lives at the Amberley Chalk Pits Museum in Sussex, where a period Southdown garage has been faithfully recreated. Note the luggage rack on the roof.

NS Type #NS1995

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Thu, 09 May 2013 19:13:16 +0200

2013-5-5 Redhill, Surrey (GB) - Brighton Road. The annual Historic Commercial Vehicle Society (HCVS) rally from London to Brighton always produces some interesting buses. This London General NS-type double deck was the first London bus type with a half cab layout and ran successfully for many years. This design was the forerunner of many subsequent London buses, up to the Routemaster of the 1950s and the introduction of one person operation. This bus normally lives in the London Transport Museum at Covent Garden and (like me) doesn’t get out very much.

Regent 1/Weymann #971J

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 12:10:34 +0200

2013-4-21 Brooklands, Surrey (GB) – London Bus Museum. An AEC Regent 1 of 1936, this bus was used in London Transport’s country area (green buses) as STL1470 until 1953, when it was replaced by one of the many RT types then coming into service. It then spent another ten years in LT service as a ‘tree lopper’, moving around the network to deal with overhanging trees where double deck routes operated. The unusual door arrangement (or lack of a door, actually) is exactly how it was when the bus was in passenger service.

Enviro 200 prototype #S12

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 12:02:14 +0200

2013-4-21 Brooklands, Surrey (GB) – London Bus Museum. A very interesting bus – one of two Enviro 200 prototypes, this bus has been sold more than once and is now used on Excetera’s stage services in West Surrey. Note the front and rear doors – I don’t know if Excetera use the rear door, or just bought this bus cheaply to use in conventional single door mode. It has been suggested that this bus was built as a prototype for the new ‘Borismaster’ buses in London.

AEC Regent III/Weymann #RLH23

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 11:33:31 +0200

2013-4-21 Brooklands, Surrey (GB) – London Bus Museum. The annual rally of London buses this year took place at the new Museum site. Amongst those buses attending was this immaculate RLH23, an AEC Regent of 1952 with a Willowbrook lowbridge body. London Transport operated 76 of these vehicles on routes where standard height double deck buses could not run. The ‘lowbridge’ layout involves a sunken gangway on the offside upstairs with long seats for four people – if you were unlucky enough to be sitting on the nearside, you maybe had to ask three people to move before you could get off! The offside downstairs was also very low, because of the upstairs gangway, so you had to take care not to crack your head when you got up to leave. Despite these drawbacks, these buses ran until the early 1970s.

Windhoff SF-50 #2

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Sat, 13 Oct 2012 20:19:06 +0200

2012-10-7 Bruxelles/Brussel (BE) – Brusselsesteenweg. Another much-anticipated appearance was this HUGE works train from the current STIB fleet – Windhoff tractors #1 and #2, with trailer #101 sandwiched between them. The whole contraption must be at least 50 metres long! These impressive beasts are often seen around the network, although I don’t think they usually run all coupled together, as seen here.

Bruxelles Standard tram #59

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Sat, 13 Oct 2012 20:17:11 +0200

2012-10-7 Bruxelles/Brussel (BE) – Brusselsesteenweg. Standards #55 and #59 pass one another on the way to Tervuren. Normal passenger trams had to take a back seat during the celebration parade.

BN PCC 7000 #7055

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Sat, 13 Oct 2012 20:15:05 +0200

2012-10-7 Bruxelles/Brussel (BE) – Tervuren, Ravenstein. A PCC, of course, from the original Brussels fleet of the 1950s and still in normal passenger operation until 2004, when it was converted as shown here. The trailer it draws is a rail scrubber #116. This PCC still works around the network on a regular basis.

Brill 'Barnum'snow sweeper #95

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Sat, 13 Oct 2012 20:12:22 +0200

2012-10-7 Bruxelles/Brussel (BE) – de Villalobar. The undoubted star of the show – a 1904 snowbroom, built by the J G Brill company in Philadelphia, USA and hidden away here for almost forty years – this was its first outing since the 1970s. This style of snowbroom was a regular item in the Brill catalogue and was supplied to a number of tramways around the world, but this one is now a rare survivor. Super!

4-wheeled motor tram #272

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Sat, 13 Oct 2012 20:10:19 +0200

2012-10-7 Bruxelles/Brussel (BE) – de Villalobar. Next, a much older, four-wheeled tram from 1927 with its own goods trailer – these are normally housed in the Transport Museum and don’t often get an outing. Note the trolley pole, which was a standard feature in Bruxelles until comparatively recently. The city also had several lines equipped with underground conduit current collection, but this has all now gone.

Bruxelles Standard tram #55

320@phototrans.eu (dvigar) — Sat, 13 Oct 2012 20:08:22 +0200

2012-10-7 Bruxelles/Brussel (BE) – de Villalobar. A busy moment during the parade, as another 1930s Standard conversion runs among normal service trams on the long forest line to Tervuren. This line seems to have limitless power supplies and can support countless trams, all moving at once! The overhead wire is also rather special, being suitable for pantographs, trolley poles or bow collectors without restriction, so older trams from the Museum get regular outings.