History of the Leyland Bus

Ron Phillips

• Publisher: Crowood
• Year: 2015
• ISBN:
  9781847978783
• Topic: Technologie et ingénierie
• Subtopic: Transport et navigation

A superbly illustrated history of the Leyland bus, one of the most important British buses of the twentieth century, with full production histories and technical specifications for all the major models. Also covers the evolution of the Leyland Bus company, and tells the full story behind the iconic Leyland badge. Including some previously unseen illustrations, the book gives a full company history - from beginnings as the Lancashire Steam Motor Company in 1886, to the acquisition by Volvo Buses in 1988. Technical details of all the main models are given including the Lion, Titan and Olympic ranges. Gearless buses and rear-engined double-deckers are covered as well as charabancs, trolleybuses, First World War military vehicles and overseas models. This will be an essential guide to these much-treasured vehicles and is beautifully illustrated with some never-before-seen pictures from the Leyland company's archives including 153 black & white photographs and 106 colour and b&w prints.

Chapter 1

EARLY DAYS

Starting by building steam-driven vehicles, the Lancashire Steam Motor Company was renamed Leyland Motors Ltd as its business diversified. By 1908, it was building its own petrol-driven engines to power its chassis, which could be adapted for buses or goods carriers. World War I brought the opportunity to mass-produce military chassis and to forge a reputation for strength and reliability.

FROM MOWERS TO LONDON BUSES

The origins of Leyland Motors go back to sometime in 1884, when a steam wagon was built to carry goods (coal and the like) by James Sumner, the owner of an engineering workshop in the village of Leyland, near Preston in Lancashire. Because of the legislation in those days regulating the speed of mechanically driven vehicles to 4mph (6.4km/h), it was felt that any further development of the steam wagon would be futile. The skills available were therefore directed towards building steam-driven mowing machines for playing fields and open spaces. These are often referred to as ‘steam lawn mowers’, but this suggests a device used on domestic lawns. These machines were quite large and intended to cut the grass of playing fields. They were guided by one man on foot, and their success was based on the fact that horses were no longer needed to pull the mower, nor were men needed to care for the horses.

In 1896, the company was refinanced and once again took up the building of steam-driven goods vehicles. James Sumner was joined by Henry Spurrier and the name of the enterprise became the Lancashire Steam Motor Company. The repeal of the ‘Red Flag Act’ allowed the expansion of mechanical transport to flourish now that vehicles no longer required a man walking in front of them. The company quickly established itself as a builder of well-engineered steam wagons. In 1903, an Act of Parliament (the Motor Car Act) allowed for higher speeds and set up the system of registration. A little later, rules were put in place that regulated the construction and use of road vehicles.

The first vehicle built at Leyland driven by a petrol engine took to the road in 1904, a 30cwt (1,524kg) lorry nicknamed ‘The Pig’. There followed a new, improved version, model Y, which was made 1905–6 and which could be used as the basis for a bus or charabanc. In those days, the customer would explain his needs directly to the manufacturer, who would then build a more or less bespoke vehicle. So the few early single-deck buses, or charabancs, had various styles and makes of bodywork mounted on what was essentially a lorry chassis. The bodies on these early vehicles were not made at Leyland, but were contracted out to the United Electric Car Company (tramcar builders at Preston), or others. Leyland did not build its own bus bodies until about 1912.

Double-deck buses generally followed the style adopted in London, for a number of reasons. First, the bus fleet in London was the largest in the world. It had begun in earnest in 1851, the year of the Great Exhibition, and by 1905 there were thousands of horse-drawn buses milling about the capital’s streets. The motor bus promised huge savings in operating costs. A double-deck body with similar features to the horse bus, with seating for about sixteen inside and eighteen on top, was quickly evolved by the local coachbuilders, who also had to comply with rules laid down by the Metropolitan Police. Customers for the products of the Lancashire Steam Motor Company generally came from the north-west of England, but Leyland saw a huge potential for sales of buses in London.

There was a flurry of activity in London in 1905–7, when attempts were made to set up motor omnibus companies to provide an alternative to the horse bus. Numerous chassis manufacturers were involved. The Lancashire Steam Motor Co., not yet formally renamed as Leyland, sent down about twenty examples of the Y type chassis to the capital. As the company had not yet evolved a suitable engine of its own, these vehicles were fitted with Crossley engines, built in Manchester. The Y type chassis became known as ‘Leyland-Crossleys’, the first time the name of the Lancashire town had been directly applied to the vehicles made there.

In common with most of the competitors, the Y types were a failure for numerous reasons and did not last long. The outcome of this struggle to replace the costly horse bus was that the Vanguard and London General omnibus companies got together to build a bus chassis themselves to their own requirements, resulting in the foundation in 1912 of the Associated Equipment Company (usually referred to as the AEC). The AEC built buses in some numbers exclusively for the London General at a factory in Walthamstow, northeast London. Over the next five decades, AEC would become Leyland’s strongest competitor, both at home and abroad, until it was bought out by Leyland in 1962.

First product – a steam-driven mowing machine.

In 1907, the company changed its name officially to Leyland Motors Limited. Extensions to the factory were made, so that new machinery could be installed and bodywork could be manufactured. A new engine was developed and was installed in a new chassis (the X type), first shown at the Olympia Show in 1907. This 6-litre unit had 4 cylinders and was rated at 35 horsepower. Another innovation at this period was the introduction of a 4-speed gearbox by adding direct drive as the 4th gear. The new engine was produced in various capacities as the range of Leyland models increased. These were denoted by backwards progression through the alphabet – Y, X, W, V, U, T and S – and were distinguished by the tonnage (or payload) for which they were designed. Leyland did not give up on selling buses to London and the X type was a success, but once the AEC had been established, it could only sell to the smaller (independent) companies, whose activities were somewhat hampered by the influence of the General.

An early charabanc with fixed roof and inclined floor stands outside the Leyland factories under the admiring gaze of some of the workers. B 2063 shows a Lancashire CC registration obtained by the makers, the Lancashire Steam Motor Company, whose oval plate features on the radiator. Early charabancs were used for pleasure outings and often carried names, in this case ‘Swiftsure’.

More bystanders gaze on a newfangled Leyland X type double-deck motor bus of the London Central Motor Omnibus Company (LN 7271). The uniformed policeman is symbolic of the fact that the Metropolitan Police had much to do with the regulation of the early omnibuses. The lack of uniform on the driver and conductor show that the New Central was a recently formed enterprise. Note that the passengers are all middle class, as at this time public transport had not yet become affordable for ordinary people. Evidence of horse-drawn traffic can be seen in the road.

PRE-WORLD WAR I BUSES

The Leyland reputation for reliability and sound engineering soon spread and from 1910–14 vehicles were being sold in many parts of the country, as well as a few places abroad. For example, the British-owned tramway companies at Cape Town and Lisbon each took charabancs with Leyland-built covered bodies. Many tramway undertakings began to experiment with buses on routes to feed their lines and the British Electric Traction Co. (BET) began thinking of establishing networks of bus routes rather than tramways. It was the BET that was to place the first block order for fifty buses for use at Barnsley, Kidderminster and Worcester, towns where the company wished to expand beyond the confines of its existing tram tracks. The placing of block orders was to continue from the 1920s until the 1960s, with Leyland usually benefiting from an annual large order for chassis that would be spread among member companies in the group. BET also established bus services away from places where it had tramways through a subsidiary, the British Automobile Traction Co.

Leyland even entered the tramway field, by building four petrol-driven trams for Morecambe and several for use abroad. These cars had an engine and radiator at one end like a bus, with a duplicate set of controls at the other end. There was also a petrol railcar for South Africa, but it was to be the 1930s before the company took a serious interest in this form of passenger transport. Subsequently, the joint AEC and Leyland enterprise British United Traction contributed to the British Railways modernization plan in the 1950s and 1960s, with large numbers of engines, transmissions and control gear for use in railway cars.

Leyland Motors built four petrol-driven tramcars for use at Morecambe, to run from Battery Inn to Heysham. There were three enclosed cars and one open one, built 1911–13 on under-frames by the United Electric Car Co. of Preston, which also built the bodies. There was an engine at one end, with duplicate controls at the other. The service ceased in 1924. These cars and a small number exported were the precursors of the Leyland railcars of the 1930s. PICTURE POSTCARD

A Leyland model-U chassis fitted with a body by the United Electric Car Co., Preston, for Todmorden Corporation. Early buses for the provinces followed the London pattern.

An early roofed ‘toast-rack’ body, probably also by UEC under contract to Leyland Motors, for export to the British-owned tramway in Lisbon. This was for serving feeder routes to tram services and is open in deference to the local climate (many of the Lisbon trams were of the ‘toast-rack’ type). New in 1912, its official description was ‘char-a-banc with fixed canopy and back’.

An early enclosed single-deck bus, built for export to Cape Town. Passengers entered by a central door in the back. Simple timber bodywork of this type was commonplace on small vehicles in sunny climates, but bodies to withstand the British climate were usually more substantial.

Up to 1914 and beyond, there was no real distinction between bus and lorry chassis. Some vehicles were even provided with two bodies, allowing the owner to change between carrying goods or carrying passengers according to the traffic on offer. When the 1914–18 war began, the military authorities commandeered many bus chassis for war purposes, but the bus bodies remained with their owners and were fitted on other chassis during or after the hostilities. Some complete buses were used by the army to transport troops to the front in western France. These were AEC buses taken from London. In the provinces at the time, the buses and charabancs were too diverse to be of use to the armed forces as buses, as they required standard types. Therefore, while Leyland bus chassis were commandeered because they had much in common with Leyland lorries, some other makes of buses were not taken because their chassis were not of a suitable type for the battlefields.

CHARABANCS

There will be numerous references in the following pages to charabancs, a type of motor bus current from about 1905 into the 1920s, and not really dying out until the early 1930s. The proprietor...