Stagecoach North West Discussion

[mbonwick]

Dallamlad - do you know if 20898 will go back to chorley when they have finished with 20451?

20661 was in reserve at Morecambe, it would make sense that this has ended up at Kendal at it will be a direct replacement for 20775, which was written of in an RTA back in the summer.

The Darts at Kendal are ex-Merseyside, and will eventually replace the Marshall examples, which will move to Lillyhall to replace the last 709Ds. The extra capacity these Darts will bring to Kendal, however small, is much needed.

 

[Dallamlad]

I would assume that 20451 will come back to us eventually once Chorley has finished with it. However this may take a while and it may even be the case that the swap is permanent. The reason Chorley wanted 20451 they wanted a single decker with digital tachograph fitted for use on private hires, and 20451 was selected (possibly as it is now a allocated as a reserve fleet vehicle).

Yes i don't know why i said the Marshall's were Dennis as their obviously not. e should get a pair from Kendal lol sick of seeing B6's around the place!!!

 

[mbonwick]

You're probably right about the 20898/20451 swap being permanant.
Does anybody know if there's any way of knowing which vehicles are fitted with tachographs?


If Lancaster were to get any Darts to enable the withdrawal of B6s, the Darts would surely come from the ever increasing pool at Lillyhall.

 

[Dallamlad]

Not a clue about finding out about tachographs.

Yeah if Lillyhall have a large collection building up they may come from there. However there seems to be a lot of vehicles passing through the Northwest from Merseyside so we may see some more form down there.

 

[driver9000]

In the Stagecoach fleet list a Tacho fitted bus was itendtified by a lower case t after the fleet number ie 14174t.

The rules regarding tachographs have changed since I was a driver, these days tachos are recorded digitally using a unit that looks like a cheap car radio, older analogue tachos recorded onto a disc that was fitted to the recording head behind the speedo head. Not sure if its correct but I believe all buses had to be fitted with tachgraph recording equipment by the end of 2006, B10Ms seem to have theirs fitted below the ticket machine, and Tridents have theirs over the windscreen where the destination viewing ports normally are.

As I recall 20451, R reg Olympians, 52xxx coaches, 17014 had Tachos fitted.

 

[cainebj]

if any darts were to be transferred from lillyhall, i'd guess it would be the reserve N reg ones.
was nice to see both ex preston solo's on moorclose circular today! and both of the 08's on mirehouse circular!
lillyhall could really do with 2 more enviro 300's, but i doubt this will ever happen! if by some miracle 2 more enviro 300's appeared for the 31, it would free up the versa and a 56reg dart, meaning the versa could be reassigned a route with branding (ideally Northside 48, currently ran by whatever is going spare, could be a 709, could be a H reg olympian, which is pretty ridiculous!).
i noticed today some of the flip dots on the K reg B10m's still say "school [graphic] special" i would have thought this had been sorted out by now! as they have been like this since the 31 frizington - maryport was introduced in april! when the enviro's were put into service! the LED displays actually show the graphic.
at lillyhall, only the buses used on EU rota are fitted with taco's, all digital i think. not sure where they are located on the K reg B10m's, but i'd guess the jonckheeres for X4/X5 have them under the ticket machine, like VRR 447. RBZ 5459 tacograph is located where the radio was.

 

[Dallamlad]

I don't care what Darts we get as long as we get something lol.

Someone mentioned Lancaster's ex Fleetwood solos a view posts back and mentioned seating. I don't think Lancaster have put new seating in. We took possession of them with the new style seating as they are 51 plates you can clearly see they wear and tare if you look closely.

Havent been out on the buses today so don't have any observations.

Anyone got some news on recent vehicle movements in the Northwest? Kendal seem to be doing well don't they!

 

[mbonwick]

I think the rules are that if a tacho is not fitted then the buses roster (what services it will be working) MUST be in the vehicle.

What you said about the Lillyhall services cainebj sounds very logical and sensible, so will never happen

Dallamlad - I thoguht the seat's weren't retrimmed, but I had a sneaking suspicion.....

 

[cainebj]

L119 HHV should be available in january, but i think it would be better off in a scrap yard! can't wait for the lillyhall 709s to disappear! they are terrible! the one running harrington 46 yesterday sounded like it was going to explode! think it was N645 VOD or something like that. was definately N??? VOD.
havn't seen M595 OSO for a while. would be nice if the K reg B10m's were brought up to the same standard! M595 has LED front, side and rear displays! the side one is the same as on the 56reg darts / enviro's / 08 reg solo's etc. shame the engine doesnt sound as good!
would be nice if lillyhall R reg olympians were replaced with tridents, but just like the 2 enviro 300's that lillyhall could do with, it would be a miracle if it happened! seems to me like lillyhall depot is improving town services more than the longer distance services (2 hours each way the R reg olympians run! Whitehaven - Carlisle. it is limited stop most of the way too!)

 

[Dallamlad]

That's a point, they may have been re-trimmed when we got them. Just got a good going over as they have been around for about 7 years so must be warn lol.

I hope they consider putting new seating in our old solos. Some of them I'm sure haven't been Stagecoach all their lives and have seating with odd patterns on them.

 

[cainebj]

they should replace seating in them, to match the rest of the solo fleet. then again, it is stagecoach. when they got the Mayne buses, most of them just had stagecoach stuck onto them! really suprised they weren't painted into the stagecoach corporate livery!
i'm suprised at how many reserve vehicles lillyhall have just sitting there wasting away! M166 CCD would be better off on the x4 / x5 service instead of a K reg B10m. i think the operations managers need to get themselves some common sense! not sure about other depot's, but carlisle and lillyhall definately have the resources available to improve their services, but nothing is happening about them!

 

[driver9000]

I stand open to correction but as I remember:

If the driver is employed on Stagecarriage timetabled services not exceeding 31 miles in length then he is working under 'domestic' rules and doesnt need a tachograph but must be able to produce a printed schedule card showing his breaks and carries a timetable for the route. If the driver is working a Stagecarriage timetabled service exceeding 31 miles, he is working under 'EC' rules but is exempt from a tachograph if he has a printed schedule card and a route timetable in addition he has to carry his roster. If he hasnt got a schedule card or the service isnt timetabled he must use a tachograph set to the correct settings and keep it for 7 days after which he must hand it in to the depot. I know the rules were changed in 2006 so my knowledge is probably a bit out of date, the 42 when it ran Morecambe-Blackpool didnt have to use a tachograph fitted bus, and Im pretty certain the 555 doesnt either. The 40/41 was under 31 miles in length so was considered a domestic route. There are different rules for mixed EC/Domestic driving which is essentialy EC rules, but you need to abide by the EC rules regarding tachograph carrying and driving hours.....

As I say its been a few years since I was involved in tachographs so have forgotten the rules a bit..

 

[mbonwick]

The overall 555 route must surely be over 31mi as it's nearly 20 from Kendal to Lancaster, along the route it takes. However, no driver works through from Lancaster to Keswick without a layover at Kendal and a swap of drivers.


Lancaster have put coach style seats into their ex-Kirkby Lonsdale Solos. 47156/7/9, 47160 have been done I think.

 

[driver9000]

The overall 555 route must surely be over 31mi as it's nearly 20 from Kendal to Lancaster, along the route it takes. However, no driver works through from Lancaster to Keswick without a layover at Kendal and a swap of drivers.

The 555 is definitely over 31 miles I think the rule applied to the drivers mileage, not the actual route mileage. Route mileage for the 42 was something like 33 miles so it was EC, but the route was contained in a dedicated roster with drivers working the route exclusively, as well as 40 & 41 so we worked it under EC rules not mixed. When Lancater had a reshuffle and the 42 was cut back to Lancaster Bus Station the EC roster was disbanded, and the peak workings of the 42 curtailed to Homfray Avenue (which is the EC boundary at 30 miles).

RBZ5459 (52268) definitely has a tachograph fitted, I used to drive it on Rail Replacement coach services between Carlisle & Preston, former National Express coach, fantastic machine to cruise up the M6 on a summers evening

 

[Dallamlad]

When you say Kirby Lonsdale do you mean Kirby Lonsdale coach hire? If so why the hell did they get of their solos? Their fleet is dominated by Mercs (they have one solo but its owned by the council) which are awful machines as we know!!!

PS: I think your right about the solos but I'm sure at least one still hasn't been done as it was running the 10 the other day. Funnily enough its been repainted but not reseated.

 

[cainebj]

i liked RBZ5459. had it on sixth form contract quite a lot last academic year. ran really well. can't remember if it was RBZ or VRR, but a woman driver got more out of it that all the male drivers i ever had on it! to get to sixth form, there is a steep hill to get up, which most buses / coaches stick between 15mph and 20mph at the steepest part, the woman driver got over 30mph! have no idea how, but she done it! especially with the auto box on them! i always found RBZ better than VRR, even though they are pretty much the same!
wish i was still on stagecoach at times! would be interesting to see how lillyhall vehicles perform on the new dual carriageway that opened this week! on the other hand, i know the boss' son of the company i travel with now, so i get all the latest updates off him :P

 

[Dallamlad]

I like having Stagecoach for our school runs but sometimes wish we had a warm coach lol

 

[cainebj]

a warm coach is really nice on these cold winter mornings! i only had stagecoach from march 2008 until july 2008.
one good thing about not being with stagecoach, apart from the nice heaters on the coach, is i don't have to put up with stupid "autocheck routine" anymore on destination displays those autocheck routines were pretty annoying! don't think RBZ done them, but VRR did! and 20107 side display done it a lot! it didnt even work but it done autocheck routine! you could hear the stuff inside it spinning around!
i wonder what is going to happen to all these 709s coming off service soon! surely not all of them will go into reserve. there are already plenty of them in reserve at lillyhall! something i havnt understood yet, 10 709s in service at lillyhall, but they have an S reg vario on reserve surely would make much more sense having that vario in service

 

[Dallamlad]

Haha your dam right about the heaters lol

Yeah common sense is something Stagecoach seem to lack. However its easy for us to criticize when we know nothing of the stuff behind the scenes. I would imagine some of them may be sold off and some kept in reserve. But who knows lol.

 

[cainebj]

lillyhall staff don't seem to know much about what is happening! i know a trainee fitter, and he hasnt got a clue what happens with things! as far as he knows, a bus goes into the inspection pit, he checks it, reports findings, and fixes things. havn't had chance to talk to a driver yet, but most of the time, they find out things a week before they happen! sometimes, things just happen without prior notice!
would be good if stagecoach boss' seen everything we say, then they might decide to look into it and see if anything can be done! as the saying goes, the customer (in this case the passenger) is always right

 

[Dallamlad]

Very true would be funny if they cam eon here and looked at what we said we should send an anonymous link via email lol

Lancaster seem to be quite on the ball to be honest. I think their one of the better depots around would u agree?

Did you see my comment about Kirby Lonsdale?

 

[cainebj]

i havn't really had chance to look at how lancaster depot run their services, but i'd say out of stagecoach northwest, lancaster and preston would be the best! lillyhall could have had the potential to be pretty good, but due to the large size, they get landed with all the out of service crap that will most likely never be touched again! loads of vehicles in lillyhall depot, but services are really poor! there used to be 4 routes on moorclose circular, and they cutback to 2. lillyhall also lost the 222 service. that meant 3 extra buses were going spare. i think they took up a new route, but have never seen that run yet! they really should have re-organised everything. new rota's were introduced with the arrival of the enviro 300's, but in my opinion, services are getting worse!

 

[Dallamlad]

What a shame. Lancaster only have about 100 vehicles so quite small really. kendal's OK but in my opinion it should be taken over by Lancaster and run as an outpost. So all the admin would be done down here and the vehicles run out of Kendal. Would save a lot of Money.

Its a shame Lillyhall are getting new buses when from what I've heard their just going to let them deteriorate as time goes on. It would be shame and a waste that if in 5 years their new Versa or indeed the Enviro 300's were nearly dead as it has been predicted by some.

Heres a blast from the past http://jel-rally.fotopic.net/p36763059.html

Also anyone remember these old things? We had a few in Lancaster but they were sold off to another bus company a few years ago
http://jel-rally.fotopic.net/p30825255.html

 

[driver9000]

RBZ is a powerful coach, I used to get on the M6 at J34 to head north and be doing 60mph by the top of the hill. I was quite sad when it got replaced with stickbox 52027. I remember the Javelins in your link they were awesome people eaters and at 63 seats no other saloon came close to them! Perfect for 55s to Silverdale and were a pleasure to drive.

 

[mbonwick]

I did mean Kirkby Lonsdale Coach Hire, yes. I tihnk it was something to do with town contracts - those Solos were part council funded or something. However, in early 2000 I think, KLCH lost those contracts so the Solos were handed to Stagecoach, who won the contracts.


cainebj, the Vario may be in reserve because of a gearbox, or other unseen fault. Lillyhall have been told to stop replacing gearboxes on the Mercs, so that may be why....


Those Javelins have had an interesting life. Off the top of my head, I can't remember where they came from, but I do know that after Lancaster, they were sold for scrap.
The scrap merchant paid bottom price for them, but as soon has he saw them, he realised what potential the Javelins had, so he sold them to some small operator down south.

 

[Dallamlad]

Yeah I think they were sold to a company called blue bird or something along those lines anyway lol.

I didn't know Kirby used to have solos for Lancaster routes how interesting and what a shame they lost them. Can you remember what routes Stagecoach took over? Kirby have gained a few more school routes this year and have 2 new B10B's and a Dennis Javalin that is similar to Battersby's yellow school coaches.

http://gez.fotopic.net/p54349574.html

http://gez.fotopic.net/p50989076.html

 

[mbonwick]

No idea what routes they lost.

Personally, I think Kirkby's Coaches are a very mixed bag...I think they should try for some form of fleet standardisation.

 

[Dallamlad]

I agree if you look at their fleetlist (follow this think http://www.freewebs.com/nwbus/fleetlists.htm their under Cumbria independents) they seem to have a lot of Mercs and a few coaches. I think from looking at the company the issue is most probably money. I doubt they have enough funding to attempt to standardise or modernise the fleet. They should try for some old Darts. Would look a hell of a lot better then the Mercs. Also their Branding should change. Their vehicles are mainly white which means most of the time they look grubby which is a real shame. Just need more money I guess.

 

[cainebj]

lillyhall enviro 300's already seem to be on their way out! well, not on their way out, but are needing repaired quite a lot already! something about engine mounts breaking. it seems to be happening to all of them, so it could be manufacturing fault. not sure.

not sure about the vario either. as far as i know, the fitters still work on the vario's, just not the 709s.

seems like one of the solo's are off service again!!! K reg B10m on moorclose circular today! i think there was a K reg B10m on Thornhill 30 too! which is normally an enviro 300!

click here to see a picture of R252 NBV with branding for 300 / 301, which is now non-existant branding! (this picture is not owned by me. it is a link to Fotopic)

 

[driver9000]

The Solos that Stagecoach got from Kirkby Lonsdale were 2004 models and were actually owned by Lancashire County Council, they were operated on routes 81, 81A, 81B. When the contract was changed over Stagecoach won the renewal and bought the Solos from LCC at knockdown price - I have some photos of them taken on the day they arrived at Morecambe garage and will post them when I find them! Around this time there was a big shakeup of LCC tendered routes which included rerouting of some routes and the loss of other routes such as the 85 Lancaster-Over Kellet via Beaumont and the 490 Railway Station-Carnforth via Halton & Kellets. Kirkby Lonsdale used the Solos on the tendered services on the 81 group Lancaster-Kirkby Lonsdale.

The Javelins are ex-Hampshire Bus and as far as I can tell they are now with Northern Blue.

Until 2004 Stagecoach operated route 8 (St Chads-Moor Hospital-St Chads circular) using a 709D, however this route wasnt commercially viable to the company and withdrew the service - Sunday No.7 still operates via Ryelands, and LCC started a contact service which today is the 8A/8C service which is a much larger route than the old Stagecoach commercial No.8 service. Kirkby Lonsdale operate this group of services with Vario 814s mainly.