Trivia: Dennis Dart and Trident

[scosutsut]

I'm curious and wondered if anyone could offer any insight.

According to a combination of memory and googling, the original Dennis Dart was launched in 1989, the SLF version in 1996, followed by the Trident in 1997.

If you follow the Darts lineage it appears to continue, through various owners and name changes, right up to the current Enviro 200 MMC and the Enviro 400 MMC/City products.

Is it fair to link them in that way? I'm sure I've read on here before that E200 MMCs have Dart 4 on their manufacturing plates?

If so has at any time has there been a blank page redesign of either chassis or are we essentially travelling on, I assume gently or significantly modified designs dating back over 25 years now?

Also do the current MMC/City bodies owe / reveal any link to the Pointer, President or ALX200/400 generations of bodywork?

 

[cnjb8]

I'm curious and wondered if anyone could offer any insight.

According to a combination of memory and googling, the original Dennis Dart was launched in 1989, the SLF version in 1996, followed by the Trident in 1997.

If you follow the Darts lineage it appears to continue, through various owners and name changes, right up to the current Enviro 200 MMC and the Enviro 400 MMC/City products.

Is it fair to link them in that way? I'm sure I've read on here before that E200 MMCs have Dart 4 on their manufacturing plates?

If so has at any time has there been a blank page redesign of either chassis or are we essentially travelling on, I assume gently or significantly modified designs dating back over 25 years now?

Also do the current MMC/City bodies owe / reveal any link to the Pointer, President or ALX200/400 generations of bodywork?

I've always thought the E200MMCs take more in terms of design from the Plaxton Centro rather than the E200, particularly at the rear.

 

[fgwrich]

I've always thought the E200MMCs take more in terms of design from the Plaxton Centro rather than the E200, particularly at the rear.

Oddly, I've always felt that the E200 MMC has a little part of the ALX 200 in it - particularly the wide destination screen and curved roof, as well as the squared windows.

 

[Jordan Adam]

E200MMCs do indeed still say "Dart 4" on the chassis plate.

As far as I'm aware there has never been a blank redesign but it has been a gradual evolution over time. For example when the Enviro400 launched they still continued to use the Euro 3 Cummins ISC 8.3L engine that Trident/ALX400s used before switching to the smaller Euro 4 Cummins ISB 6.7L.

Photo showing the chassis plate on First Aberdeen 67086:

 

[route101]

I always think the curved roof at the back of the E200MMC make it look like the buses you see in Paris.

 

[Tom Gallacher]

I'm curious and wondered if anyone could offer any insight.

According to a combination of memory and googling, the original Dennis Dart was launched in 1989, the SLF version in 1996, followed by the Trident in 1997.

If you follow the Darts lineage it appears to continue, through various owners and name changes, right up to the current Enviro 200 MMC and the Enviro 400 MMC/City products.

Is it fair to link them in that way? I'm sure I've read on here before that E200 MMCs have Dart 4 on their manufacturing plates?

If so has at any time has there been a blank page redesign of either chassis or are we essentially travelling on, I assume gently or significantly modified designs dating back over 25 years now?

Also do the current MMC/City bodies owe / reveal any link to the Pointer, President or ALX200/400 generations of bodywork?

The original Dart was an integral called the Duple Dartline with the Cummins 6BT engine and Allison AT545 gearbox (the same units were used in the MCW Metrorider without the turbo). When Duple closed the design was offered to Carlyle. They didn't want to take on the chassis building part but were happy to body any chassis to the same design as that used by Duple. Wrights also took up the option to provide bodies. In 1993 the braking system was slightly tweaked changing from imperial to metric measurements. The SLF introduced the flat floor, air suspension and the Euro 2 engine but basically everything else was the same.

2000 saw the introduction of the Euro 3 standard and another tweaking of the braking system with NG (next generation) braking components and the Allison 2000 gearbox.

The Enviro range was originally called the Enviro Dart but the suffix Dart seems to have fallen out of use. These introduced disc brakes and Euro engines and a few other little changes.

 

[jammy36]

M

The original Dart was an integral called the Duple Dartline with the Cummins 6BT engine and Allison AT545 gearbox (the same units were used in the MCW Metrorider without the turbo). When Duple closed the design was offered to Carlyle. They didn't want to take on the chassis building part but were happy to body any chassis to the same design as that used by Duple.

This isn't quite correct. The original Dart wasn't an integral - in the true sense - it was always a body on chassis design. The bodywork was by Hestair Duple and the chassis was by Dennis Specialist Vehicles. Both companies were then owned by the Hestair Group.

The original chassis was 9m long and 2.3m wide and had a rear mounted engine - with both the Cummins 6BT and lower powered (non Turbo) 6B being options at launch. As you say these were paired with Allison AT545 four-speed transmission.

The Duple body itself was steel framed with aluminium bonded panels. It wasn't actually a brand-new design. The framing constructionally being based on Hestair Duple's 300 series bus body.

Hestair Group sold both Duple and Dennis to a management buy out team, so the two continued as sister companies under common ownership (as Trinity Holdings). When the decision was taken to close Duple in 1989 the design rights for the Dartline (as Duple called their body design) was sold to Carlyle of Birmingham who initially built the body at Duple's old Blackpool facility before the jigs transferred to their own works in Birmingham.

With the body and chassis manufacturers no longer in common ownership Dennis were able to offer the chassis for others to body.

 

[ChrisPJ]

Disclaimer - not an engineer

But as with any long running design there is unlikely to be much shared DNA between a Hestair era Dart and a MMC under NFI ownership (think how the Ford Fiesta has evolved for instance)

There isn't likely to be much common componentry as almost everything has changed at one model revision or another. You might find that the wheel nuts are still the same or something

Slightly different question. Is it still possible in 2022 to buy a "Dennis" chassis with another coach builders bodywork, either here or overseas?

 

[DunsBus]

Disclaimer - not an engineer

But as with any long running design there is unlikely to be much shared dna between a Hestair era Dart and a MMC under NFI ownership (think how the Ford Fiesta has evolved for instance)

Common componentry there isn't likely to be much as almost everything has changed at one model revision or another. You might find that the wheel nuts are still the same or something

Slightly different question. Is it still possible in 2022 to buy a "Dennis" chassis with another coach builders bodywork? Either here or overseas

You could also class the Volvo-era Olympian likewise. Very little in common with the Leyland version save for the name and (initially) one of the drivelines.
And there was the Optare Spectra, planned as a simple reworking of the MCW Metrobus.

 

[Mikey C]

If the original and far more radical Enviro 200 had caught on (the one with a door at the back), then maybe there would have been a clean break, the the Dart SLF being the end of the Dart lineage.

 

[37114]

Slightly different question. Is it still possible in 2022 to buy a "Dennis" chassis with another coach builders bodywork, either here or overseas?

I don't think so, the last were probably the E200s and E400s bodied with Optare (Nee East Lancs) bodywork for London in 2009

 

[bussnapperwm]

Here's some trivia about the Dart/ Trident.

Until 2012, National Express was the only group not to have brought big batches of the Dart, with only a handful on Wright Handybus, Plaxton Pointer and Wright Crusader bodies (and then they only brought 100ish examples of the E200 & MMC, compared to nearly 1000 Trident/ALX400, E400, E400MMC and E400 Citys)

 

[JonathanH]

Until 2012, NX was the only group not to have brought big batches of the Dart, with only a handful on Wright Handybus, Plaxton Pointer and Wright Crusader bodies (and then they only brought 100ish examples of the E200 & MMC, compared to nearly 1000 Trident/ALX400, E400, E400MMC and E400 Citys)

Isn't that just because NX don't have a significant requirement for Dart-sized buses, preferring longer single dockers?

Didn't Travel London buses bought Darts / MPDs in National Express days, before selling up to Abellio?