This report shows just “how clued up” the Leyland management were regarding customers. They eventually got their way killing of all pure AEC production apart from the Reliance and ended up with just the Marathon until the T45 was launched and even that was transferred to Scammell and Guy at some point. It was like they couldnt see further than their own products pushing the headless wonder in place of the 505 , they started fitting the 760 (L12) into some Leylands trying to entice AEC customers to the Leyland ranks with very little success . Ive said this before , AEC never really updated any of the ergo range and I stand corrected but believe they were still fitting the old ratchet style handbrake to the Reliance until it went out of production. Could this have been a deliberate ploy to undermine AEC products in the hope their customers would move to Leyland . Think of it another way , what if AEC had been given a chance to improve their own products without the restraints of BL ( I dont think they were ever a fan of the ergo ) they were selling well without improvements what if they had updated them , and I dont mean spending millions just sensible adjustments. The group needed either splitting up or slimming down but the way they did it was very questionable