Ray Smyth:
coomsey:
0
This is Ridgmont works Ray you can count them at your leisure. While I’ve got you was Midland Red coaches Leopards or am I imagining all wrong n do you know what top speed was cheers coomseyHi Coomsey, Thanks for your comments and picture. I don’t know vey much about Midland Red vehicles, but I do know that the
company built a large number of its own buses. Regarding the motorway coaches, it was fairly common to be overtaken by one
of their coaches on the M1, usually doing the best part of 80 M.P.H. It would be interesting to learn what engine and transmission
was in these “Flying Machines”. Kind Regards, Ray.
Read about it here theguardian.com/theguardian … rrier-1959
and another link which wont work so an excerpt from it.
In developing the motorway express versions of the type C5 coach, BMMO engineers at Central works took an early unfinished vehicle from the second production batch of BMMO C5 coaches, fleet number 4801 (registration number 801HHA), and experimented with fitting turbochargers, thus this vehicle became the prototype CM5T coach. The standard BMMO 8.028-litre engine was fitted with a CAV turbocharger, increasing the power output by 37bhp, and a five-speed “crash” overdrive gearbox replaced the standard four-speed unit. Engineers also upgraded the differential, changing the ratio from 4.78:1 to 4.44:1.
The Prototype underwent extensive testing at the MIRA test track near Nuneaton, in both semi-finished and completed forms, and achieved speeds of up to 85mph. This speed was extremely impressive as the legal speed limit for coaches prior to this time was 30mph, and the average family car struggled to reach 70mph. BMMO officially listed the top speed at 76mph, with a surprisingly fugal fuel consumption of around 15mpg."
Oily