gingerfold:
Having seen the Sabre at an AEC Society Rally its engine compartment is quite spacious and it was well vented, so air circulation around the engine was much better than the Mandator V8 engine installation. The radiator appeared to be about twice the capacity of a Mandator V8 radiator, so Carryfast does make a valid point earlier about engine operating constraints and cooling. The Sabre has an ECW body so it is heavier by about 1 ton than a contemporary AH760 Reliance, but with 247 bhp on tap that is not an issue. Incidentally it has the same back axle and double reduction diff as used in the Mercury 26 tons gvw tractor unit, also the 24 tons gvw 6x2 Marshal, so itâs a red herring to say that the Reliance had a back axle that wouldnât take extra power. The AEC / Maudslay back axle design was a well engineered, robust, and reliable unit. Those same axles became the basis of Rockwell axles when Leyland sold the Maudslay plant at Great Alne to Rockwell, who incidentally were quite happy to host an Autumn AEC Rally one year. The reason the AEC / Maudslay axle wasnât used in the Marathon was because itâs design and engineering quality made it more costly to manufacture than other Leyland group axles.
The Sabre was new to a London operator and Kempâs bought it second hand. I donât think that in Kempâs ownership it ever did much serious coaching work, but some PSV enthusiasts will know its operational life.
The Queensland export orderâs ? service life might provide some interesting answers regarding the V8 saga. Although my guess is it was always going to be on the back foot v Detroit in the day bus or truck.
Hopefully cav might appreciate this more than Ramone.
My point was that AEC had the vision of and realising building a high powered coach , something no other British or foreign manufacturer at the time were doing or making available over here. We all no the V8 power unit wasnt any good due to reasons discussed at length in another thread. What Im trying to say is that when the TL12 was launched surely someone must have thought about dropping it in the Sabre having spent money developing the chassis and not being able to use it . The TL12 would have been well on top of the job at 273 bhp but it never happened. They didn`t need to use outside supplies of engines when they had one at their disposal
It all boils down to what has been discussed many times on other threads about Leyland. Leyland in the 1970s was bust and had no money to fund any more new developments. The Marathon was developed on shoe-string funding. Existing models had to struggle on with what they had.
The Sabre must have cost a small fortune; it would be interesting to know what its sale price was. A totally new chassis design and the ECW body design was non-standard. If it ever went to auction Iâd wager on a 6 figure selling price. Canât blame Kempâs for not taking it out very often.
Hi Graham, Thank you for your post and comments. I was aware that the offset/offside driveline as in picture 1 was fairly
common with bus chassis manufacturers, but I am intrigued with the driveline in picture 2, particularly where a short drive
shaft turns through 90 deg to the nearside of he chassis, was the diff at this point ? and did any other makers use this layout
other than Bristol and Dennis ?
Carryfast:
The Queensland export orderâs ? service life might provide some interesting answers regarding the V8 saga. Although my guess is it was always going to be on the back foot v Detroit in the day bus or truck.
Hopefully cav might appreciate this more than Ramone.
My point was that AEC had the vision of and realising building a high powered coach , something no other British or foreign manufacturer at the time were doing or making available over here. We all no the V8 power unit wasnt any good due to reasons discussed at length in another thread. What Im trying to say is that when the TL12 was launched surely someone must have thought about dropping it in the Sabre having spent money developing the chassis and not being able to use it . The TL12 would have been well on top of the job at 273 bhp but it never happened. They didn`t need to use outside supplies of engines when they had one at their disposal
I agree with you the AV760/TL12 was obviously the natural progression from the 690 powered RMC/L,but Detroits were the obvious default V configuration choice in the day even moreso in bus applications.At what point do we start calling it conspiracy not â â â â up ?.Although obviously not helped by the weird backward operator expectations which afflicted the all important domestic market.Although as weâve seen the foreign competition conveniently had no trouble in that regard,in pushing those expectations into the late 20th century,before it jumped.
Ray Smyth:
Hi Graham, Thank you for your post and comments. I was aware that the offset/offside driveline as in picture 1 was fairly
common with bus chassis manufacturers, but I am intrigued with the driveline in picture 2, particularly where a short drive
shaft turns through 90 deg to the nearside of he chassis, was the diff at this point ? and did any other makers use this layout
other than Bristol and Dennis ?
Kind Regards, Ray.
I cannot make out what is happening in the second photo. It was also quite common to locate the gearbox mid-chassis on PSV chassis.
Regarding Lolines; all I know is that the fitters at the corporation reckoned they were the worst buses that they had. Of course at that time they were still operating some trolleybuses (until 1968) as well, plus a few old AEC Regents and also Reliance single deckers.
This bloke seemed to have all the answers to a British high powered coach , obviously not taken up by any of the manufacturers he even costed the exercises out with different running gear For some reason I can`t post the link
Ray Smyth:
Hi Graham, Thank you for your post and comments. I was aware that the offset/offside driveline as in picture 1 was fairly
common with bus chassis manufacturers, but I am intrigued with the driveline in picture 2, particularly where a short drive
shaft turns through 90 deg to the nearside of he chassis, was the diff at this point ? and did any other makers use this layout
other than Bristol and Dennis ?
Kind Regards, Ray.
I cannot make out what is happening in the second photo. It was also quite common to locate the gearbox mid-chassis on PSV chassis.
Bristol Built two prototype lodekkas one went to Bristol the other to West Yorkshire. They had the chassis where the shaft from the gearbox was taken to both sides of the chassis half way down and from here there was a drive shaft back to each rear wheel. The bodies were hashed up by ECW from existing bodies. The chassis suffered from broken half shafts in service and the production model came out with the single prop shaft to the offside of the rear drop axle. ECW designed a new body for it.
I found this picture on the Bootle History Forum site. A Liverpool Corporation AEC Regent Mk 3 at the Pier Head
on route 86, and a Crosville Bristol K at its terminus in front of the Cunard Building. Ray Smyth.
Hi Pete, Yes, the Bristol Lodekka was an unusual machine, particularly in the line of the transmission.
First picture shows the driveline coming down the chassis on the offside, and then dividing at the diff
to the drivewheels. The second picture shows the diff is further up the chassis, and the driveline going
rearwards and across from this point. I believe the Lodekka was a reliable vehicle, they had a choice
of engines from the start, Gardner 5LW, Gardner 6LW, Bristols own engine, and later, some were fitted
with Gardner 6LX. Ray.
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Sorry Ray but the transmission line you describe was standard industry practice for all low body double decker chassis, and also for most standard height bodied chassis. Thereâs nothing unusual about that layout.
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Certainly the Lodekka was the first really successful low floor design, the drop centre rear axle which is a feature of modern low floor buses really started with this vehicle.
The second photograph shows one of the prototype designs with the drive being split through 90 degrees mid chassis ⌠vaguely similar to the Albion Reiver in principle. The important thing about the Lodekka/Loline transmission in production was that the dropdown gears for the gearbox output shaft reversed propshaft direction.
As you can probably tell from my posts i know very little about buses , so what were the main problems with the Swift and wasnât there a Merlin. I know the Leyland National was launched in the 70s but i heard they werenât too clever either , were they developed to cover other rear engined offerings from the group?
ramone:
As you can probably tell from my posts i know very little about buses , so what were the main problems with the Swift and wasnât there a Merlin. I know the Leyland National was launched in the 70s but i heard they werenât too clever either , were they developed to cover other rear engined offerings from the group?
I remember the Leyland National coming out. Compared with their predecessors they looked the â â â â â â â â but were noisy, very uncomfortable and unreliable - horrible things, and in no way a celebration of a newly nationalised sector; the Bristol MW did a better job at that 20 years earlier! Robert
The Swift was a rear engined single deck stage carriage design with the AEC AV505 engine. The Merlin was basically the same bus but with the AV691 at the behest of London Transport who bought most of those built. The AV505 Swift was the better one of the two. The Merlin was found wanting in London traffic conditions and suffered from over heating problems. They were often seen at the side of the road steaming well with a pool of coolant underneath.
The Leyland National was built at the new Leyland bus factory at Workington and it had the headless wonder Leyland 500 series engine (not sure which variant but at a guess the 510). They were noisy - sounded like a bag of nails jumbled up with nuts and bolts - smokey and unreliable. Enough said!
Although my guess is it was always going to be on the back foot v Detroit in the day bus or truck.
