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Bus manufacturing, a sector of the automotive industry, [1] manufactures buses and coaches.
Bus manufacturing had its earliest origins in carriage building. Other bus manufacturers had their origins in truck manufacturing. Historically, chassis designs were shared between trucks and buses, but in later years specific bus chassis have been developed, and the midibus introduced a lighter weight bus chassis than normal trucks.
Bus manufacture historically developed as chassis and body builds. Often, large bus operators or authorities would maintain separate stocks of bus bodies, and would routinely refurbish buses in a central works, and refurbished chassis might receive a different body. One of the first integral type bus designs combining the body and chassis was the AEC Routemaster.
In the 1980s, many minibuses were built by applying bus bodies to van chassis, so called van-derived buses. Many of these have been replaced by purpose-built designs, although for smaller minibuses this is still an option.
In several parts of the world, the bus is still a basic chassis, front-engined, rear-wheel-drive vehicle; however, where manufacturers have sought to maximise the seating capacity within legal size constraints, the trend is now towards rear- and mid-engined designs due to the lack of need for a transmission tunnel.
In the 1990s, bus manufacture underwent major change with the push toward low-floor designs, for improved accessibility. Some smaller designs achieved this by moving the door behind the front wheels. On most larger buses, it was achieved with various independent front suspension arrangements, and kneeling technology, to allow an unobstructed path into the door and between the front wheel arches. Accordingly, these 'extreme front entrance' designs cannot feature a front-mounted-engined or mid-engined layout, and all use a rear-engined arrangement. Some designs also incorporate extendable ramps for wheelchair access.
Further accessibility is being achieved for high-floor coaches, whereby new designs are featuring built-in wheelchair lifts.
While the overwhelming majority of bus designs have been geared to internal combustion engine propulsion, accommodation has also been made for a variety of alternative drivelines and fuels, as in electric, fuel cell and hybrid bus technologies. Some bus designs have also incorporated guidance technology.
There are three basic types of bus manufacturer:
Manufacturers may also be a combination of the above, offering chassis only or integral buses, or offering bodywork only as used on integral buses.
The splitting of body and chassis construction allows companies to specialise in two different fields. It also allows differing offerings of product to customers, who might prefer different chassis/body combinations. For the manufacturers, it lessens the exposure if one or the other goes out of business. Larger operators may also split orders between different body/chassis combinations for shorter delivery schedules.
Sometimes, a chassis and body builder will offer an exclusive combination of one body on one chassis, as a 'semi-integral'. This combines the expertise of the two companies, and saves the cost of making their chassis/body usable on different products.
Often builders, such as Duple Metsec will assemble products into kits, for export and local assembly at a partner site.
Large users of transit buses, such as public transport authorities, may order special features. This practice was notable in the Transport for London bus specification, and predecessors. The Association of German Transport Companies was defining a VöV-Standard-Bus concept that was followed between 1968 and 2000.
The chassis combines:
Chassis will often be built as complete units, up to the point of being drive-able around the factory, or on the public highway to a nearby bodybuilder. The chassis can be front-engined, mid-engined, or rear-engined. Most chassis will mount the radiator at the front, irrespective of engine position, for more efficient cooling.
Chassis products will often be available in different standard lengths, even produced in articulated variants, and often be used for both bus and coach bodywork, such as the Volvo B10M. The same chassis may even be used for single- or double-decker bus bodywork. Chassis builders may also offer different options for gearbox and engine suppliers. Chassis may also be built in multiple-axle configuration.
The bus body builder will build the body onto the chassis. This will involve major consideration of:
Bodywork is built for three general uses:
Bus bodywork is usually geared to short trips, with many transit bus features. Coach bodywork is for longer-distance trips, with luggage racks and under-floor lockers. Other facilities may include toilets and televisions.
A dual-purpose design is usually a bus body with upgraded coach-style seating, for longer-distance travel. Some coach-body designs can also be available to a basic dual-purpose fitment.
In past double-deck designs, buses were built to a low-bridge design, due to overall height restrictions.
Bus manufacturers have to have consideration for some general issues common to body, chassis or integral builders.
In the 1990s onwards, some bus manufacturers have moved towards making transit bus interiors more comparable to private cars, to encourage public transport ridership. Other additions have seen multimedia and passenger information systems, and CCTV systems. With these developments, bus designs have been increasing in weight, which is a concern for operators with the rising price of fuels in the 2000s (decade).[ citation needed ]
Specialist builders may also produce bodies for executive, sleeper bus, tour bus, airport bus, or school bus uses, with special features for these uses. Builders may also adapt standard designs for these uses, and especially for paratransit use. In Israel, due to terrorist attacks on buses, general bus builders have developed armoured buses, and are investigating controlled boarding systems. Armoured buses are also used for prisoner transport.
Several manufacturers and operators have invested in articulated bus designs, and even bi-articulated buses, to increase capacity without using two decks.
The use of different body and chassis manufacturers can mean one bus can have up to four identifying badges – the chassis maker and model, and the bodywork maker and model, making non-expert recognition difficult compared to the identification of other vehicles, such as cars. Operators may also paint over, or completely remove, badges. Several bus companies have changed ownership and name many times, leading to the same bus design receiving many different name badges, most notably Transbus International.
A further confusion can arise in the case where identical bodywork is applied to different chassis. This is sometimes truly identical, or only different in minor details. Mid-engined chassis designs are often identifiable by a mid mounted radiator and exhaust.
Radically different bus company liveries can cause problems in the application of a livery to a specific design. Many operators will apply a corporate design in the same way to any bus, leading to some odd sight lines. Some operators are more sympathetic, and tailor their liveries to the specific lines of each bus body design in use.
Often, a bus builder will embark on a rebody programme, such as the East Lancs Greenway, where an existing chassis receives a new body to extend the usable life of the bus. Sometimes this is done by a manufacturer on a piecemeal basis, leading to odd one-off designs.
Sometimes, when a number of buses change hands, or operator requirements change, a bus builder may be required to refit them into the new owners preferred configuration. This can include adding or removing doors, or changing the destination display equipment to or from LED, dot-matrix, or roller blind types.
Some operators will rebuild a buses bodywork after superficial crash damage, or a bridge strike, again leading to odd one-off looking buses where the standard bodywork was not available. Bridge strike buses are often converted to open top buses, or into single-decker bus. Older buses are often converted to shunters, tow trucks, tree-loppers, training buses, or canteens.
Often, large operators with different types of buses will settle on a standard bus design for their fleet, to produce savings in maintenance and driver training. These operators may either sell off non-standard types, or consolidate them in one operating location.
Operators are often concerned with the ease of replacement of consumable items, such as bulbs, and easily damaged parts, such as the lower panels of the body, or windows. This is to maximise the time in service for its buses, although now builders will offer whole life servicing contracts.
Operators may also make decisions on a particular bus type or components based on the particular terrain operated in. Some hillier areas may select different powertrain options. Areas with many low bridges may have more single-deckers than double-deckers. Operators in humid climates may select air-conditioning as standard. A particular difficulty with double-deckers is trees striking the kerb-side top front corner. Manufacturers, or operators – post delivery, may fit a bull bar type arrangement to protect this part of the bodywork.
Bus manufacturers sometimes provide loans to operators in places where financial institutions are not able to said loans. These agreements usually hold the vehicles themselves as collateral. [2]
A bus is a road vehicle that carries significantly more passengers than an average car or van, but less than the average rail transport. It is most commonly used in public transport, but is also in use for charter purposes, or through private ownership. Although the average bus carries between 30 and 100 passengers, some buses have a capacity of up to 300 passengers. The most common type is the single-deck rigid bus, with double-decker and articulated buses carrying larger loads, and midibuses and minibuses carrying smaller loads. Coaches are used for longer-distance services. Many types of buses, such as city transit buses and inter-city coaches, charge a fare. Other types, such as elementary or secondary school buses or shuttle buses within a post-secondary education campus, are free. In many jurisdictions, bus drivers require a special large vehicle licence above and beyond a regular driving licence.
A minibus, microbus, or minicoach is a passenger-carrying motor vehicle that is designed to carry more people than a multi-purpose vehicle or minivan, but fewer people than a full-size bus. In the United Kingdom, the word "minibus" is used to describe any full-sized passenger-carrying van or panel truck. Minibuses have a seating capacity of between 12 and 30. Larger minibuses may be called midibuses. Minibuses are typically front engine step-in vehicles, although low floor minibuses are particularly common in Japan.
Plaxton is an English builder of bus and coach vehicle bodies based in Eastfield, Scarborough, England. Founded in 1907 by Frederick William Plaxton, it became a subsidiary of Alexander Dennis in May 2007. In 2019, the maker was acquired by Canadian bus manufacturer New Flyer which then became NFI Group.
The Volvo B7RLE is a low-entry single-deck bus chassis manufactured by Volvo. It was superseded by the Volvo B8RLE in 2013.
The Volvo B7L is a fully low floor single-decker bus, double-decker bus and articulated bus chassis with a rear engine mounted vertically on the left of the rear overhang. It was built as a replacement for the Volvo B10L, and the Volvo Olympian. It was used as both a single-decker bus and a double-decker bus chassis largely in Continental Europe.
Van Hool NV is a Belgian family-owned coachbuilder and manufacturer of buses, coaches, trolleybuses, and trailers.
Switch Mobility is a British bus manufacturer based in Sherburn-in-Elmet, North Yorkshire. It is a subsidiary of Indian company Ashok Leyland. The company is responsible for the EV operations of the group with Ashok Leyland focusing on its core business of diesel-powered vehicles as well as work on alternative fuels like compressed natural gas (CNG), liquefied natural gas (LNG) and hydrogen.
The Ford R series was a range of single-decker bus and single-decker coach chassis, built by Ford that evolved from designs made by Thames Trader until the mid-1960s. A number of components were shared with the D-series lorry, including the engine which was mounted vertically at the front of the vehicle, ahead of the front axle so as to provide a passenger entrance opposite the driver. The original R192 and longer R226 models later became the R1014 and R1114 variants which with constant revision and upgrading had become R1015 and R1115 by the mid-1980s. In an attempt to lower the floor height of the vehicle, the turbocharged diesel engine was tilted over to one side around 1978. Synchromesh transmission was fitted as standard but some later examples were equipped with Allison automatic gearboxes to ease the driver's workload in urban areas. It ceased production in 1985.
Duple Coachbuilders was a coach and bus bodybuilder in England from 1919 until 1989.
The Alexander Dennis Enviro200 is a midibus that was manufactured by TransBus International and later Alexander Dennis between 2003 and 2018. The original TransBus Enviro200 design was innovative but ultimately unsuccessful, with few being sold before the introduction of the second generation Enviro200 revived sales for the product from 2006. It was supposed to be positioned in between a minibus and a rigid single-decker bus.
Duple Metsec was a bus bodywork builder based in West Midlands of England in the United Kingdom. It usually supplied body kits for bus assembly overseas.
The Volvo B10M was a mid-engined city bus and coach chassis manufactured by Volvo between 1978 and 2003. It succeeded the B58 and was equipped with the same 9.6-litre horizontally mounted Volvo diesel engine mounted under the floor behind the front axle. An articulated version under the model name Volvo B10MA was also offered, as was a semi-integral version known as the C10M, with the engine in the middle of the chassis.
The Leyland Atlantean is a predominantly double-decker bus chassis manufactured by Leyland Motors between 1958 and 1986. Only 17 Atlantean chassis were bodied as single deck from new.
The Bristol Lodekka was a half-cab low-height step-free double-decker bus built by Bristol Commercial Vehicles in England. It was the first production bus design to have no step up from the passenger entrance throughout the lower deck; although Gilford and Leyland Motors had developed low floor city buses in the 1930s, these did not enter production.
The East Lancs 1984-style double-deck body is a type of double-decker bus body with a step-entrance, built on several different chassis by East Lancashire Coachbuilders in England.
The MAN Lion's City is a range of low-floor and low-entry public buses built by German truck and bus manufacturer MAN Truck & Bus since 1996 primarily for the European market, but is also available in chassis-only variants worldwide. The name Lion's City has been used since 2006, when MAN's public bus models which had been marketed separately were gathered into one range, when also most models received a facelift. The first models to be introduced were the 12-metre low-floor intercity bus NÜ xx3 (A20) in 1996, the 12-metre city bus NL xx3 (A21) in 1997 and the articulated NG xx3 (A23) in 1998. As with former MAN bus models the power-rating made up part of the model name, giving the NÜ-series buses with power-ratings of 260 and 310 hp model names NÜ 263 and NÜ 313 respectively. The main production sites are in Starachowice and Sady in Poland, but the models have also been built in Germany, Turkey and Malaysia. Initially most of the midibus variants were manufactured by Göppel Bus in Augsburg, later Nobitz.
The Daimler Roadliner was a single-decker bus and coach chassis built by Daimler between 1962 and 1972. Notoriously unreliable, it topped the 1993 poll by readers of Classic Bus as the worst bus type ever, beating the Guy Wulfrunian into second place. It was very technologically advanced, offering step-free access some 20 years before other buses; as a coach, it was felt by industry commentators to be in advance of contemporary UK designs.
The Daimler Freeline was an underfloor-engined bus chassis built by Daimler between 1951 and 1964. It was a very poor seller in the UK market for an underfloor-engined bus and coach chassis, but became a substantial export success.
The Leyland Tiger was a heavyweight half-cab single-decker bus and coach chassis built by Leyland Motors between 1927 and 1968, except the period of World War II.
H. V. Burlingham was a British coachbuilding business based in Blackpool, Lancashire from 1928 until 1960 when they were taken over by London-based rivals Duple Motor Bodies. Duple initially renamed Burlingham as Duple (Northern) but in 1969 they closed their Hendon factory and concentrated production in Blackpool. Duple coach bodies were built in the former Burlingham premises until Duple itself was liquidated in 1989.
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