THE SCOTTISH VINTAGE BUS MUSEUM - WG 8790 (P573)
DETAILS
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Chassis:
Leyland Tiger TS8 Special, built 1939, chassis no. 302749
Body: W.Alexander,
C39F single deck coach, built 1939
Engine:
First Licensed: 1st June,
1939
BACKGROUND HISTORY
The TS8 'special' was a Leyland variant specifically
developed for the SMT Group. 150 were built, all Alexander bodied, for
Alexanders, SMT and Western SMT in 1939/40, and were a common sight throughout
Scotland until the early 1960s. They differed from standard 35-seat TS8s in
that the front bulkhead was moved some 6 in. forward, allowing for an extra row
of seats making them 39 seaters, the rear of the engine being enclosed in a
removable cowl which projected into the entrance area. (Jasper Pettie)
HISTORY OF THIS VEHICLE
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P573
was the second of the 1939 TS8s delivered to Alexanders. It was bodied at the Drip Road coachworks in
Stirling with a 39-seat coach body, possible because of chassis modifications
which made it a TS8 Special.
Finished in Bluebird
livery the vehicle operated initially from Larbert
Road Depot, being used on the longer distance services covered from that
Garage.
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Sometime
in the early 1940s the vehicle received all over blue livery and the heating
system was altered to the later standard, the two intake grilles in the front
dome being removed along with the circular anemostat
vents inside the saloon, and the Clayton canopy heater modified to intake under
the canopy and discharge down a trunking in the
middle of the front bulkhead.
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In
1947 the vehicle received a heavy overhaul and the original window pans were replaced with Claytonrite
pattern as used on the Leyland and Alexander bodied double deckers. The original side sweeps were replaced with
the familiar arrow trim encompassing the title ‘Bluebird’, and the livery
adopted was that of the post-war Bluebird style with white window pillars.
By 1952 the vehicle was
allocated to Kilsyth garage and by 1954 it had moved to Bannockburn where it
remained until withdrawn in December 1961*.
By the late 1950s it had been repainted in two-tone blue bus livery with
standard bus fleetnames, the side trim having been
removed along with the sunshine roof. It
spent its twilight years on local runs around Stirling.
P573 was sold to Millburn
Motors in December 1961 - later reported in use as a caravan at Tummel Bridge in
July 1965.
Mike
Chapman and Eddie Taylor take up the story:
The Recovery of a1939
Leyland Tiger TS8 Special - As remembered by Mike Chapman and Eddie Taylor
(With apologies to those whose names have been omitted or
forgotten and further apologies for the vagueness of some dates and place names)
By 1979, older vehicles were
becoming harder to find although they did occasionally surface, hidden away in
unlikely places, just waiting to be found. Eddie discovered that a work colleague
was a keen hillwalker and often stayed in a converted bus in the Highlands.
Curiosity aroused, he asked for more details, (ie reg
no, fleet no, etc). After his next visit Dougie returned with the fleet no P573.
Records were consulted and disbelief followed. If that fleet number was correct
it meant that the bus was a Leyland Tiger TS8 Special, a class thought to be
long extinct. Furthermore, it was the first production model (numerically) to
enter Alexanders’ fleet – P572 being the
prototype. This had to be investigated.
With Dougie’s
help, the owner and exact location of the bus was determined. Bill Tuckwell
and Ian Bruce expressed an interest in being involved in the project and we
were grateful to have the benefit of their experience. The owner was contacted
and we arranged a visit to view the bus to determine whether it was savable and if it could be recovered. The road to Fersit, where the bus was located, is off the A86 some 5
miles east of Roy Bridge. (Road is probably an exaggeration - 2.5 miles of
single track with a couple of narrow bridges, plenty of tight bends, steep
hills and overhanging trees.) Still, the bus had got up there so, in theory it
should come down.
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When
we arrived and met the owner, we were given a brief history of how the bus came
to be there. It had been bought some 20 years earlier and driven into position
near the house. The insides had been stripped out and some basic facilities,
including a wood burning stove, installed to allow the bus to be used as bothy
accommodation for hillwalkers in the area. We explained why we were interested
in the bus and showed some pictures of Bill’s TS7 (P331) and FAC4.
An initial inspection
revealed that all of the mechanicals were still in situ. The bodywork was in
fairly rough condition, as would be expected after such a time standing outside
in the lovely Highland weather, but externally complete. In fact the only
missing items were the folding passenger door, which had been replaced with a
wooden shed door, and the cab door, which had partly disintegrated. Internally,
all of the seats, luggage racks and some of the light fittings had been
removed. Getting the bus out of its resting place would also be fairly
straightforward, no 6ft stone walls or new houses in the way!
The registration plates, WG8790 and one of
the fleet plates P573 were still on the bus, confirming its identity. We
could not think of any other TS8 Special in preservation, so P573 would
fill a gap in the range of preserved Leyland vehicles and, to this day, no
other example has come to light so P573 remains a unique survivor. A
brief discussion followed and we all agreed that we had to try to save it. The
owner was willing to let us have the bus if we could provide another one to
take its place. A syndicate, comprising Eddie Taylor, Mike Chapman, Bill Tuckwell and Ian Bruce was formed with a view to saving the
bus.
The next step was to find
a suitable vehicle to take the place of P573 at Fersit.
That vehicle turned out to be 121CVD, an Ex- Baxter’s AEC Reliance/Alexander
DP41F B964 which had been the team bus for Inverkeithing United FC. It
was purchased for £180 and, in Dec 79, moved from Inverkeithing to temporary
parking on a farm near East Kilbride. The plan was to drive the replacement up
to Fersit, strip off any spares we could for 7424SP
and then tow P573 back to East Kilbride. It took a while to get this
arranged and, in the meantime, the owner had found and installed a residential
caravan. We agreed to contribute towards the cost of this, instead of providing
the bus and 121CVD was sold on and eventually scrapped.
We finally managed to arrange a date for the
recovery (autumn 1980) and set off for Fersit. Ian Mckerracher’s Leyland Tiger TS8 tow wagon CSF226 – ML199
had been “hired in” for the tow job, the rest of us travelled up by car. We
arrived to find that access to P573 had already been cleared and we set
to work preparing the bus. Loose bits were secured and the bus was made safe to
tow around lunchtime. The track out from the house to the road involved a
fairly steep climb of about 100 yards over loose gravel and doubts were
expressed as to whether the tow truck would handle this. We decided to see if P573
would fire up and come out under its own steam.
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Recovery, Phase 1
We had already established that the engine was not
seized so, after checking the oil state, we opened the valve lifter, hooked up a
set of batteries to the starter and, to our surprise, the engine turned over
easily. Next we rigged up a gravity fed fuel supply and tried again. Almost
immediately, the engine tried to fire so we eased in the valve lifter and,
after a few coughs, splutters and bangs, the engine burst into life. After a
few seconds running, the engine was ticking over nicely, as though it had just
come in from a day’s service work.
There was a rush for the
cab as the volunteers fought for the opportunity to be the one to drive the bus
out but, after such a promising start, we were all to be disappointed. It was
impossible to select any of the gears. Even with the engine off none of the
gears would select, so it wasn’t that the clutch had stuck to the flywheel. The
top of the selector box was removed and it was found that the selector sliders
appeared to be jammed.
Time was now running short if we were to complete
the journey back to civilisation before dark, so we accepted an offer from the
owner’s son to tow the bus to the top of the hill with his Forestry tractor.
The tractor made light work of the load and rough surface and pulled the bus up
with ease.
With P573 safely at
the top of the hill, it was hitched up to the tow wagon and the long journey
home began. Negotiating the narrow road down to the A86 was interesting and a
tight squeeze at times. Once on the main road, progress was good and trouble
free down through Fort William, Glencoe, Crianlarich
and Callander but, because of the delays trying to
sort out the gearbox, time was beating us and it was clear that we would not
reach East Kilbride until long after darkness had fallen. So it was decided to
park the bus at a lorry yard in Doune and continue
the journey to East Kilbride later in the week.
Recovery, Phase 2
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The
second phase of the recovery took place during the middle of the following
week, so it was early finishes at work and off to Doune
to continue the move. ML199 was once again the workhorse and pictures
show the hitching up and departure from Doune.
The journey to East Kilbride was fairly
uneventful, apart from one tactical reverse when a wrong exit was taken off a
roundabout. P573 arrived safely at the farm just as darkness was
falling. The bus was parked up in a field near one of the farm’s barns where it
was to remain for the next two years or so.
Outside parking/storage is not the ideal situation
for a vehicle awaiting restoration but, at the time, it was all we could get
and the price was right (i.e. free). During all of its time at the farm the bus
stood outside and was subject to the vagaries of the Scottish climate and the
local yob element who took great pleasure, I am sure, in breaking all of the
windows and generally doing as much damage as they could. No work was done on
the bus while it was stored at the farm, due to the distance to travel, the
size of the task and the unsuitable environment and we were not able to come up
with a better solution which we could afford. One important item was dealt with
– the retention of the bus’s registration number, the loss of which was
threatened by the DVLC’s plan to kill off all the old registration numbers
which had never been reported as scrapped.
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Time
passed, as it does, and The Scottish Vintage Bus Museum got itself off the
ground. Larger premises were acquired at East Whitburn which offered undercover
storage and workshop and pit facilities. Unfortunately we were not quick enough
to get a space there for P573 but storage space was now available at
Pathhead. Concern about the rapidly deteriorating condition of the vehicle
resulted in a Bus Museum working party descending on the farm one freezing
Sunday morning with the aim of transferring the bus to Pathhead for storage.
The bus was towed up from the field onto hard
standing by one of the farm tractors. Its condition by now could only be
described as “hingin”. Most of the body panels were
in the process of detaching themselves from the frames and had to be removed.
More of the small interior and exterior fittings had disappeared.
After several hours of hard work on the remaining
bodywork and fitting of roadworthy wheels and tyres, a swan-neck bar was
attached to the front axle and P573 was deemed ready for towing. All of
the loose bits were secured inside the bus and it was a very sad looking
vehicle which was hitched up to the museum’s AEC Matador.
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With
Andy Walker at the wheel of the Matador and Mike Chapman keeping P573 in
a straight line behind it, we set off for Pathhead. Facilities in the Leyland’s
cab were less than basic. No windscreen, no floor, no door – in fact, not much
more than a seat and a steering wheel.
A comfort stop was taken at Harthill
Services on the M8 where we had a cup of tea and Mike had a chance to thaw out.
When we returned to the vehicles, a coach party was just arriving and a few
looked in disbelief at our ensemble and asked if we were taking it to a scrappie. When we explained that their coach had broken
down and that this was their replacement vehicle, for some reason, they didn’t
believe us!
The journey continued with Eddie Taylor at the
wheel of P573. Just Eddie’s luck. As we left Harthill heading for East Whitburn
the rain started and he had to endure a soaking along with the biting wind. We
stopped in at East Whitburn to pick up a second
Matador which was also going to Pathhead. So our Matador was hitched up to the
lifeless Matador and P573 towing duties were taken up by David
Heathcote’s Leyland Tiger TS8, WG8107 - ML205.
The rain kept falling as the convoy continued on
to Pathhead where P573 remained, still untouched, for several years
before being transferred to East Whitburn for a short
spell and eventually to its current home at Lathalmond. Lack of funds and the
purchase of two other vehicles meant that P573 lay neglected at the back
of a shed for more years, deteriorating further.
P573’s rarity value was not forgotten, however, and in
2003 it was suggested that, if the bus was owned by the Museum, its restoration
could be funded by an appeal for public donations. The owners readily agreed to
this, ownership was transferred and the project was set in motion. Work has,
after a delay of more than 20 years, now begun on the restoration of the only
Leyland Tiger TS8 Special known to have survived.
(Mike Chapman and Eddie Taylor)
RESTORATION DETAILS
Following an appeal ……….
The body of course had all but collapsed and Phase
I of restoration comprises a complete new frame to be built using what's left
of the original as patterns. A detailed inspection and assessment of the
remains has been made. In order to do this what's left of the body was
dismantled, taking the vehicle down to the bare chassis.
It will be required to
fabricate a complete new frame comprising pillars, roof sticks, main bearers,
front bulkhead, wheel arches, cab framing and interior stress panels. However,
there's also good news. All the mechanical components are present, and can be
refurbished by volunteers with the minimum of replacement and therefore cost.
The Museum fortunately has a good stock of pre-war Leyland parts which can be
used to replace any worn or defective items. The engine can be rebuilt if
necessary by volunteer labour. The chassis has survived in reasonable
condition, having only suffered surface rust, and once shot blasted and
spray-painted will be as good as new. Despite the funding shortfall, we are
going to make a start.
(Jasper Pettie)
Click for RESTORATION PROGRESS