Jersey Motor Transport
1959
Leyland Titan PD2/31
Reading H31/28R

780 JGY is a Leyland Titan PD2/31 with H59R body by Readings of Portsmouth. She was new in 1959, as J 8588, for the Jersey Motor Transport fleet and carries the usual advert for Mary Ann.
Is my eyesight playing tricks again or does the bodywork look a bit "Park Royal"? She’s at Amberley on 21 September 1997.

Photograph and Copy contributed by Pete Davies

12/06/15 – 06:11

Did Readings use Park Royal frames hence the similarity?

Philip Halstead

12/06/15 – 07:54

I’m not aware that they ever did, Philip. They always seemed to plough their own furrow and were quite happy to do one-off orders to an individual design. Granted, this body shape is a bit Park Royal’ish, though. Was this one bus the total order for JMT, of its type? It certainly looks very smart, stylish and airy inside.

Chris Hebbron

16/06/15 – 06:51

The Ian Allan ABC British Bus Fleets ‘West of England’ (May 1964) included details of the JMT fleet and has a photograph of number 27 is included.
The fleet list shows a batch of 5 Reading bodied Leyland Titan PD2/31s. They were numbered 16 (J 1583); 22 (J 8587); 27 (J 8588); 47 (J 1588) and 52 (J 1528). The dates new are given as 1958 (16, 47 and 52) and 1959 (22 and 27). Whether they all looked similar I don’t know.

David Slater

18/06/15 – 06:11

Jersey Motor Transport (JMT) J 8587 (22) and J 8588 (27) were the second batch of Reading bodied PD2/31 Titans delivered to JMT, arriving in June 1959. These were of a 4 bay design, where as the first batch had 5 bays {please see picture of J 1588 (47)}.
No.27 was the last double decker bought new by JMT, ex London Transport RTLs being bought after that.

Also shown is a picture of sister vehicle J 8587 in service in Jersey at The Weighbridge Bus Station for many years the main departure point for JMT services.
The rear of J 1528 (52), one of the first batch is seen on the extreme right.

Stephen Howarth

Jersey Motor Transport
1947
Bedford OB
Mulliner B28F

J 6986 was new to Jersey Motor Transport in 1947. She is a Bedford OB with Mulliner B28F bodywork and fleet number 57. She’s seen passing Beaulieu while taking part in a vintage vehicle run through the New Forest on 20 August 1978. The registration shown is LTR 336R but she is noted in the PSVC listing for 2012 as being LSU 857.

Photograph and Copy contributed by Pete Davies

05/10/13 – 17:05

Here is a shot of J 6986 – 57 when in service with JMT it is seen here at the St Helier – Weighbridge Bus Station.
As with all of JMT vehicles of that era, it has adverts for ‘Jersey’s own Brew’ Mary Ann. It is waiting to depart on Route 22 to BEL ROYAL via (Victoria Ave).
A 5 day Rover Ticket was 25/-, JCT (Jersey Coach Tours) All Day Tour 12/3 with meals 19/6. The window bill is advertising ‘The Sound of Music’, whether this was the film or a stage production is not known.
No.70 behind is displaying notices for ‘Flat Fare please pay 6d in the SLOT – Children 4d’.

Stephen Howarth

06/10/13 – 08:08

Thanks for the response, Stephen.
Certainly when I visited the island in the mid 1970’s, the buses were still advertising that brand. The cars in my posting are waiting to visit the oversize garage which Lord Montagu has in his garden!

Pete Davies

06/10/13 – 08:08

No. 70 is a 1948 Morris Commercial CVF 13/5 with Wadham FB27F body.

Chris Hebbron

08/10/13 – 07:50

This is a lovely little bus, the Mulliner body makes a change from Duple bodies on OB chassis. I have always thought it a great shame that so many enthusiasts tended to ignore Bedfords and Fords. To me they were fascinating vehicles which kept many small independent stage operators using them on rural stage services.

Don McKeown

08/10/13 – 11:24

I agree with you entirely Don. Not only were the OBs (and even more so their "War Effort" OWB siblings) fascinating but their performance from a 28hp petrol engine was unbelievably impressive. They were often in addition subjected to the most abominable overloading which they handled without a whimper. As far as their aural talents were concerned they were unique and magnificent – the lusty tuneful roar in the first three gears was classical music to the ears, followed by calm and quiet in top gear when their gentle rear spring twittering was most enjoyable. They were also very comfortable indeed, considering that the suspension was completely basic, and economical to run and simple to maintain – well, we’re talking legends now and legends they were for me.

Chris Youhill

08/10/13 – 12:53

More than once, Chris, I’ve heard folk, unacquainted with the gearbox crescendo, associating this with the engine noise and make comments such as, ‘If he keeps flogging the engine like that, he’ll have the big ends go!’ I agree with the unbustability of the mechanicals of these little gems so affectionately held in high regard. I sometimes went out of my way to travel on the Portsmouth Corp’n OWB’s, not so satisfying, because in their latter years they were on short routes, some only 10-15 mins long! But a kind driver would let me do a return journey or two if nicely spoken to! Fortunately, no inspector ever came aboard, perhaps because it was an unrewarding pastime on fringe routes! Route 13, Milton (White House) to Locksway Road was the usual one, busy solely for the mental hospital it served.

Chris Hebbron

12/10/13 – 08:05

I have found a near side view of J 6986.

Stephen Howarth

24/11/13 – 07:42

The nearside view of J.M.T. Bedford OB with Mulliner bodywork was taken at the Snow hill bus station in the early 1960’s just after a re-paint loosing its characteristic cream stripe below the windows which was bordered with a green stripe. originally she had a cream bonnet top and the cream on the front ran down to the mudguard level.She entered service in June 1947 and withdrawn in July 1969. Originally used as a coach from new until March 1951 and there after as a bus.
She ran from 1947 to 1951 in the B.E.A. livery of grey and red before being painted in the green and cream bus livery. She came from S.C.S ( Safety Coach Service) as a chassis and new in 1946, she was going to be bodied by Jersey Motor Panels for S.C.S but the company was taken over by the J.M.T in November 1946.
The chassis was sent up to Mulliner for the bodywork to be fitted. The first vehicle in Jersey to have Mulliner bodywork.

John Luce

10/03/17 – 07:30

My dad used to own what was J 6986 or LTR 336R. He bought her from a man called Sandy in New Milton Hampshire early 70s. She was in rather a sorry state, as it was being used as a green house. Dad brought her back to Breamore near Fordingbridge, where he was curator of the countryside museum there. He completely stripped her down to rolling chassis, repaired and renewed timber frame where needed. He managed to save the panels and beading on the body, took some straightening. Gradually she came back to life. He put her back in her Jersey colour green and cream and named her Maralyn. We used to do Bournemouth to Bath road run with her. Great fun, have to see if I can find some photos. Dad retired about 1979 and moved down to Tiverton Devon with me. Then in 1981 we all moved to Wellington Somerset needless to say the bus came to. Unfortunately dad had to sell her, can’t remember where she went, but not long after we heard she was sold on again, I think she went up to the Kent area,. Dads name was Pat Wale if anyone has the logbook to her. Lost dad 2003, Hope this is of some interest.
Does anyone know where she is now?

Shirley Williams

10/03/17 – 08:40

Thanks for your contribution, Shirley. I lived in Blackfield at the time of my original posting. I see you mention Tiverton. My wife’s side of the family has a branch there, in sight of the canal. Small world!

Pete Davies

10/03/17 – 17:31

Hi Peter my family came from Blackfield my aunt still lives there. We used to live at the Mazery at the top of canal hill Tiverton. We had the bus parked out the back of the house.
Any relation to Richard Davis from New Milton Hampshire.

Shirley Williams

10/03/17 – 17:35

LSU 857 passed to Dr Mark Sleep t/a Ages Past of Eversley 8/08 and is now part of his wedding hire fleet. Now painted Green & White there are numerous pics of it on Flickr.
Previous owners in reverse order are:
John Yonge, Kew 4/07
J M Poultney, Minster 11/89
Thorpe, Herne Bay 6/83 (re regd LSU 857 5/88)
Legg, Bishops Lydeard by 11/82
Pat Wale (Countryside Museum) Fordingbridge -/78 (regd LTR 336R)
New to JMT as J 6986 3/47

John Wakefield

11/03/17 – 07:25

No relation at all to the one you mention in New Milton. I have the Welsh spelling (IES) where he has the English spelling (IS). My grandfather was actually a Welshman!

Pete Davies

11/03/17 – 07:26

Chris Y correctly gives the stated output of the OBs petrol engine as 28 hp, but this was the RAC rating, an absurdly inaccurate and outdated method of measurement from the early years of the 20th century that some manufacturers seemed reluctant to ditch. The 3519 cc engine actually developed 72 bhp, not that far short of the 85 bhp of the Gardner 5LW in many 1940s/1950s double deckers. In the early post war years, a Bedford OB with the Mulliner body could be bought for £1290, which compared well with the £1415 that was asked for one with a Duple Vista coach body.

Roger Cox

12/03/17 – 07:42

Despite the obvious price advantage in having the attractive OB Mulliner coach body, it remained relatively rare, compared with the Duple ones.

Chris Hebbron

12/03/17 – 08:06

I took this photo of the delightful J 6986 at the end of the Bournemouth to Bath Rally in about 1977.

John Stringer

12/03/17 – 17:35

Thanks to all its lovely to know the old girls still going strong dad would be very proud. I see in the photo she still has her lucky heather in the grill mum put that there when we took her across the New Forest. Now I will have to find those photos won’t I.

Shirley Williams

13/03/17 – 16:29

Roger, the RAC formula was used to determine vehicle tax until 1947. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tax_horsepower

Stephen Allcroft

14/03/17 – 06:48

Stephen, I confess to being astonished that the RAC engine formula was still being used for vehicle taxation purposes as late as 1947. I suppose in the early years of the 20th century using the cylinder bore measurement was a roughly consistent method of assessing horsepower when long stroke engines were the norm, but the RAC formula very soon became hopelessly inaccurate as engine design was refined. Its retention until 1947 in official taxation circles seems barely credible. It just goes to show how remote from reality are our politicians cocooned in their Neo Gothic ivory tower at Westminster.

Roger Cox

15/03/17 – 07:04

DVLA still get engine capacity wrong. They often get Cubic Centimetres mixed up with Cubic Inches which of course engines of most buses & commercials are quoted in. So we get 330cc in the case of a 330 cubic inch Bedford engine.

John Wakefield

29/03/21 – 07:03

During my research on Daimler Freelines I was pointed to this page in regard to Mulliner bodies. No less than 22 Gardner-engined Freelines with Mulliner B56D bodies were supplied to JN Zarpas, in Lagos, Nigeria in 1957/8.
I have only recently found a low-res scan of 3 of them, which I will try to attach.
Would I be correct in thinking that these bodies would have been built on the Daimler chassis in Birmingham and exported as complete vehicles, or would the bodies have been supplied CKD like the Saro bodies for New Zealand?

Jim Neale

 
Copyright Stephen Howarth

Jersey Motor Transport
1955
Leyland Titan PD2/22
Metro Cammell H31/26R

When Leyland Motors finished building bus bodies, the Jersey Motor Transport Company went to M.C.W. for their next double deck bodies. Two were bought in 1955, the other being J 16521, fleet number 20. They were the first Double Decker’s in the fleet with ‘Tin Fronts’ and Lightweight bodies. It was reported that the seats were hard, and the bodywork rattled. But the Drivers liked them because they were nippy vehicles.
They served in the fleet for 16 years, being withdrawn in 1971, when Bob Lewis, from Trimdon Motor Services bought the J.M.T., and brought in more saloons, and gradually replaced Double Decker’s and Conductors. He also repainted the fleet in to a Blue livery getting rid of the Green/Cream used for many years. This was so vehicles could be moved between Trimdon and St Helier without repaint. J 16522 No 21 is seen here at the Corbiere Terminus of Route 12.  Incidentally both vehicles 20 and 21 were actually scrapped on the island of Jersey. 
In this photograph the Driver has changed the blind to St Helier, but the Conductor has yet to change the platform blind from Corbiere.
The advert is for Jersey’s Famous Beer ‘MARY ANN’ which has been Jersey’s local brew for over the last 100 years. Most of JMT buses through out the years carried an advert for ‘MARY ANN’ in one form or another. The building in the back ground is the old Corbiere Terminus Station (it is now a private residence) of the Jersey Railways & Tramways Limited, this company taking over the assets of the Jersey Railway Company Limited on 1st February 1896. The extension from St Aubin’s (the original terminus) to Corbiere being opened in 1899. The whole railway shut, after a fire broke out in St Aubin’s Station in the early hours of 18th October 1936, when the station buildings were badly damaged and 16 of the best carriages were destroyed.

Photograph and Copy contributed by Stephen Howarth

A full list of Titan codes can be seen here.

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14/02/12 – 07:51

This is another example of the much maligned Orion design looking quite attractive. This is helped by the layout of the livery, a style which suited the Orion very well. The ones at Brighton which had the same livery layout but red instead of green always looked attractive to me.
I always thought JMT was owned by the Jersey Government and had no idea it was bought by Trimdon Motor Services. That seems a strange commitment for a relatively small North East based independent. My former employers did some construction work in Jersey (nothing to do with transport) and found it a difficult place to operate. Shall we just say there were a lot of ‘vested interests’!

Philip Halstead

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14/02/12 – 07:53

The Orion body was not the most attractive of designs and adding it to the tin front ‘Midland Red’ Leyland chassis did it no favours. Mix that with a 7’6" wide chassis as in the case of JMT 21 and the result is positively undesirable, in my opinion. It looks narrow and top heavy, and that is from a side view!
Having said that the Orion body could be made to look quite reasonable if painted in a smart livery with lining out, for example, Halifax, Bradford or West Bromwich.
Equally, the BMMO style tin front Titan could be made to look quite attractive if it was fitted with a good looking body and smart livery, such as the Roe bodied Sheffield PD3’s shown in the previous posting. Perhaps a smart livery and body style draws the eye away from the plain BMMO style Leyland front. Who knows, beauty is in the eye of the beholder!

Eric

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14/02/12 – 08:50

Know what you mean, Eric. I generally prefer exposed radiator PD3s – especially the Stockport’s. Sheffield’s tin fronts, however, do work.
As Charles Roe’s biggest fan, how is this for a variation on a theme (of livery improving an Orion)? Of all the many variations on offer, I found the worst looking one to be the front entrance PD3 – with several Doncaster operators, including the Corporation. Over the Pennines in Oldham (HQ of the Roe appreciation society?) their last traditional buses were front engined Roe/PD3s – which looked superb in their smart livery. So it can work both ways!

David Oldfield

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14/02/12 – 11:27

Newcastle Transport had some very similar ‘tin front’ Orion PD2’s but Tyneside’s were the exposed radiator type, whilst the rest of the Northern groups Orions were Guy Arab’s They were all what could be best described as ‘cheap and chatty’ on the upper deck, with single skins and exposed frame’s, hence all the knocks bangs rattles and squeaks, but to be fair to the later PD3’s, although apart from being longer they looked very much the same from the outside, they were an entirely different beast inside, with double skins and sound proofing.

Ronnie Hoye

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14/02/12 – 16:29

I should have mentioned in my original description that there is a Society devoted to the Channel Islands Bus scene.
This is the Channel Islands Bus Society.
Details can be obtained (please enclose a SAE), from
Dr Jim Young, 67 Boston Avenue, Southend on Sea, Essex, SS2 6JH.
Newsletters are published in Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter. Subscriptions are £14 per year for UK and CI residents or £17 for other EU countries.

Stephen Howarth

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14/02/12 – 16:31

The demise of the Leyland bus-body building activities 1954 was a great loss to the bus industry. The alternatives such as the MCW Orion body must have been a great disappointment yet this style of body started a trend by other body builders such as Park Royal and Roe who attempted to copy and go lightweight.
However a good livery such as on the JMT Leyland does improve matters a little but inside comforts and appearances such as front dome of rough fibre-glass make me wonder how Weymann and MCCW could change from their previous classical and quality bodywork finishes.
My first view of a MCW Orion body was Yorkshire Woollen Leyland PD1 in overall red livery in Leeds in 1955, which was a shock to my senses.
Fortunately some operators such as Liverpool CT demanded a better specification and MCW gradually changed and improved their designs in the sixties.

Richard Fieldhouse

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10/04/12 – 06:24

I wasn’t keen on the Leyland tin front either and another Orion/Tin front combination which looked awful was a batch of PD2s delivered to Bolton which had the full front design, also used by Blackpool.

David Pomfret

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11/04/12 – 06:05

Regarding the comment by Mr Fieldhouse regarding the Yorkshire Woollen bus he saw just to set the record straight this was not a PD1 these buses were rebodied Leyland PS1s. Their Orion bodies were actually lighter than their original Brush single deck bodies. They were always called Cans or Salmon Cans by us enthusiasts. My wife used to conduct on them and she always said they were very cold in winter possibly because they had no internal lining panels to keep the weight down.

Philip Carlton

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11/04/12 – 15:35

Edinburgh bought many MCW bodied PD2s with tin fronts for tram replacement. This lead a councillor to comment on them by calling them Monstrous masses of shivering tin the only modern thing about them is their approximation of rock and roll when moving! Edinburgh liked the Leyland tin front so much they retro fitted it to some exposed radiator PD2s and also some rebuilt Guys. They also continued to fit it to new deliveries until 1966 long after the St Helens version superceded the original. In the end they built their own fibre glass version in house.

Chris Hough

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22/04/12 – 16:13

Nice to see a picture of JMT 21 taken when new at the Corbiere terminus Route 12. I have seen a pre-delivery shot of the sister J16521 but not 21 new.
Does the copyright owner have any other pictures of any other vehicle in Jersey at this time? I have a good collection of Jersey photos both pre and post war, but I am always looking to add to my collection.

John Luce