Leeds City Transport
1954
AEC Regent III
MCW H33/25R

Photo taken Leeds city bus station information from my now found official fleet lists my Leeds one is dated May 1964.

“TNW 757 entered service 1st December 1954. It was withdrawn 29th October 1970.
The batch 755- 759 were all then sold to Telefilm Transport Ltd in November 1970 but immediately passed on to Pickersgill & Lavery at Barnsley for scrap”

Terry Malloy

TNW 759 of this batch of five buses (755 – 759) was fitted with an experimental “self locking” fluid flywheel – a vicious device which made it very difficult to give a decent ride even for those of us who could be bothered to try – many couldn’t. This mechanical pest earned 759 the nickname of “Leaping Lena” – a title which was confirmed by a very prominent piece of “BIRO GRAFFITI” above the windscreen.

Chris Youhill

Bring back the old two shades of green livery.

Anonymous

Here here Anonymous – I couldn’t agree more strongly – AND some windows which can be seen through instead of passengers having to look at the back of zany and largely ineffective advertising !! The last time that passengers were obliged to tolerate "horse box" gloom like this was in the London Blitz of WW2 when London Transport were obliged to board up shattered windows to keep the vehicles in service.

Chris Youhill

You can have your two shades of green if we can have our various applications of blue and cream in Sheffield and Rotherham – and proper green in my current neck of Surrey!

David Oldfield

Its a deal David !!   There was no more handsome sight in Leeds Bus station than the Sheffield vehicles in cream and blue on service 67, especially sometimes the rare ECW bodied examples. As far as lovely leafy Surrey is concerned I just have to say "Bring back the immortal Godstone STLs." Quite irrelevant I admit, but my first ever car was a 1934 Standard 9 – £25 "0n the road" – which was registered in Surrey – BPE 405 and affectionately nicknamed "Beepy" for obvious reasons.
I shall now be missing for a few days as I’m having my right eye cataract removed tomorrow, and if its as excellent as the left one in February I shall be grateful and delighted.

Chris Youhill

The first Orions I ever saw were on Aldershot & District’s 1954 Dennis Lances, and at the time I thought they looked cheap and homemade, with only the nice two-tone green livery to redeem them. The Leeds Regent IIIs again prove that two greens (though very different from A&D’s) can bring a metal box to life.
SUK 3, the ex-Wolverhampton Guy Arab IV at Wythall, proves again what a fine livery can do for an Orion, which I think looks its worst in BET overall red.
For a design whose hideous incompetence shines triumphantly through any livery, I’ll go for those front-entrance Park Royal Southampton and Swindon deckers of the 1960s.
Apparently the A&D Orions were about a ton lighter than their handsome East Lancs brethren, something for which the pre-war Gardner 5LWs they inherited must have been very grateful, and Tim Stubbs tells me that the Orion batch had to be sent back to Dennises to have the springs softened to cope with the unexpected lightness!

Ian Thompson

29/10/14 – 17:24

Hi after looking through your Pages of old AEC Buses! with great memories. Can you tell me any information about the bus that I used to travel home from school on in the early 1950s in Leeds, it was on the no 42 route traveling from Harehills to Lower Wortley traveling past Harehills County Secondary School. The bus had fleet no 700, the seats on this bus were not straight backed, each seat seat bent in the middle.

David Hill

30/10/14 – 07:11

Ian Thompson makes his always informed comment about this characteristic in respect of the 1954 Dennis Lance K4s of Aldershot & District, the first 20 of which carried sturdy East Lancs bodies, but the final 12 had Weymann Orion ‘tin cans'(though these were better finished than the norm). Dennis had to reset the springing to improve the ride. I doubt that many operators went to that trouble.

Roger Cox

30/10/14 – 07:12

David, if you look at the comments on Sheffield Leyland PD2 fleet number 391 on these pages you will find references to cranked seats and Leeds 700.

Ian Wild

30/10/14 – 07:12

MCW body with Roe staircase, by the look of it.

Ian T

31/10/14 – 16:27

David 700 was a one off AEC Regent II exhibited at the 1950 Earls Court Show. As Ian mentions its seats were an effort to give greater comfort to the traveling public it remained unique in the Leeds fleet.

Chris Hough

18/01/18 – 09:05

Lovely trip down memory lane on an LCT bus. In the 60’s I was a school kid living in Halton. The trudge up Halton Hill was always a struggle, especially if the bus was full when it became a first gear thrash that used to take forever. Would these double-deckers with rear landings have been Leyland Titans and AEC Regents?

Chris Bradley