Halifax Corporation Transport and Joint Omnibus Committee
1951
Leyland Titan PD2/12
Leyland L27/26R

On the left of this photo taken in PTE days in December 1977 is the last operational ex Todmorden JOC PD2, as Halifax 356 which had been a Driver Training bus since withdrawal from passenger service. On the right is its replacement – ex Halifax 279, a 1965 Roe bodied Leyland PD2/37. This is in its new guise as Driver Training bus T7. By this date the PTE had introduced a dedicated training bus livery.
T7 was later sold to a driving school in the West Midlands. 356 was put on one side for preservation but was eventually scrapped as a lost cause, a sad loss considering what can be achieved nowadays.

Photograph and Copy contributed by Ian Wild

14/05/18 – 07:18

The heaters on Halifax MCW PD2s were very good for about a year. Being under the seats at floor level they sucked in lots of dust which blocked the warm air flow. It was a long job to clean them out. Just blowing the dust out with an air line covered the saloons in dust. The cleaning job was also unhealthy so nobody would do it. The old round Clayton heaters being fitted well above floor level didn’t gather much dust and remained in working order much longer. At Blackburn we used to place wet sacks over the heater unit to catch the dust when blowing it out with an airline, this was not ideal but kept some heat in the saloon during winter!

Mr Anon

17/05/18 – 07:56

The 1965 Roe bodied Leyland PD2s & the CCP registered Park Royal bodied Regent IIIs are my all time favourite Halifax D/Ds, its a great pity that no examples of either type are in running order in the UK. I did see a former Halifax Roe bodied PD2 still in its Metro training bus guise at Winkleigh a few years ago, but I could not tell which one it was.
Another of the Roe bodied PD2s number 62 was put back in full Halifax green, orange & cream attire, but it did not spend long in preservation & it was exported to either the USA or Canada in the early 1980s. Does it still exist?

Andrew Spriggs

02/07/18 – 07:12

In 1974 my wife worked in the personnel dept. of the then newly formed West Yorkshire Metropolitan Transport Executive. She, they had to send a memo out to Ex Tod crews that taking their buses home at lunchtime was no longer permissible.

Geoff Bragg

05/07/18 – 06:21

Wonderful story, Geoff. Big business versus small business destroying the personal touch, as ever!

Chris Hebbron

11/07/18 – 07:17

The 1965 Roe bodied Leyland PD2s of Halifax were wonderful buses, very solid in the best Roe tradition. It is interesting to relate that a very similar batch of buses were supplied to Ashton Under Lyne in the same year & two years later Lincoln received a batch. Lincoln had received two batches of Roe bodied Atlanteans in 1964/5 & then reverted to PDs in 1967. I would say these Roe bodied PD2s were my favourite double deckers, the longer HBU registered Oldham Corporation Roe bodied PD3s of 1964 were also firm favourites, sadly one was lost when it turned over on a roundabout in Rochdale in 1967.

Andrew Spriggs

12/07/18 – 07:18

The Oldham bus which turned over was 108 HBU.
It turned over in Oldham, at the bottom of West Street, after being hit by a tanker, not in Rochdale.
It was operating the Rochdale to Ashton service 9.

Stephen Howarth

13/07/18 – 07:37

I drove a number of these Roe bodied PD2s whilst at Halifax when they were new, and I agree that they were in a greatly superior class to their Weymann contemporaries, except in one particular. Being a quite long legged specimen, I found that the drivers’ seats on the Roe bodies did not go back as far as those on the Weymann examples, making them less comfortable to drive.

Roger Cox

14/07/18 – 07:01

I know that Mr. Hilditch was, shall we say, a traditionalist in his views and requirements but why did he specify holes in the bonnet sides on these vehicles? It seems like a throwback to the 1940s, did they serve any practical purpose?

Chris Barker

GGH inherited this order from the previous (Leyland besotted) GM, Richard le Fevre, who, despite being on the verge of retirement, chose to saddle his successor with his Leyland legacy. Because of the extended strike at Weymann, where some of these PD2s were heled up for months, Geoffrey Hilditch managed to divert those chassis that were still accessible to Roe for bodying. The apertures in the bonnet were for access to the oil filler cap and dipstick, and this was a Leyland option that appeared on all the Halifax PD2s and PD3s.

Roger Cox

17/07/18 – 06:29

Believe me those holes are invaluable for oil checking. I have a couple of vehicles with solid sides and they are a pain. In service you needed conscientious mechanics to avoid engine seizures.

Roger Burdett

Southdown Motor Services
1956
Leyland Titan PD2/12
Beadle H59RD

There have been comments over the years about the last Beadle double deck bodies to be built delivered to Southdown in Nov/Dec 1956 but few photos. To try and rectify this I attach two photos of this batch No’s 777-788 Reg No’s RUF 177-188, That of 783 was taken outside Pevensey Road bus station, whilst not a very good photo I included it as this bus was later converted into a tree lopper after an accident at I believe Jarvis Brook railway bridge which was near Southdown’s Crowborough garage, I heard that the unfortunate driver was an Maidstone & District man trying to reach the garage. That of 785 was taken in Pool Valley Brighton when being reversed on to the stand for the Brighton local service 38 which later became the regular haunt of the RESL/6L’s the route had a significant amount of hill work. Believed to have been built by Beadle on Park Royal frames, the easy way to tell these near identical batches apart was the Beadle’s had sliding ventilators and the Park Royal’s had half drops.

Photograph and Copy contributed by Diesel Dave

30/01/18 – 16:33

In 1956/7, both NGT and Newcastle Corporation took delivery of batches of very similar Park Royal bodied vehicles.
Those of NCT were all AEC Regent V.
The 1956 NGT group vehicles were GUY Arab IV, and the intake for 1957 were R/D versions on a Leyland PD2/12 chassis.
Although they looked very similar to these, one notable difference was that both NCT & NGT were all four bay construction, whereas these are five.
Was that Southdown spec?

Ronnie Hoye

01/02/18 – 07:10

Further to Ronnie Hoye’s post, Northern took 28 Guy Arabs with Park Royal bodies in 1956, 20 for the main fleet and 8 for Tynemouth. There were 10 PD2s in 1957 for Northern. All were 63 seaters.

Newcastle took 20 high bridge examples in 1956, 137-156 (XVK 137-156) and 20 in 1957, 157-176 (157-176 AVK) ten of which were low bridge. The high bridge vehicles seated 62 and the low bridge vehicles 58.

Living north of the Tyne, I was more familiar with the Tynemouth and Newcastle buses. I thought they were well proportioned buses, but the interior finish on the Newcastle vehicles left a lot to be desired, red painted lining panels, narrow seats and a distinct lack of ventilation. Tynemouth’s vehicles were far better finished in my view.
A couple of photos are attached illustrating a Northern vehicle and one of Newcastle’s 1957 high bridge buses.

R Slater

02/02/18 – 05:37

Your not wrong, the NCT vehicles were positively spartan in comparison to those of the NGT Group.
It was the same story with the Orion bodied Leyland PD’s that followed these. Every expense seems to have been spared on the NCT vehicles, with their painted metal interiors, whereas the NGT were covered.
Those of Tynemouth & Wakefields were finished to an even higher standard with moquette upholstered seats.
Getting back to the Park Royal GUY Arab IV’s. As you say, Tynemouth & District had eight of them, FT 9408/15 208/15 I started as a driver at Percy Main in 1967, so by now they were nearly 11 years old, but they were VERY reliable, and for all their age they were a delight to drive, but how much better would they have been if they ha been fitted with a G6LW rather than a 5?
214 was written off after an accident, and dismantled for spares, and the remainder were transferred to Northern in 1968.
By this time we had quite a number of the superb Alexander bodied CRG6LX Daimler Fleetlines, so I was probably in a minority, but I for one was sorry to see them go.

Ronnie Hoye

08/02/18 – 14:46

I could go on a real nostalgia fest here, Ronnie. Tynemouth was my local fleet. My memories date from the mid 1950s when I can just about remember the ECW rebodied Leyland TD5s and the trio of AEC Regents rebodied by Pickering. Wallsend locals were largely in the hands of successive batches of Guy Arabs. I used these services to go the the Buddle school and later the grammar school. I recall end of school day transport at the Buddle was provided by four vehicles, two for High Farm and two for Sunholme, usually older vehicles but sometimes newly overhauled vehicles doing what I assume were running in turns. The Guys gave way to Leyland PD2s and PD3s, Atlanteans and Fleetlines. I’ll shut up now!

Richard Slater

11/02/18 – 06:23

Like you Richard, our school bus was either one of the Pickering rebodied pre war Regents or, occasionally, one of the Weymann bodied, early post war variety. As the bus came off an earlier "Workmen"s service it was usually late,a source of delight to we pupils, but consternation to the school.
In 1957, I started to attend Tynemouth High School, where it was decided we lived near enough to walk to school. 4X4s were rare and mostly restricted to the farming community in those days!
I remember the ECW rebodied TD5s also largely because they were quite fast and refined mechanically, for a bus of that era.They seemed to spend a lot of their time on the 5 Whitley Bay (St. Mary’s Lighthouse) to Newcastle (Haymarket)until about 1955, when they I think (its all a long time ago now) they were largely replaced on that route by the 1955 Orion bodied Guys.

William Mill

Copyright Unknown

Ideal Service (R Taylor & Sons)
1949
Leyland Titan PD2/3
Brush L27/26R

New to Ribble Motor Services (No 2691) in 1949 passed to Delaine Bourne in 1961 as their (No 54) where it served 5 years when it then passed to R Taylor & Sons Cudworth in February 1966 (No 16) part of the Ideal Service When Taylors sold out to Yorkshire Traction in 1967 this vehicle passed to H Wray & Sons of Hoyle Mill Barnsley and remained in service until 1969.
Photographed outside Taylor’s garage at Cudworth.

Photograph and Copy contributed by Brian Lunn

26/09/17 – 06:45

Twenty years service from one of these vehicles who’s Brush bodies were said to be of questionable durability was a good innings.
Delaine’s beautiful livery must have inspired Taylors to replicate the V arrangement on the upper deck front panel and the application of the IDEAL name on the (illuminated?) glass panel is a nice touch. The large fleetname on the side is just visible and the whole thing looks very smart indeed, a worthy transformation from blue to red!
I can’t help thinking that H Wray & Sons might not have gone to the same trouble!

Chris Barker

26/09/17 – 14:23

Judging by the rubber window mounts I would guess this vehicle’s bodywork was rebuilt/refurbished somewhere along the way. In 1949 except for ECW this type of window mounting was rare. I seem to recall hearing or reading that at this time ECW had this type of window mounting patented. I am sure someone will comment.

Philip Halstead

27/09/17 – 06:22

Pictures of this bus in Delaine’s ownership are seen here:- //www.delaineheritagetrust.org/54.html The windows had already acquired the external flush rubber glazing at that time, so a body refurbishment took place either under Delaine or earlier. Full details about Delaine, including a historic fleet list, may be found on this web page:- //www.delainebuses.com/fleet.html

Roger Cox