Standard bus battle must be won'
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• "The advantages of standardization are admitted by everyone, and all engineers are willing to accept standardized products, so long as the standard includes their own personal preferences." This reflection on one of the problems which has affected the bus industry for so long was made by Mr G. Hardy, chief engineer, National Bus Company, in a paper Engineering in the National Bus Company presented to the Institute of Road Transport Engineers in London, on Thursday of last week.
Since the formation of the NBC in November 1968, the standardization battle had become more involved, he said, but they had been trying over the last two years to approach nearer to a standard, by cutting down as far as possible the list of optional equipment on both chassis and body. This process must go on and eventually the only options allowable must be reduced to two or three items such as rear axle ratio, fouror five-speed gearbox and colour of paintwork. Not only would such a process help to hold
down the cost of production, it would increase the flexibility of delivery programmes, and enable new vehicles to be changed from one company to another to meet sudden changes in requirements.
Other points from Mr Hardy's paper included a brief description of the engineering organization within NBC, present and future fleet sizes, vehicle life factors, and the constant battle against corrosion caused by salting of roads in winter.
The NBC was divided into six regions, and the chief engineers of the companies in each region attended a regional committee meeting three times each year; each engineer, in turn, became chairman of the regional committee for one year.
Between the regional committee meetings main engineering committee meetings were held at headquarters, which were attended by the chairmen of the regional committees. By this means and the circularization of the meeting minutes, every engineer was aware of matters being discussed throughout the country.
Mr Hardy quoted figures of vehicles in service with NBC subsidiaries according to a census taken last year, together with the companies' views on the future composition of their fleets. This revealed that last year a total of 22,484 vehicles were owned, comprising 10,357 double-deckers, 9062 singledeckers and 3065 coaches. The future estimate was of a total of 22,292 vehicles, comprising 7296 double-deckers, 12,152 single-deckers and 2844 coaches.