'U DI' for London Country
Page 22
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MANAGEMENT and staff at London Country's new Crawley works agreed at Sunday's open day that things have been going well during its " running in " period.
Although there are still sections of the works awaiting completion mechanical overhauls and work on chassis have been carried out at Tinsley Lane since March and the facility will shortly make London Country fully independent of London Transport and outside contractors in the maintenance of its 1,200-strong fleet.
By the end of the year the labour force will reach its full strength of 120. Before then the body overhaul works, in a separate building, will have become fully operational while a hot-spray paint booth should be completed within the next two months. The large and well-equipped machine shop is backed up by a main stores area which will also serve all garages within the company.
Of particular interest is the arrangement of the chassis overhaul area with six pits in a " swimming pool " layout. SMtype single-deckers are currently being modified to hydraulic fan drives to replace the troublesome original mechanical drive.
A feature of the bodyshop is the use of tubular alloy access gantries which can be rapidly altered to any desired configuration for work on single and doubledeck buses,