Neoplan's new
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• A new ultra-low-floor articulated city bus with a special automatically-activated bridging plate, to allow easy boarding of wheelchair passengers, is being developed by Neoplan of Stuttgart, and is expected to be displayed at next week's UITP PSV show at Lausanne.
The 17.4m-long, single-deck artic features an unusual suspension layout with special ZF inverted portal axles for the second as well as the rear drive axle. Stepless access to the flat floor, which is only 320nun above the road, is provided at both the first and second doors. The floor is then raised at a shallow angle over the latest Hymer turntable which has an integral antijacknife device. Floor height in the rear section, behind the turntable, is 515mm with single intermediate steps at doors three and four.
To allow wheelchair passengers and prams to be accommodated, Neoplan has kept a minimum width of 870mm between the seats in the front passenger section.
The German bus and coach builder has broken with normal practice by placing the engine and transmission in the rear offside corner of the artic bus.
The air-cooled Deutz BF 8L 531 vee-eight diesel, rated at 208kW, is coupled to a VoithDIWA D 851/2 automatic gearbox with an extremely short, angled propshaft leading straight into the offset input of the ZF drive axle.