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irmingham to Manchester electric bus

28th February 1975
Page 27
Page 28
Page 27, 28th February 1975 — irmingham to Manchester electric bus
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as prototype has full day working :ential

lartin Hayes

WEEK the first electric vehic ped by the Lucas Group a eon Seddon midibus went into ger-carrying service with the !r Manchester PTE. It is operatn the city's Centreline shuttle which has duties of near cons 12-hour running and schedules ing more than 40 miles a day per as the only journalist invited to s the vehicle's record-breaking ial when, last month, it was from Birmingham to Manunder its own power. A distance re than 90 miles was completed it any trace of the batteries becoming discharged. Since then I have had an exclusive opportunity to drive the bus in Manchester.

The bus is phase one of the Lucas Group's electric vehicle programme. (The second phase, to be announced shortly, is the development of a number of converted Bedford CF vans which will enter trial service with leading fleet operators.) It has been developed at a special factory in Birmingham by a small team led by Mr Geoff Harding, who initiated the project when he was the Manchester PTE's director of operations and research.

The development of the vehicle has been under way for several years now and it is clear that the accent has been on practicality throughout. The midi vehicle was chosen deliberately so that the problems of a full-scale bus might be avoided in this first model. Greater Manchester Transport is now operating the country's largest fleet of Seddon midis over a particularly demanding city centre route where the benefits of electric traction should be most readily appreciated. At the same time easy comparisons with the diesel-powered vehicles are possible.

Significantly, the bus utilizes lead acid batteries; Lucas feels that new concepts like sodium sulphur are still nowhere near commercial reality. But it is improvements to the conventional lead acid design — together with an efficient control system — which are said to lie behind the impressive range figures so far achieved.

Conventional traction batteries give about 10 watt-hours per pound of battery weight at a two-hour discharge rate with an average life of about 1500 cycles. Norma! hard rubber-cased SLI (starting, lighting and ignition) batteries• give about 12 watt-hours per pound weight at the two-hour rate and a 100cycle life. Polypropolene SLI batteries, like Lucas's own Pacemaker model, give 13.6 watt-hours at the two-hour rate. The batteries used in the bus are developed from the polypropolene SL1 unit with improved life expectancy. Several hundred cycles is the target. As it is, the batteries are claimed to have twice the energy for half the weight of conventional traction batteries.

The batteries themselves — there are sixty of them — are mounted in pallets at the sides and rear of the vehicle. They can be demounted by fork-lift truck though it is not envisaged on this bus at least that they will be exchanged for charged batteries. They can be charged in situ and only need to be removed for occasional maintenance and topping up with distilled water.

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