Around Chiswick Works
I`m sure I wasn`t the only person who thought how inappropriate it was for RM 1 to be left outside at Chiswick Works for a couple of years. But I didn`t know then what I would later discover from conversations with Colin Curtis (LT`s most senior engineering manager) about the difficulty of trying to protect this most historic example of carefully considered bus design. The greatest challenge to keeping it within LT was the rather tenuous situation of a bus being attached to `Research & Development` with no realistic prospect of it being used to trial new ideas in service. And that`s how an `arrangement` came about for Lockheed to `buy it` for ongoing trials with hydraulic brakes.
But when their use of it could go no further it came back to LT and was usually to be found as seen here in the lowest part of `the dip`. Maybe this was chosen to afford a little bit of protection from the weather though the state of the roof is probably relevant to years spent at Lockheeds. My recollection of seeing RM 1 often was that it had regular use by workers looking for somewhere quiet to go at lunchtime. There were just a few seat cushions in it but plenty of lunch wrapper litter plus drinks cans, bottles, cigarette ends and matches. It was a sorry sight internally - often damp too - and, as can be seen here, it wasn`t great externally either with wiper and indicator ears missing.
When I took this picture on 12 September 1979 it was a Wednesday which ordinarily would make this an unusual scene for no other buses to be present. This was often where a couple of staff buses would park and maybe vehicles attached to The Experimental Shop. But with some significant work taking place in the background it is probable that access to `the dip` wasn`t possible. On the lower windscreen is chalked `apprentice repaint 30/11/78. Doesn`t look much like a bus repainted less than year previously but maybe it suggests that an attempt was contemplated to get the bus away from open storage much sooner than actually happened as it would be 1981 before the future of this important bus finally started to move in the right direction.
Around Chiswick Works
I`m sure I wasn`t the only person who thought how inappropriate it was for RM 1 to be left outside at Chiswick Works for a couple of years. But I didn`t know then what I would later discover from conversations with Colin Curtis (LT`s most senior engineering manager) about the difficulty of trying to protect this most historic example of carefully considered bus design. The greatest challenge to keeping it within LT was the rather tenuous situation of a bus being attached to `Research & Development` with no realistic prospect of it being used to trial new ideas in service. And that`s how an `arrangement` came about for Lockheed to `buy it` for ongoing trials with hydraulic brakes.
But when their use of it could go no further it came back to LT and was usually to be found as seen here in the lowest part of `the dip`. Maybe this was chosen to afford a little bit of protection from the weather though the state of the roof is probably relevant to years spent at Lockheeds. My recollection of seeing RM 1 often was that it had regular use by workers looking for somewhere quiet to go at lunchtime. There were just a few seat cushions in it but plenty of lunch wrapper litter plus drinks cans, bottles, cigarette ends and matches. It was a sorry sight internally - often damp too - and, as can be seen here, it wasn`t great externally either with wiper and indicator ears missing.
When I took this picture on 12 September 1979 it was a Wednesday which ordinarily would make this an unusual scene for no other buses to be present. This was often where a couple of staff buses would park and maybe vehicles attached to The Experimental Shop. But with some significant work taking place in the background it is probable that access to `the dip` wasn`t possible. On the lower windscreen is chalked `apprentice repaint 30/11/78. Doesn`t look much like a bus repainted less than year previously but maybe it suggests that an attempt was contemplated to get the bus away from open storage much sooner than actually happened as it would be 1981 before the future of this important bus finally started to move in the right direction.