beans_again?
Sunnyvale School District Crown coaches 2001 2
School districts, community colleges, the California State University system, and the University of California overall are struggling to get monies needed for operations. In the early 2000s, a school bus driver who knew how to work on these buses worked half a shift driving and the other half doing oil changes and preventive maintenance with the district mechanic.
This is a roughly 1978-1981 Crown Coach, notorious among fleet garages. Since the early 1950s models, they all look about the same. One fleet mechanic told me Crown went out of business because their buses were made so well they never wore out. Lending credence to his claim, Crown established a business upgrading their old buses. Once, a gentleman entered the office and asked if any of these would be coming up for sale soon. I told him there were no plans. "These are the only buses that can survive the roads in my part of Mexico," he reported. I remember being surprised the first time I looked underneath and saw the size of the steel frame rails. This coach had the biggest brake drums I'd ever seen.
This bus had a two cycle 6-71 Detroit Diesel and a 5-speed manual transmission. This means it has six cylinders of 71 cubic inches each. The engine sits horizontally under the floor just behind the front axle. It makes the most beautiful percussive clatter at idle. I like to say these Detroit Diesels sound like someone is pouring ball bearings down the air intake at idle. This model has the first anti-lock brake system called FS-121. They had a reputation for being troublesome and federal regulations allowed them to be disconnected. These were still hooked up and reportedly worked fine. I believe the high-backed seats in this one were retrofitted in order to comply with regulations.
Crown was originally in Los Angeles. Later, their factory moved east of Los Angeles to Chino. They made fire engines, school buses, and a few tour buses.
Your corrections are welcomed.
…This default assumption that public schools are terrible; the default assumption that any private school is better than any public school is so poisonous to us being able to really rationally assess which systems are failing: which ones need help, which ones don't... We can't see these things clearly. We can't get useful intelligence out of these places because we are so soaked in this bile that has us... down on the public schools so completely and totally that of course everybody's coming out of the woodwork to talk about vouchers. We've already convinced ourselves that this institution, that built the American middle class, is irredeemable. Somehow we were so smart and wonderful in 1929 and 1939 — when only a third of students graduated from high school, by the way — that in 1999 we're totally stupid and we can't figure it out anymore.
— Ray Suarez
Journalism grade image.
Source: recklessly scanned Kodachrome 25 slide resulting in a 5,700x1,800 16-bit TIF file.
Please do not copy this image for any purpose.
Sunnyvale School District Crown coaches 2001 2
School districts, community colleges, the California State University system, and the University of California overall are struggling to get monies needed for operations. In the early 2000s, a school bus driver who knew how to work on these buses worked half a shift driving and the other half doing oil changes and preventive maintenance with the district mechanic.
This is a roughly 1978-1981 Crown Coach, notorious among fleet garages. Since the early 1950s models, they all look about the same. One fleet mechanic told me Crown went out of business because their buses were made so well they never wore out. Lending credence to his claim, Crown established a business upgrading their old buses. Once, a gentleman entered the office and asked if any of these would be coming up for sale soon. I told him there were no plans. "These are the only buses that can survive the roads in my part of Mexico," he reported. I remember being surprised the first time I looked underneath and saw the size of the steel frame rails. This coach had the biggest brake drums I'd ever seen.
This bus had a two cycle 6-71 Detroit Diesel and a 5-speed manual transmission. This means it has six cylinders of 71 cubic inches each. The engine sits horizontally under the floor just behind the front axle. It makes the most beautiful percussive clatter at idle. I like to say these Detroit Diesels sound like someone is pouring ball bearings down the air intake at idle. This model has the first anti-lock brake system called FS-121. They had a reputation for being troublesome and federal regulations allowed them to be disconnected. These were still hooked up and reportedly worked fine. I believe the high-backed seats in this one were retrofitted in order to comply with regulations.
Crown was originally in Los Angeles. Later, their factory moved east of Los Angeles to Chino. They made fire engines, school buses, and a few tour buses.
Your corrections are welcomed.
…This default assumption that public schools are terrible; the default assumption that any private school is better than any public school is so poisonous to us being able to really rationally assess which systems are failing: which ones need help, which ones don't... We can't see these things clearly. We can't get useful intelligence out of these places because we are so soaked in this bile that has us... down on the public schools so completely and totally that of course everybody's coming out of the woodwork to talk about vouchers. We've already convinced ourselves that this institution, that built the American middle class, is irredeemable. Somehow we were so smart and wonderful in 1929 and 1939 — when only a third of students graduated from high school, by the way — that in 1999 we're totally stupid and we can't figure it out anymore.
— Ray Suarez
Journalism grade image.
Source: recklessly scanned Kodachrome 25 slide resulting in a 5,700x1,800 16-bit TIF file.
Please do not copy this image for any purpose.