Fray's new rôle
Stake-out along Milton Road, Weston-super-Mare, Friday 22nd August 1980. The 105 was the last of the town's services using FLF Lodekkas. I'm not sure whether the sea-front open-top service may have perpetuated the use of crew-operated FS Lodekkas for another couple of years.
Hey! It's 7182 ...a bus that looms large in my legend, being the first I ever drove in service with passengers on board. I remember the terror of that occasion. I had learned mostly on a particular LD, with a couple of KSWs thrown in. Once I'd "passed out" I was given "MW training", which consisted of an hour or so around Yate and Chipping Sodbury to accustom myself to the famous "treacle-stirring" effect of the MW's allegedly synchromesh gearbox. I must have had RE training, but I don't remember it at all. Special training on FLFs was considered unnecessary, as they were essentially a modernised version of the LD. One was merely "familiarised" My familiarisation consisted of a few circuits of Lawrence Hill yard, passing each time through "No. 1 Shed". Actually, as a complete novice driver, I found the difference between the LD and the FLF very noticeable and the latter considerably more of a handful. After a little experience you can take an unfamiliar type in your stride, but anyone who has driven buses will know that no two, even of the same type, are alike. I remember, in a show of "confidence" for the benefit of my conductor and the supervising driver, setting off at a cracking pace down Bouverie Street, "off service" to the "Charltonmead" terminus of the 88 route, but being unable to discover the whereabouts of fourth gear. Those first two charladies I picked up outside the "Wayfarer" wooden pub clambered aboard without so much as a glance in my direction, ignorant and heedless of my newly exalted state. Perhaps, in this case, ignorance was bliss. There were a few stallings of the engine, but the only hairy moment came the second time in from "Charltonmead", by which time it was the morning rush hour. The traffic came to a standstill on the slope down to the Centre from College Green and I failed to take into account the effect on braking performance of a downhill slope and a fully-laden bus. There were inches in it, but all's well that ends well. The rest is history...
Fray's new rôle
Stake-out along Milton Road, Weston-super-Mare, Friday 22nd August 1980. The 105 was the last of the town's services using FLF Lodekkas. I'm not sure whether the sea-front open-top service may have perpetuated the use of crew-operated FS Lodekkas for another couple of years.
Hey! It's 7182 ...a bus that looms large in my legend, being the first I ever drove in service with passengers on board. I remember the terror of that occasion. I had learned mostly on a particular LD, with a couple of KSWs thrown in. Once I'd "passed out" I was given "MW training", which consisted of an hour or so around Yate and Chipping Sodbury to accustom myself to the famous "treacle-stirring" effect of the MW's allegedly synchromesh gearbox. I must have had RE training, but I don't remember it at all. Special training on FLFs was considered unnecessary, as they were essentially a modernised version of the LD. One was merely "familiarised" My familiarisation consisted of a few circuits of Lawrence Hill yard, passing each time through "No. 1 Shed". Actually, as a complete novice driver, I found the difference between the LD and the FLF very noticeable and the latter considerably more of a handful. After a little experience you can take an unfamiliar type in your stride, but anyone who has driven buses will know that no two, even of the same type, are alike. I remember, in a show of "confidence" for the benefit of my conductor and the supervising driver, setting off at a cracking pace down Bouverie Street, "off service" to the "Charltonmead" terminus of the 88 route, but being unable to discover the whereabouts of fourth gear. Those first two charladies I picked up outside the "Wayfarer" wooden pub clambered aboard without so much as a glance in my direction, ignorant and heedless of my newly exalted state. Perhaps, in this case, ignorance was bliss. There were a few stallings of the engine, but the only hairy moment came the second time in from "Charltonmead", by which time it was the morning rush hour. The traffic came to a standstill on the slope down to the Centre from College Green and I failed to take into account the effect on braking performance of a downhill slope and a fully-laden bus. There were inches in it, but all's well that ends well. The rest is history...