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+--- Thread: Arriva North East: Order Predictions (/showthread.php?tid=2038)
RE: Arriva North East: Order Predictions - JoshP - 30 Oct 2017
I'd like to see knackered Solo's replaced with the short E200MMC, Omins replaced with full length E200MMC and the oldest deckers replaced with E400MMC. It steers with fleet towards standardised vehicles (and will help with engineering and repairs as the models will be very similar).
And maybe for Darlo since we now have gas facilities, introduce more EcoCities on major routes that require a heavy vehicle, albeit in their required brands (express/premium/eco).
Of course, never will happen with Arriva haha
RE: Arriva North East: Order Predictions - mb134 - 30 Oct 2017
(30 Oct 2017, 10:47 pm)JoshP I'd like to see knackered Solo's replaced with the short E200MMC, Omins replaced with full length E200MMC and the oldest deckers replaced with E400MMC. It steers with fleet towards standardised vehicles (and will help with engineering and repairs as the models will be very similar).
And maybe for Darlo since we now have gas facilities, introduce more EcoCities on major routes that require a heavy vehicle, albeit in their required brands (express/premium/eco).
Of course, never will happen with Arriva haha
Omnis should be replaced with B8RLEs. They're heavyweight single deck vehicles, to replace them with Enviro 200s or StreetLites would be foolish, though given Arriva, I fully expect it.
On a similar note, even the Wright website labels the StreetLite as a "midi-bus", yet operators are buying them in their droves as replacements for heavy weight single decks...
RE: Arriva North East: Order Predictions - Dan - 02 Nov 2017
(30 Oct 2017, 11:05 pm)mb134 Omnis should be replaced with B8RLEs. They're heavyweight single deck vehicles, to replace them with Enviro 200s or StreetLites would be foolish, though given Arriva, I fully expect it.
On a similar note, even the Wright website labels the StreetLite as a "midi-bus", yet operators are buying them in their droves as replacements for heavy weight single decks...
In my view, it's unlikely that Arriva will replace the Scania OmniCitys with a bus on the Volvo B8RLE chassis.
Unfortunately for many operators, a bus being low carbon emission certified is what makes the business case stack up to order these new vehicles. Regardless of who the operator buys from, buses which are Euro 6 are very expensive. A bus being low carbon certified makes it eligible for the additional fuel subsidy (BSOG) of 6p per km in England and 14p per km in Scotland. This helps build a solid business case for most operators when buying new vehicles, as there is a solid benefit for buying this type of bus as a replacement for the existing vehicle type.
Any buses in Wrightbus' range which have the 'Micro-Hybrid' package achieve Low Carbon Emission Bus Certification (the Wright Eclipse 3 bodied Volvo B8RLEs don't have this package, like the buses on the Volvo B5TL chassis).
JoshP's suggestion for further gas-powered EcoCitys and full size diesel Enviro200MMCs is the most plausible in my view, though a further order for Streetlites in Darlington could suggest that they're still interested in the Wrightbus LCEB range.
With reference to the Streetlite being labelled as a midibus: the Streetlite is! It's the full-size Streetlite Max (11.5m) which is classed as a full-size single deck bus, and it's this type that we see the most of in this region. The main examples of the 'midibus' range of Streetlites in this region are Go North East's "Saltwell Park" branded examples (this is why they're numbered in the 8xxx series as opposed to 5xxx series).
Arriva North East: Order Predictions - Jimmi - 02 Nov 2017
Can't see the North East getting much more in the way of new single deckers for the next few years, the new order for Darlington next year should see off the last of the Cadets and Volvo B10BLE's although I wouldn't be surprised if a few hang on for a bit longer, especially as 4802 & 4813 aren't likely to be back in service at Darlington anytime soon. It was suggested on here before that the Omnicities are likely to remain in service until around 2020 and once the Cadets and B10's have gone, the only full size single deckers older than the Omni's are the three VDL Commanders.
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RE: Arriva North East: Order Predictions - mb134 - 02 Nov 2017
(02 Nov 2017, 4:34 pm)Dan In my view, it's unlikely that Arriva will replace the Scania OmniCitys with a bus on the Volvo B8RLE chassis.
Unfortunately for many operators, a bus being low carbon emission certified is what makes the business case stack up to order these new vehicles. Regardless of who the operator buys from, buses which are Euro 6 are very expensive. A bus being low carbon certified makes it eligible for the additional fuel subsidy (BSOG) of 6p per km in England and 14p per km in Scotland. This helps build a solid business case for most operators when buying new vehicles, as there is a solid benefit for buying this type of bus as a replacement for the existing vehicle type.
With reference to the Streetlite being labelled as a midibus: the Streetlite is! It's the full-size Streetlite Max (11.5m) which is classed as a full-size single deck bus, and it's this type that we see the most of in this region. The main examples of the 'midibus' range of Streetlites in this region are Go North East's "Saltwell Park" branded examples (this is why they're numbered in the 8xxx series as opposed to 5xxx series).
I fully agree, hence my point being that while the OmniCitys should be replaced by a vehicle that can handle the demands of the route, in the B8RLE, they won't be.
Yet the 11.5m Max is still listed on the same page that refers to the Streetlite as a "midi-bus". It's built on a near-identical platform (you can buy an 11.5m Streetlite with the exact same engine as can be found in the 8.8m version.), and was never designed for some of the routes that they're being deployed on - which is my issue. Streetlites, on city routes, are solid enough and I actually quite enjoy travelling on them for short hops - hearing them strain when trying to reach 50mph on the other hand, is a completely different story. Horses for courses.
Arriva North East: Order Predictions - Dan - 02 Nov 2017
Where on Wrightbus' website is the full-length "Max" version of their Streetlite referred to as a midibus?
I have gone through their website and the closest I can find is this:
http://www.wrightbusinternational.com/product-range/StreetLite
making no reference to the "Max" version.
The truth of the matter is that this version of the Streetlite (at 11.5m) was introduced to compete with full-size single deck offerings (such as the 11.7m Optare Versa, and more recently, other buses such as the full size ADL Enviro200MMC, Mercedes Citaro, etc). They weren't merely designed just to be allocated to buses pottering around city centres. The Streetlites on services in the North East, by and large, seem to cope alright? Some of these services are pretty demanding, too! Whilst long-term it would seem likely that a heavy-weight single-deck vehicle stands a better chance of withstanding the test of time, we have no evidence that the Streetlite Max won't last 15 years in service.
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RE: Arriva North East: Order Predictions - L469 YVK - 02 Nov 2017
The biggest problem I find with the StreetDeck and StreetLite is that the engine choices are too linear. Wrightbus should've offered both vehicles with a 6.7 Cummins Unit (Same as ADL) and with the option of either ZF/Voith.
RE: Arriva North East: Order Predictions - mb134 - 02 Nov 2017
(02 Nov 2017, 7:05 pm)Dan Where on Wrightbus' website is the full-length "Max" version of their Streetlite referred to as a midibus?
I have gone through their website and the closest I can find is this:
http://www.wrightbusinternational.com/product-range/StreetLite
making no reference to the "Max" version.
The truth of the matter is that this version of the Streetlite (at 11.5m) was introduced to compete with full-size single deck offerings (such as the 11.7m Optare Versa, and more recently, other buses such as the full size ADL Enviro200MMC, Mercedes Citaro, etc). They weren't merely designed just to be allocated to buses pottering around city centres. The Streetlites on services in the North East, by and large, seem to cope alright? Some of these services are pretty demanding, too! Whilst long-term it would seem likely that a heavy-weight single-deck vehicle stands a better chance of withstanding the test of time, we have no evidence that the Streetlite Max won't last 15 years in service.
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That page contains a link to all right hand drive versions, including the 11.5m variant.
So, 1573 has been off the road for months with engine failure. The batch on the X1 are constantly off the road with issues. Every single time, without fail, that I've travelled on a Streetlite operated X18/20 it has been late, and completely unable to make up time until a period of sufficient layover. Which routes are 4653/9/64 usually allocated to at Ashington? Yep.
Arriva North East: Order Predictions - DanielS15 - 02 Nov 2017
Let's take the 5 examples on arriva x1 service. Every week there is problems with multiple even though there is only 5. Within the past 4 months there's probably less than 20 days where all 5 have been on the road. 1594 is currently on at least it's 3rd engine and is constantly having troubles with overheating and no acceleration. 1593 goes well however this also has troubles on a weekly basis. 1592 seems to be the best one of the batch, with it being the fastest and having less reliability issues than the rest. 1591 & 1590 on the other hand are dangerously slow, and struggle to do 45mph flat out again with these 2 having problems on a very regular basis. Not to mention the fact that the drivers absolutely hate them as the are horrible to drive and they would have a pulsar or a solo any day over a streetlite.
Oh and 1 arriva Stockton driver had to go on long term sickness leave due to bashing his head on the back of the cab compartment as the gearbox became confused and over revved violently shaking the bus causing him to whack his head with a considerable amount of force
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RE: Arriva North East: Order Predictions - JamesDunkley - 02 Nov 2017
Yep this is certainly true, there's already been two breakdowns on the X1 since Monday now, 1594 is around 40.000Miles behind the rest due to the amount of problems it's had. 1592 seems to be the best of the batch at the moment, although Voith have been out a few times recently with that one. Bearing in mind their are 15 05REG omnicitys at Darlington and 5 15REG Streetlites, an Engineer was telling me that The omnicitys have been doing fine recently with just one or two of the road daily now, with some examples covered over 2 Million Kilometres since New. I wouldn't want to see what the Streetlites are like on the X1 in Three years time never mind 15. At Least the X1 drivers are doing their best to kill them, and at least they'll get a more capable Pulsar instead, which at the moment is nearly every few days.
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RE: Arriva North East: Order Predictions - Jimmi - 02 Nov 2017
Thing that really frustrates me with the constant issues with the X1 StreetLite's at Darlington is the fact that they have to allocate Pulsar's in their place on the X1 which means other buses have to be allocated to other services in these instances, really growing tired of 29 seater Solo's on the busiest 5/5A runs now.
RE: Arriva North East: Order Predictions - Dan - 03 Nov 2017
(02 Nov 2017, 9:05 pm)mb134 That page contains a link to all right hand drive versions, including the 11.5m variant.
So, 1573 has been off the road for months with engine failure. The batch on the X1 are constantly off the road with issues. Every single time, without fail, that I've travelled on a Streetlite operated X18/20 it has been late, and completely unable to make up time until a period of sufficient layover. Which routes are 4653/9/64 usually allocated to at Ashington? Yep.
Yes, a link because the Streetlite Max is related to the Streetlite (so is relevant to include a link from one page to another). We'll have to agree to disagree on this one, but I'm sure if you ever saw a Wrightbus sales sheet for one of these buses, it would not say "midibus".
Without wishing to get too hung up on your statement that this type of bus is not a full-size single deck, and drawing away from the main intention of the post, an excerpt from the "Midibus" Wikipedia page is below:
"A midibus is a classification of single-decker minibuses which are generally larger than a traditional minibus but smaller than a full-size single decker and can be anywhere between 8 metres (26 ft 3 in) and 11 metres (36 ft 1 in) long."
As the Streetlite Max is 11.5m in length, it's a full-size single deck bus. Operators will continue to use them for this purpose, because that's what the bus was built for.
With regards to your specific examples - yes, there have been a few problems (I did say 'by and large'). A major component failure so early on in the life of a bus is worrying and I expect Arriva will be chasing this up with the vehicle manufacturer. Something happening on one bus does not accurately represent the general reliability of this vehicle type. It shouldn't happen but does: faulty engines, gearboxes etc, can go through production and pass a PDI without flagging any issues. I can't recall a single major component failure on one of Go North East's comparable Streetlite Micro-Hybrids, and I'd be inclined to suggest that these operate similar heavy-endurance routes, but are probably out longer (early, later, and 7 days a week now that they're used on other work on Sundays).
I believe Go North East did have a few teething issues with their Euro 5 bog-standard 'Streetlite Max' buses at Deptford on the "Drifter" 60 service. These have seemingly been overcome now: the after-support from Wrightbus allows little niggles to be fixed and tweaks to be made to the programming of the units sitting behind the scenes. If this happened on Go North East's early Streetlites, has it happened on Arriva's early Streetlite Micro-Hybrids on the "MAX" X1 service?
I'm not sure what relevance the X18/X20 has to this debate. The timetable for these services have not been designed with a bus sitting at 50mph in mind: they've been built in the knowledge that a bus that can exceed this speed will be allocated. Of course a Streetlite, limited to 50mph, would not be able to keep to time on these routes.
RE: Arriva North East: Order Predictions - Dan - 03 Nov 2017
(02 Nov 2017, 10:47 pm)Jimmi Thing that really frustrates me with the constant issues with the X1 StreetLite's at Darlington is the fact that they have to allocate Pulsar's in their place on the X1 which means other buses have to be allocated to other services in these instances, really growing tired of 29 seater Solo's on the busiest 5/5A runs now.
This is an issue regardless of which vehicle type has been ordered, though.
I've said this many times before, but there are umpteen amount of reasons why buses can be off the road and they're not all necessarily something to get worried about. I don't know specific reasons for Darlington's Streetlites to be off the road, but the fact they've ordered more suggests that it can't be anything too bad.
The issue you're highlighting here is that there's a need for operators to buy more spare buses, even for smaller orders. Go North East has a tendency to buy one spare bus for every 8 in a batch of new vehicles - on services with higher PVRs, this works well, but we see the downsides to buses with smaller PVRs not having spare buses to the same specification bought with that batch all the time (look at recent allocations to the X21, X9/X10, etc). It proves how important buying more higher quality spare vehicles is, to maintain customer expectations when premium features are advertised on that bus.
Arriva North East: Order Predictions - DanielS15 - 03 Nov 2017
The max variants may be a full size single decker but they are not heavy duty and are not suited to demanding routes. Drivers say that the 5 examples on the X1 feel like they are worn out and won't last. One particular driver said that they have a spacious cab but that it was the only positive thing he could say about them. 1592 in particular has had many complaints from passengers that the gearbox was too jerky which is why voirh have been out to it multiple times. 1594 performed a day on frequenta 2 service a couple months back and now that one is rattling much more compared to the other 4. I can also remember 1 day in the summer there was only 1 streetlite on the x1 due to the other 4 being off road which led to 2 pulsars, 1 solo and 1 Scania being on the x1. The engineers have also said that they are less reliable than the Dennis darts were when they were at the end of their life. Also 1593 and 1594 have both had to have new exhaust systems fitted costing arriva around £20,000 per vehicle which should have been covered under Wright warranty however Wright claimed the warranty was void due to arriva using the wrong coolant. There has been rumours that Darlington may not be reviving the new streetlites now due to a confusion with the price of the vehicles as the only reason these vehicles were ordered is because they were cheap and apparently Wright had come back to arriva with a new price that arriva was not prepared to pay.
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RE: Arriva North East: Order Predictions - deanmachine - 03 Nov 2017
Drivers hating on streetlites are just big whinges in my opinion, they're just as nice to drive as most other buses I've driven. I'd take a streetlite any day over a Solo, Solar, or the worst imo, a Versa. The gearbox faults with them, whilst I do find annoying when they smash into gear, and it's not something a finished product should have. However, a driver claiming sick because it smashed into gear? Come on, it's a well known issue with those streetlites, and it's a very simple problem to rectify. When you hear it downshift and the revs raise, take your foot off the throttle, and not just keep it at full throttle. Something a "professional" driver should easily be able to overcome.
RE: Arriva North East: Order Predictions - JamesDunkley - 03 Nov 2017
Streetlite over a solo no way!!!. The solos have a far nicer Gearbox and most Darlington examples can do 55MPH and over, they are also more reliable. I haven't came across one driver who likes the Streetlites on the X1, they are all sick and tired of them, and the passenger's are sick of their Appaauling reliability.
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RE: Arriva North East: Order Predictions - deanmachine - 03 Nov 2017
(03 Nov 2017, 4:21 pm)JamesDunkley Streetlite over a solo no way!!!. The solos have a far nicer Gearbox and most Darlington examples can do 55MPH and over, they are also more reliable. I haven't came across one driver who likes the Streetlites on the X1, they are all sick and tired of them, and the passenger's are sick of their Appaauling reliability.
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The 66 plate GNE ones have quite clunky gearboxes funnily enough. Don't mind a Solo at all, just the nature of them being a minibus, as well as being wheel forward makes them a little bit annoying to drive at times. You're right about the reliability though, vehicles that new shouldn't so unreliable. I do question the quality of Wrightbus sometimes, they're very hit or miss. But then again, they are built in the UK which isn't surprising that the quality can be so variable, just ask people who own Land Rovers!
RE: Arriva North East: Order Predictions - JamesDunkley - 03 Nov 2017
Oh right I don't mind them as much as they have the Daimler Engine, and it works much better with Gearbox. I see what you mean with the wheels being at the front, but apart from that they are nice buses, the Go North East Indigo ones are Lovely. Yep Wright seem to have quite a few problems with Reliability Shane as the only problems the pulsars have is the odd Electrical problem.
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RE: Arriva North East: Order Predictions - Andreos1 - 03 Nov 2017
I've read the comments with interest.
Not a fan of them, but live in hope that history repeats itself and following a review of the product, we see a Mk2 version in the future, that reaches the standards that we saw with the Mk2 National. It goes without saying that an improvement with the ride quality would be welcomed too.
I've commented on the whiplash like experience seen on a purple Streetlite climbing Houghton Cut.
It wasn't a one off.
A trip out on ANE Streetlite's the other week, was an experience that didn't give out any whiplash, but an experience that saw the vehicles struggle on hills, rattle like mad and saw one chugging about with what sounded like a slipped belt. I feared it may have been something more complicated.
Having read comments on here about the engines, I wonder whether my fears were correct.
I can't see the longer vehicles lasting for a longer total period than their slightly shorter cousins either (it's not as if length = a longer life span) and see the purchase of them flawed.
Maybe flawed in the way of a sort of false economy, given the chase for BSOG payments which will boost profits short-term. However, I think will result in new vehicles being purchased and replacing these Streetlites on front-line service, well before schedule.
Politically, Wright are massively important. It doesn't justify them producing vehicles, which some think are tat.
I suppose the damage to bus builders and reliance on companies like Wright, could be seen as collateral damage caused by de-reg in 86.
If de-reg hadn't happened and the subsequent lack of orders from operators hadn't resulted in the many builders closing down, maybe we would see a totally different environment...
Despite all that... These Streetlites must feature alongside the Pacer for 'most contributions' in the Sleepy Commuter thread!
Draw your own conclusions!
RE: Arriva North East: Order Predictions - L469 YVK - 04 Nov 2017
Why don't Wrightbus do these as options?
Single Deck:
- Wright UrbanLite (5l Daimler)
with Voith and Stop/Start
- Wright Endura (6.7 Cummins) with ZF
Double Deck:
- Wright CityDeck (5l Daimler) with Voith and Stop/Start
- Wright EnduraDeck (6.7 Cummins) with ZF