Although not part of the Southcoast Motor Services
fleet, a recent departure from our depot has been HFJ144, a Leyland
PD2/1 with Leyland body, built in 1948 as part of a batch of
seventeen vehicles for Exeter Corporation. Coincidentally bearing the
fleet number 17, this vehicle was delivered new to Exeter in February
of that year, at a purchase price of £3,243.00 (£106,300.00 in
today’s money).
It entered service straight away and remained so
employed until March 1970 when Exeter Corporation Transport was
bought out by the newly-formed National Bus Company: its vehicles
were absorbed into the Devon General fleet, a company which had also
recently been acquired by NBC. Along with three sister vehicles No.
17 was put up for sale and was acquired by a small consortium of
enthusiasts led by Philip Platt, the well known Devon General
enthusiast, who sadly passed away earlier in 2017.
No. 17 was taken to the West of England Transport
collection at Winkleigh Airfield and kept under cover there until
1993, when it was acquired by a Surrey-based enthusiast. It arrived
(somewhat ignominiously, behind a tow truck) at our depot on the 12th
March 1994 and underwent a five year comprehensive mechanical and
exterior body restoration. Exeter Corporation had somewhat belatedly
realised the economic necessity of allowing advertising material to
be displayed on their vehicles, but when they did, they did it in
style: all adverts being meticulously painted by expert signwriters,
a feature which was perpetuated in the restoration. A thorough
restoration of the interior then took place, with the finished
vehicle being back on the road in 2010.
Appreciated though it has
been in Sussex, No 17 was a long way from its natural home, so a
decision was finally taken to return it to its old haunts and it is
now in the care of Dan Shears at the superbly upgraded Winkleigh
facility.
The Southdown connection
The Southdown connection
Looking at the intricate mahogany interior
mouldings, which are a feature of the Leyland design, it would be
easy to imagine that these vehicles were almost hand built by
craftsmen, but the truth was very different. In1948, Leyland built no
less than 976 PD2 chassis and put their own bodies on 749 of them,
giving a weekly output of 18 chassis and 14 bodies – a remarkable
achievement at any time, but particularly so in view of the post-war
shortage of materials and labour. As a result of this productivity,
barely a week elapsed after the last Exeter PD2 had rolled off the
production line before work commenced on the first of a batch of
near-identical vehicles destined for Southdown. Car 316
was the first of eighty such vehicles,
often referred to by enthusiasts as “the JCD’s” – a reference
to their registration letters.
Prior to the advent of the
PD3 'Queen Marys' in the late 1950s and 60’s, these vehicles formed
the largest single delivery to Southdown in the post-war period. This
version of the Leyland body design was extremely robust and widely
regarded as a classic of its time, with most of the Southdown fleet
serving the company well for almost twenty years. One of them also
survived into preservation: car 381 (JCD81) was withdrawn in April
1967 and sold to a dealer in Greater Manchester. It was purchased for
preservation in December 1968 and spent several years in the North of
England, (mainly in Sheffield), before returning to the Brighton area
in December 1974. Sadly it was heavily vandalised about eighteen
months later, and was scrapped at Ashington in November 1976.
