Guy Motors E-Book

Kevin Warrington

• Herausgeber: Crowood
• Kategorie: Lebensstil
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018

Beschreibung

Covering all the motor bus and trolleybus products of Guy Motors, this book recounts the history of an iconic British coachbuilder. It begins with the early origins of Sydney Guy's eponymous company, followed by the ubiquitous Arab bus and the eventual absorption of the company into the British Leyland empire. Starting with the small single deck vehicles of the 1920s, the story continues with the development of the six-wheeled chassis, with both internal combustion and electrically powered trolleybus formats. The book also examines the leading technological developments in braking, suspension and chassis design, now commonplace, that were to lead to both the Victory and Wulfrunian products, neither of which were the commercial success originally intended. The story develops with the acquisition of the Guy Motors business by Jaguar and eventual absorption into British Leyland, and ends with the final Guy Motors inspired designs sold under the Leyland brand. In addition to new images of preserved vehicles, the book is illustrated with an extensive selection of period images of vehicles in normal service and manufacturer's sales brochures. A full marque history of Guy Motors, the iconic British coachbuilder, covering all the motor bus and trolleybus products. Of special interest for all bus enthusiasts and those who restore and preserve buses and coaches. Covers the origins of the company; the development of the Arab range from its rebirth in WWII until the 1970s. Illustrated with archive material, contemporary material and new colour photography of preserved Guy buses and coaches. 168 colour and 148 black & white photographs are included.

Leseprobe

GUY MOTORS

BUSES AND COACHES

KEVIN WARRINGTON

THE CROWOOD PRESS

First published in 2018 byThe Crowood Press LtdRamsbury, MarlboroughWiltshire SN8 2HR

www.crowood.com

This e-book first published in 2018

© Kevin Warrington 2018

All rights reserved. This e-book is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights, and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

ISBN 978 1 78500 498 8

CONTENTS

Acknowledgements

Preface

Chapter 1GUY MOTORS LIMITED: THE BEGINNING

Chapter 2GROWTH AND EXPANSION IN THE 1920s

Chapter 3GUY TROLLEYBUSES

Chapter 4THE 1930s – TROUBLED TIMES AND UTILITY VEHICLES

Chapter 5POST-WAR EXPANSION

Chapter 6REPOSITIONING THE ENGINE AND THE NEW ARAB IV

Chapter 7UTILITIES REBUILT AND VARIATIONS ON A THEME

Chapter 8OTTERS, VIXENS, WARRIORS AND VICTORIES

Chapter 9WULFRUNIAN – TOO MUCH TOO SOON?

Chapter 10THE BEGINNING OF THE END

Chapter 11GUYS IN PRESERVATION

Index

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Creating this book would never have been possible without help from many enthusiasts, who have given their time to create extensive fleet lists of vehicles that are published on the Internet and have been extremely helpful for confirming both dates in and out of service and helping to verify details such as the origins of bodies fitted. The resources compiled by The PSV Circle have proved invaluable as a thoroughly reliable source of information and I have also used with gratitude the lists created by Peter Gould and buslistsontheweb.co.uk. Without these valuable online resources, checking information would have been so much more difficult and time-consuming. Similarly, the archive of the magazine Commercial Motor has proved to be of great value, not just from the position of confirming technical data, but also in forming a view of how the output of Guy Motors was considered when newly introduced.

In the research for the book, I’ve had the pleasure of visiting many of the collections of preserved vehicles in the United Kingdom, where the custodians have without exception been unfailing in their help. In particular, I would like to thank everyone involved with the museums at Aldridge (formerly the Aston Manor Road Transport Museum), Wythall, Dewsbury and Lathalmond, who made me welcome during my visits and provided unrestricted access for photography. Whenever I found a Guy vehicle at a rally, the owners were more than willing to chat about their prize possession and help with information as needed.

IMAGES

I’ve used a variety of sources for images to illustrate this work, aiming to achieve a balance of newly created modern digital photographs of preserved vehicles, most of which are my own work, and historical period images that have been obtained from various archives and collections. The archives of the Online Transport Archive, the Omnibus Society and 1066 online were all exceptionally helpful in providing historical images. Other images have been sourced from various library and local authority archives, the one at Wolverhampton being worthy of a special mention for their assistance. A number of images have been supplied from Wolverhampton City Archives and are reproduced with their permission.

My very good friend and fellow enthusiast, Clive Wilkin, provided many of the images of vehicles in service from the 1950s and 1960s; his contributions are acknowledged with his initials ‘CW’ in the captions. I must also thank my wife, Ann, as usual, for her patience in helping with this work, especially for proofreading the drafts.

PREFACE

As a young boy at the end of the 1950s, I moved with my parents to a new housing estate built to accommodate the overflowing population of Portsmouth. Bus journeys became a way of life for trips into town to visit family and for other essential social activities, as the development of other facilities lagged far behind the provision of new housing. The bus services were extensive, especially in the morning and afternoon to accommodate the needs of the rehoused residents making their way to and from work, which for the most part remained in the city. Portsmouth Corporation at the time operated a large fleet of almost exclusively Leyland vehicles, smartly finished in a red and white livery. These were augmented on longer routes out of the city by Southdown Motor Services, which again were a predominantly Leyland customer, but did have a few other vehicles that we would see from time to time. Moving slightly further westwards along the coast, we would run into the fleet of Hants & Dorset, exclusively Bristol and Eastern Coach Works of course, and venturing as far as Southampton would bring us to a large fleet of entirely different vehicles that proudly bore the word ‘GUY’ on their radiators. Although more basic in finish and austere in style, these were impressive vehicles even to a primary school-age child. They seemed to be faster and more powerful than the Portsmouth buses and Southampton had steep hills that the buses would charge up and speed back down again.

Just across Portsmouth Harbour we would encounter the Provincial fleet of green buses. These to my young eyes seemed to be a mixture, but many had the magical word ‘GUY’ on them and some even had the Indian Chief’s Head on the radiator cap. And like so many other young boys, I ‘learned’ to drive a bus by watching how the real driver did it. When I did eventually learn to drive a half-cab bus with a crash box, I quickly discovered that it isn’t quite as easy as it appeared and accepted that I might have been just a little harsh as a little boy in my scoring of the driver’s abilities to execute clean gear changes.

Moving on to gain engineering qualifications, I developed a fascination for elegant designs, especially those that take a novel approach to a series of problems and provide a solution that on paper should work well, but where the implementation appeared to create more problems than were originally to have been solved.

While the vast majority of Guy’s products were simple, robust and workmanlike, one model, far ahead of its time but woefully under-engineered, shines as an example of such a design. This is of course the Wulfrunian.

A similar fascination with railways led me to compare the Wulfrunian with the Merchant Navy class railway locomotives of the Southern Railway; again, the implementation of multiple new designs into a single new class of machine rushed into production before the numerous and inevitable shortcomings in the design had been evaluated and resolved. While these locomotives, with their smaller ‘Light Pacific’ cousins, went on to provide long service for the nationalized British Railways, the Wulfrunian was to have a catastrophic effect on its manufacturer. With supreme irony, many of the features that were to be pioneered in that design are now taken for granted.

When the opportunity to create a new book on a range of bus and coach models arose, the choice of Guy Motors became an automatic choice.

Chapter 1

GUY MOTORS LIMITED:THE BEGINNING

Half-cab buses were for many years the traditional form of public transport in the United Kingdom. Now kept at the North West Museum of Road Transport, DFM 347H was the final Guy bus chassis to be delivered for the home market.

Leyland. AEC. Bristol. Bedford. All names that come quickly to mind when considering the companies that made a significant contribution to passenger transport in the twentieth century. Leyland were the leading choice of municipal operators across the country; AEC were synonymous with London Transport, particularly with the RT rear-entrance double-decker, RF single-deck front-entrance bus and of course the Routemaster – the stereotype half-cab rear-entrance double-decker that has become a worldwide symbol for London. Bristol, nearly always with bodywork designed and built by Eastern Coach Works in Lowestoft, was the choice of the nationalized Tilling Group, uniquely available to that undertaking until the market was liberalized and the designs were made available in the general market. Bedford, the commercial vehicle brand of Vauxhall Motors, owned since the 1920s by General Motors, was the lightweight chassis choice of the independent, with single-deck buses and coaches constructed by the likes of Duple and Plaxton on a chassis derived from Bedford’s extensive range of goods vehicles.

And Guy Motors. Conventionally designed but with many innovative features, robust and economical to operate with a long service life. So long, that often life-expired bodywork would be removed, scrapped and a new body installed on to the still serviceable chassis. A company that produced motor buses both single and double deck; touring coaches and trolleybuses; and which developed a substantial export market worldwide. Guy’s products sold across all markets, the output of a progressive and forward-thinking Wolverhampton-based business. Not just passenger transport, but also goods vehicles, munitions and, for a short period, motor cars. Later in the life of the company, an overambitious sales expansion, coupled with a technically innovative but underdeveloped bus design, would bring down the company, resulting in it being acquired by Jaguar. With the latter’s eventual integration into British Leyland, what had once been a fiercely independent company became all-subsumed into the fiasco that was British Leyland.

THE BEGINNINGS OF GUY MOTORS

Sydney Slater Guy was born on 31 October 1884 in Wolverhampton, the son of Isaiah Guy and his wife Emmeline, who are shown in the 1891 Census as living at 51 Beach Road, Sparkhill, a short distance south of Birmingham. The family home, which no longer exists, having been replaced with modern housing, was shared with a general domestic servant, Susan Brown. Isaiah gave his occupation on Census night as ‘Commercial Traveller’ and the area appears to have been comfortable, as several neighbours also employed general servants and gave occupations such as ‘Chief Clerk’ and ‘Printer’s Manager’, while Mr Francis Parkes, the immediate neighbour, also described himself as a ‘Commercial Traveller’.

Sydney Slater Guy, founder, Managing Director and Chairman of the company that bore his name. WOLVERHAMPTON CITY ARCHIVE

Between 1891 and 1901, the family moved to 34 Cambridge Road, King’s Norton, which is the address given for the next official census. Emmeline is recorded as being the head of the household, so we must presume that Isaiah was travelling on business. The family has by now grown to include four sons: Sydney, William Ewart, Frank Maurice and Frederick James. A general servant was still employed: Harriet Lane had replaced Susan Brown. King’s Norton is located a little further from the city centre of Birmingham and is now in the ‘leafy suburbs’. The occupations given by the neighbours of the Guy family suggest that the area was much the same in 1901.

In 1902, Sydney was coming to the end of his education at Birmingham Technical School, where the subjects he had studied included Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry and Electricity and Magnetism, all subjects that would provide a solid foundation for his future career. From here, he was indentured to Belliss and Morcom, where he would complete a three-year apprenticeship.

Having completed his apprenticeship, Sydney Guy took a position as a senior draftsman at the General Electric Company (GEC) at its newly built factory in Witton to the north of Birmingham city centre. GEC was growing rapidly with huge demand for its electrical products, particularly the Osram brand of incandescent lamps, in which it was a market leader. Sydney was not to stay with GEC for long; in 1906 an opportunity arose for a position as Service Manager at the repair department of the Humber Company in Coventry and Sydney Guy now found himself involved in the industry that was to be his future and in due course to bear his name.

Humber, like many of the Coventry-based motor vehicle manufacturers, had its beginnings in bicycles, developing into motorcycles and, eventually, motor cars. Three years later in 1909, Guy was to leave the position at Humber and move to a position in Wolverhampton. Now aged just twenty-four years, this was to be his final position as an employee and his new employer was the Sunbeam Motor Car Company Limited, whose Works were established at Upper Villiers Street. Despite much redevelopment of the city of Wolverhampton in the intervening years, the Sunbeam Works have survived, although now used for different industrial purposes and with part of it Grade II listed.

Guy’s appointment was to be as Works Manager, a very senior position for one of such an age and with relatively little experience. It is reported that immediately after his appointment, one of the Board enquired of his age and Guy is said to have responded that as they (the Board of Sunbeam) had already decided to appoint him to the position, his age was immaterial. This was not to be the only occasion on which a degree of youthful arrogance was to be shown: some years later when applying for membership of the Institution of Automobile Engineers, he increased his age by two years when he was appointed as an Associate Member.

The Sunbeam Motor Car Company had been formed in 1905 from a business founded in 1887 by John Marston to manufacture, not surprisingly, bicycles. Joining the newly fledged car company at around the same time was a French car designer, Louis Coatalen, who came to England in 1900 from his home in Brittany after working for renowned French car manufacturers De Dion-Bouton and Panhard et Levasseur. He, too, worked for Humber prior to forming a partnership with William Hillman and eventually moving to Sunbeam. Coatalen was an enthusiastic motor-sport driver, competing in the 1908 Isle of Man Tourist Trophy race with a Hillman-Coatalen car and developing the Sunbeam 12/16 cars that competed at Dieppe in the Coupe de l’Auto for 3-litre cars and took the first three places. Coatalen is credited in coining the expression that ‘motor sport improves the breed’. In the years between the two world wars, Sunbeam were to become an important name in motor sport and in world speed-record endeavours. But this was all to occur long after Sydney Guy had departed.

By 1913, Sunbeam were enjoying a successful period, with profits in the region of £200,000, an increase of tenfold since Guy had joined. Notwithstanding an already generous salary of £250 per year, plus a company-sup-plied car, Guy was of the opinion that he was due a more substantial compensation in return for his contribution to the company’s success. The directors were not of the same opinion and during May 1914, Guy resigned his position with effect from the end of that month. The directors of Sunbeam wished him well in his new position and an agreement was reached whereby the company car would be returned or paid for by the end of August.

SYDNEY GUY’S FIRST EMPLOYER

The foundations of Belliss and Morcom were set out by George Belliss in 1862 when he acquired an engineering business situated in Broad Street, Birmingham, from R. Bach and Company and formed a partnership with Joseph Seekings that survived until 1866, after which Belliss traded as G.E. Belliss and Company, moving in 1875 to new and larger premises located alongside the Birmingham Canal in Ledsham Street, Ladywood, an area that remains industrial on the very edge of the recently redeveloped area of Birmingham city centre around Brindley Place.

The second part of the business name came in 1884 when the first-class former Royal Navy steam engineer Alfred Morcom joined as a partner, although the trading name remained as G.E. Belliss & Co. The main business for the firm was the engineering and construction of electrical generating sets comprising a reciprocating steam engine and directly connected dynamo, with the main users being industrial plants, hospitals and waterworks. Morcom’s experience of the maritime industry brought new business that was to result in the firm’s products providing main power and electrical generation for the Royal Navy’s Sharpshooter class of torpedo gunboats.

The name of Belliss and Morcom was adopted formally in 1899, having become a limited company six years earlier. Customers for generating equipment included the municipal undertakings in Bury St Edmunds and Gloucester and the Glasgow Corporation Tramways.

The future career direction for Sydney Guy and his employer reached an interesting point when in 1907 a double-decker bus was built for the London General Omnibus Company, and although Guy was no longer employed at the time of the delivery, it is interesting to consider that it may have planted a seed in his imagination for the future.

Following the end of World War I, Belliss and Morcom produced a series of internal combustion engines, building their own range of diesel engines until the 1930s. The business continued under the same name until 1968, when it merged with W.H. Allen, Sons and Company to create Amalgamated Power Engineering. Just before the merger, however, Belliss and Morcom purchased the Crossley-Premier Engines business from the receiver. Crossley-Premier had been formed by the Crossley Brothers in Manchester, another famous builder of motor buses, that part of the business being eventually acquired by AEC and, like Guy’s business long in the future, being subsumed into British Leyland.

The Amalgamated Power business remained until 1981, when it was acquired by Northern Engineering Industries plc (NEI), a business that had been built on well-established firms in the electrical generating industry, including the turbine business originally established by Charles Parsons. NEI was subsequently purchased by Rolls-Royce in 1989. Eventually, the original business would find itself purchased by US-based industrial equipment manufacturer Gardner Denver and the original name resurrected, now supplying a range of oil-free compressors. There is no connection with the Manchester firm of Gardner, renowned builder of the diesel engines that were to provide power to so many of Guy Motors’ products.

SUNBEAM – A WEB OF OWNERSHIP

John Marston set up on his own account first as a tinplate manufacturer in 1859 at the age of twenty-three and expanded by purchasing the Works of Edward Perry, his former employer and apprentice-master. As an enthusiastic cyclist, the fashion of the time, Marston quickly established his own cycle business in 1887 at a factory in Wolverhampton that he named Sunbeamland. A limited company was incorporated in 1895 and five years later, the name Sunbeam was registered to designate motor cars to be built by the company, following the first experimental forays into motor cars in 1899. Other models following the general style for veteran cars were to follow until 1905, when the Sunbeam Motor Car Company was formed to focus on the interests of motor car design and construction. This was the concern to which Sydney Guy would be appointed as Works Manager.

It had been planned that Marston’s third son, Roland, would succeed his father as Chairman, but he was to die unexpectedly in March 1918, with John Marston himself dying the morning after Roland’s funeral. The bicycle and motorcycle business, which had been separated from the car business, were sold to a business consortium that by 1927 was to have formed into Imperial Chemical Industries and, ten years later, the Sunbeam tradename for motorcycles was disposed of to the owners of the Matchless and AJS brands, which in due course sold the name to BSA.

In 1920, the Sunbeam Motor Car Company was bought by the established French motor company, Darracq, which, the previous year, had purchased London-based Clément-Talbot, with each brand retaining its individual identities. The group had three sets of premises from which it operated: Darracq from Suresnes, then a suburb of Paris; Sunbeam in Wolverhampton; and Clément-Talbot in North Kensington, London. Economies of scale were obtained by centralizing administration, purchasing and advertising under the umbrella name of STD Motors Limited.

In common with many other motor businesses, Sunbeam did not survive the depression of the 1930s and went into receivership in 1934. It was purchased out of receivership by the Rootes Brothers, who were busily acquiring other car manufacturers, notably Hillman and Humber.

To complicate matters further, from the late 1920s Sunbeam extended its production of ambulances on car chassis into larger commercial vehicles, particularly motor buses and trolleybuses. The commercial vehicle business also passed to Rootes, who had also recently purchased the Karrier Motors business from Clayton & Co. of Huddersfield. Karrier also produced trolleybuses, production of which moved to Sunbeam, and small petrol-engined commercial vehicles, which moved to Rootes’ Commer business in Bedfordshire.

Then, in 1946, Rootes sold Sunbeam Commercial Vehicles to J. Brockhouse & Co., based in West Bromwich, who in 1948 sold the trolleybus business to … Guy Motors Limited.

The Sunbeam name continued to be used as part of the Rootes group, either as Sunbeam-Talbot, then finally as a marque in its own right, designating cars that were essentially higher-performance Hillman models. Rootes were, if nothing else, consummate masters of what has become known as ‘badge engineering’.

GUY MOTORS LIMITED IS BORN

A new business was incorporated on Saturday, 30 May 1914 by Sydney Guy. It was registered as Guy Motors Limited and established with a capital of £50,000 made up of 45,000 ordinary shares and 5,000 deferred shares, all shares having a nominal value of £1. It is hardly credible that the plans were not in Guy’s mind prior to his departure from Sunbeam, especially as designs had been drawn up for a 30cwt light lorry and plans were under way for a factory to be constructed in the Fellings Park area of Wolverhampton. Traditionally, industrial development in the West Midlands, and particularly in the area around Wolverhampton known as the Black Country, had followed the lines initially of the canals and latterly of the railways. With the introduction of motor transport, reliance on railways and canals to bring in raw materials and take out finished goods was diminishing, giving businesses the opportunity to expand into new areas, which today we might refer to as ‘green fields’.

THE GUY FAMILY

The 1911 Census shows the Guy family still living at 34 Cambridge Road; ‘Father’ is still shown as a ‘Commercial Traveller in Hardware’ and ‘Mother’ has no occupation shown. Sydney declares his occupation as ‘Works Manager – Motor Works’; William Ewart Guy is shown as an ‘Engineer’s Fitter’; and Frank and Frederick are still at school. It is interesting that the census data now collects information relating to the number of children born to the marriage, and this shows that Isaiah and Emmeline had a total of nine children, five of whom had sadly died in infancy. The family no longer appear to have a servant living in, although they may have retained the services of a daily maid who resided elsewhere.

An internal, early view of the Guy Motors factory showing chassis assembly.WOLVERHAMPTON CITY ARCHIVE

An aerial view believed to date from the early 1950s showing the extent of the Guy Works at Fallings Park. Today, most of the buildings have been removed and replaced with modern light industrial units.WOLVERHAMPTON CITY ARCHIVE

Sydney Guy was married in 1923 to Leila Brooks, the second daughter of Buckley and Anna Maria Brooks, who were at the time of the 1911 Census living at The Manor House in the pleasant area of Hale in Cheshire to the south-west of Manchester, now an area much favoured by the affluent. Mr Brooks gives his occupation as ‘Brewery Manager’ and the family were clearly living very comfortably, employing a governess for the children’s education, a domestic servant and a coachman. Anna was originally from Victoria, Australia, and Leila had four siblings – an elder brother and sister, and a younger brother and sister.

William Guy, known usually by his middle name of Ewart, joined the Guy Motors business and eventually became Sales Director, a position he retained until he died in 1954. The two other brothers were to die relatively young, Frank in the service of his country in the trenches of Flanders in 1917 and Fred in 1938.

Sydney and Leila had three children: Hazel Elizabeth Guy; Trevor Maurice Brooks Guy; and Robin Slater Guy. Trevor and Robin were both to become Directors of the family business.

GUY MOTORS EARLY PRODUCTS

The first product to emerge from the Fellings Plant factory was the 30cwt lorry in September of 1914, some four months after Guy terminated his employment at Sunbeam. This vehicle included a number of innovative design features, including a chassis frame constructed from pressed steel, which provided the same strength but with less weight than the rolled channel chassis that was more usual at the time. An engine, clutch and gearbox were assembled into a subframe, which was suspended from the chassis in three locations, giving the chassis more ability to flex without either fracturing itself or the more usual solid engine mounts.

The petrol engine was not manufactured by Guy, but bought in from the Coventry company of White and Poppe, an independent supplier to many of the smaller vehicle constructors. White and Poppe were eventually to be purchased by Dennis Brothers of Guildford in 1919, a company that was to become well known for its manufacture of fire appliances, as well as buses and coaches that would be in competition with Guy’s future products, and which will enter the story again in the next chapter. The engine used by Guy was a 4-cylinder side valve. The clutch was of the cone type and the four-speed gearbox was directly driven in third gear, with fourth forming an overdrive. A speed governor was fitted which only operated in fourth gear, restricting the top speed of the vehicle to 30mph (48km/h).

The earliest vehicles to emerge from the fledgling Guy Motors Works were similar to this 30cwt lorry seen here with a boxtype body carrying what appears to be laundry baskets.WOLVERHAMPTON CITY ARCHIVE

The same chassis formed the basis for the first passenger vehicle to be built by Guy Motors in 1914 and was supplied for service in the West Highlands of Scotland, operating between the railway station at Achnasheen on the line between Kyle of Lochalsh and Inverness and Autbea on the northern side of Loch Ewe. This had a capacity to carry fourteen passengers, plus mail in a secure compartment at the rear of the vehicle.

The very first Guy passenger vehicle was a postbus that was supplied for service in the West Highlands of Scotland. As well as providing carriage for fourteen passengers, the vehicle also carried the mail in a secure compartment.WOLVERHAMPTON CITY ARCHIVE

With one cylinder hidden behind the propeller blade, the nine cylinders confirm that this aircraft engine is the Dragonfly assembled as part of the war effort by Guy Motors. WOLVERHAMPTON CITY ARCHIVE

All this was taking place just a few weeks after Great Britain had declared war on Germany on 4 August 1914. Supplies of vehicles were requisitioned for war work and the new Guy factory found itself used for other war contracts. Of these, the most important, particularly in reference to vehicle production, were two aircraft engines that were built in the second half of the conflict to designs by Granville Bradshaw working for the All British Engine Company (ABC Motors Limited). The Wasp was a 7-cylinder radial engine that developed 160bhp and the Dragonfly was a 9-cylinder radial rated at 350bhp. Neither design appears to have been especially successful.

Chapter 2

GROWTH AND EXPANSION IN THE 1920s

The Armistice in 1918 resulted in a substantial number of former military motor vehicles being disposed of by the Forces, many of which were to find ready ownership with newly demobilized soldiers who had learnt to drive during the conflict and who now saw an opportunity to set up their own haulage businesses. This was also the era of the charabanc, either purpose-built for passenger carriage or an interchangeable body fitted to a goods vehicle frame to allow passengers to be carried when this was more profitable to the operator. These vehicles were very basic, with solid tyres, firm springs and wooden bench seating. To improve the quality of the ride, an innovative pneumatic suspension system developed by Holden was fitted experimentally. This simply comprised an air tube mounted between the chassis and the body, but rapid development of pneumatic tyres suitable for commercial vehicles resolved the issue in a more effective manner.

Charabancs provided a popular form of transport prior to the development of the motor coach, seating four or five abreast. This Guy chassis charabanc has a folding roof for weather protection and it looks as though the passengers in the rearmost seats are perched on top of the folded roof.WOLVERHAMPTON CITY ARCHIVE

Entering the 1920s saw the general weight of vehicles increase, along with their engine size, with those built by Guy ranging from 2.72 litres to 4.5 litres. At this time, passenger vehicles were still built on lorry chassis, resulting in the floor level being high above the ground, but in 1923 Bournemouth Corporation purchased three chassis that were equipped with ‘toast rack’ bodies by the local firm of Steane and ran on small, solid-tyred wheels, which gave the vehicles a slightly comical appearance. However, they proved their worth on the short service between the piers at Bournemouth and Boscombe with a further three being acquired the following year, by which time they had gained the name of ‘Promenade Runabouts’ with other seaside resorts taking up the idea of running a tourist seafront service. Along the south coast to the east, Portsmouth Corporation had the same idea and commissioned the local coachbuilder, Wadhams in Waterlooville, to build five similar bodies on Guy’s J-type chassis for seafront service between the two piers at Southsea, Clarence Pier and South Parade Pier. In the case of the Southsea service, this was to be the instigation of a continuing summer seafront service that was to continue to run regularly long after the municipal operator had disposed of its passenger business. The 30cwt lorry chassis showed itself to be a useful platform for bus construction, with a seating capacity of up to thirty passengers. The flat chassis required to construct a cargo-carrying body had a serious drawback when used for mounting passenger coachwork, in that the height of the frame above pavement level required the intending passenger to mount two or three steps from ground level to enter the saloon. A solution would be forthcoming in 1924 when Guy introduced the first drop-frame chassis, based around the goods vehicle design, but now allowing much easier access for passengers, who would now need to negotiate just a single step from street level.

The driver poses alongside his Guy Promenade photographed in St Helen’s Parade while operating in Southsea. The small wheels and solid tyres are visible. This service ran along the seafront, a route that was to change little for many years.ALAN LAMBERT COLLECTION

Thundersley and Hadleigh are located a short distance apart in the county of Essex, close to the resort of Southend-on-Sea. The company of Thundersley, Hadleigh & District Motors Ltd was formed in 1915 to carry out the business of manufacturers and dealers in motor cars and, as illustrated here, operated an early example of a Guy bus in the district.THE OMNIBUS SOCIETY

A factory image of a Guy 2.5-ton chassis fitted with a body by Walmer dating from around 1921.NATIONAL MOTOR MUSEUM

GUY VENTURES INTO CARS

Between 1919 and 1925, Guy Motors built a large and upmarket car, powered by a V8 engine of Guy’s own design. Copying the lorry design, the engine and gearbox were mounted on a subframe that was isolated from the chassis using ball joints. The engine had a displacement of 4072cc, was rated at 20HP, and able to achieve a maximum speed of around 80mph (130km/h). A four-speed gearbox, operated by a right-hand positioned lever, was connected to the engine with a cone clutch. Not unusually for the time, the braking system was described as being barely adequate, being rod-operated to the rear wheels only. 1921 brought two smaller models rated at 12HP and 15.9HP, and finally in 1923 the last model of car to be produced by Guy Motors was launched as the 13/36 powered by a 4-cylinder petrol engine with a capacity of 1954cc.

Guy Motors produced simple but effective advertising for its products, including this one for the V8-powered car.

At first glance, this car might appear to be a Rolls-Royce, but it is a 1920 Guy V8 four-door tourer.NATIONAL MOTOR MUSEUM

GUY 13/36HP TOURING CAR SPECIFICATION

LayoutSeparate pressed-steel frame with either a six-light, four-door saloon body, or four-door tourer, supplied with folding hood and side curtains  Engine Cylinders4-cylinder, in-lineCoolingWater, film-type radiator, cooling fan driven by engine and circulation by thermo syphonBore and strokeBore: 2.83in (72mm), stroke: 4.72in (120mm)Capacity1954ccValves2 valves per cylinderFuel supplySingle zenith carburettor, fed from a rear tank via an Autovac  Transmission ClutchLeather-faced coneGearboxFour forward speeds and reverse  Suspension and steering SuspensionSemi-elliptic front and rear with hydraulic dampers to each wheelSteeringWorm and wheel with adjustable steering column; special note was made that the worm wheel could be fitted in one of four positions to allow for wearWheels and tyresFive detachable artillery wheels supplied as standard, with disc wheels available as an extra-cost option; each wheel fitted with 30 × 3.5 Dunlop Cord tyres  Axles FrontH section with oil-lubricated kingpinsRearSemi-floating, spiral bevel final drive  Electrical systemDynamo and starting motor; ignition by magneto; electric lighting  Brakes TypeFoot brake operating by rods to drums on all wheelsHandbrakeLever operating on rear wheels only  Dimensions Track52in (1,320mm)Wheelbase112.5in (2,857mm)

‘FEATHERS IN OUR CAP’

Guy Motors were always well known for their bonnet mascot showing a native American Red Indian head complete with war bonnet. The origin of this was a newspaper advertisement placed in early 1924 boasting of important orders taken in the preceding months, many of which were repeat orders, which, as the copywriters claimed, showed satisfaction in the products. Amongst the customers mentioned, Leeds Corporation, Midland General Omnibus, The War Office, Peek Freans & Co. and Harrods are noted as repeat customers, with each of the thirteen highlighted orders being shown as a feather arranged around a vehicle radiator. The advertising headline shouted ‘Feathers in our Cap’ and reminded people of the war bonnet worn by Native American warriors and was, in due course, to become the company mascot adorning the radiator cap of many Guy vehicles.

A little newer than the original Guy ‘Feathers in our Cap’ advertisement, the radiator with a background of feathers, a selection of vehicles produced and a list of repeat customers formed a common theme for Guy’s advertising and was widely used in the specialist press.

In 1925, the transport undertaking in Wolverhampton obtained its first Guy motor buses, having previously purchased vehicles from Tilling-Stevens. These were two Guy lightweight ¾-ton chassis with thirty-one seat bus coachwork by Fleming, of which number 36 seen here was numerically the first.WOLVERHAMPTON CITY ARCHIVE

The same vehicle seen on an excursion photographed at the Fox Inn at Shipley on the road from Wolverhampton to Bridgnorth, a road that would in the future see many Guy vehicles being tested. The bus had only a short life in its home town, being withdrawn from service after four years.WOLVERHAMPTON CITY ARCHIVE

THE DROP-FRAME CHASSIS

Specifically designed for use as a bus chassis, and the first of the type to be manufactured in Britain, Guy Motors introduced three variations of existing chassis with a dropped centre section of the frame in 1924. Keeping the same designation as the normal height, straightframed chassis, these were designated as models BA with a wheelbase of 13ft 4in (4,064mm), B with a 15ft 3in (4,648mm) wheelbase and BB with a wheelbase of 16ft 5in (5,004mm). A front or rear entrance could be accommodated, or, for high-density service, a dual entrance could be fitted, although at the cost of a reduced seating capacity. The longest of the three would accommodate up to thirty passengers. While the advantages of the reduced chassis height were mostly seen by the passenger, drivers were provided with improved handling as a result of the lower centre of gravity. The drop-frame chassis quickly became the standard for bus chassis and was only really superseded more than thirty-five years later with the development of front entrance buses.

Reducing the height of the main chassis by creating an arch over the rear axle allowed Guy to introduce the drop-frame chassis, providing for a reduced overall vehicle height and a lower centre of gravity, as well as easing the task of entering the vehicle.

Guy’s advertising department liked a good slogan, ‘Ten years in advance of the times’ being just one that was used to promote the features of the product. This particular advert is believed to have been produced for inclusion in an exhibition catalogue.

Another development came in 1926 with the introduction of the Premier Six model, also referred to as the BK, powered by a 6-cylinder sleeve valve engine developed by Daimler Knight. This new model was extensively reviewed by Commercial Motor early in 1926, which gave great emphasis to the ease of maintenance, noting that every assembly on the chassis, other than the wheels of course, could be removed without the need for a lifting jack or pit. The 4-cylinder Guy engine remained available, but the 6-cylinder engine gave a smoother ride and increased torque. Six-cylinder engines had gained much popularity in the United States, where very long distance journeys were more common, and in some of Guy’s target export markets, a similar requirement existed.

At the time the magazine article was produced, Guy had received orders from the city of Rio de Janeiro, following a long and detailed search by that operator in the US and Europe for a suitable vehicle type to meet the city’s particular needs. Liverpool Corporation had placed an order for thirty-five single-deck buses built on the chassis and nine for the firm of Keith and Boyle (London) Limited, better known under their trading name as Orange Coaches. The orders received from Rio de Janeiro, which totalled 170 vehicles in 1926, were to prove to be very significant for Guy. Ten years after they were delivered, they were still running in everyday service in ‘excellent condition’ according to a report by Leyland’s Technical Director at that time, who concluded that they would probably still be running in a further ten years’ time and that there was little opportunity of business for Leyland in Rio.