Coach and Bus Week

[bwsau cymru]

Cadets are awful. Underpowered, slow buses and no they can't be classed as pretty much wright bodied darts. Yes, the bodyworks fine its just the naf bus chassis. 30831 is the new MAN/plaxton centro ex jpt middleton

I thinks the cadets are great. I originally come from Telford and when I lived there it was dafs or Volvos. Do prefer the larger Commanders but still don't mind a cadet. Now if you compare them to some of the wright body darts and some of those horrible pointers diamond are the cadets are in a different league. And yes the are going to look tired but cant see diamond investing in refurbishing them before they sell them.....I personally think its a great shame, I love any DAF/VDL bus and think the quality is far better than a pointer. Im really happy when I see a cadet turn up on the Arriva 335 service and hate it when its a dart. I will be sad to see diamonds cadets go and personally cant understand why they are going and more rubbish solos and mans are coming in!

[PM]

Of course the cadets will be better than the wright bodies darts-theyre about 5 years newer! Theyre not better than pointers, if they were so good then why did pretty much only arriva buy them?? Commanders are underpowered as well and some of diamonds pointers are fantastic-refurbished, fast, reliable-unlike the new 30201. A half decent bus design wouldnt break down when only just 7 years old!! And love any DAF/VDL bus and think the quality is far better than a pointer-youre comparing a chassis marque with a body!!! And ask any driver-the MANs are good buses that are powerful and modern. Admittedly even I'm not going to try to argue that any Optare is a good bus...... ;)

[tank90]

I dont understand why they dont transfer the 4 04 plate BRLEs up here and the 2 05 plate Darts up here to replace older buses in the fleet.

[PM]

I dont understand why they dont transfer the 4 04 plate BRLEs up here and the 2 05 plate Darts up here to replace older buses in the fleet.

Neither do i-tho if the eclipses don't sell then they may well do and withdraw some darts at redditch making the whole fleet volvo b7rle/eclipse.

[winston]

I dont understand why they dont transfer the 4 04 plate BRLEs up here and the 2 05 plate Darts up here to replace older buses in the fleet.

Neither do i-tho if the eclipses don't sell then they may well do and withdraw some darts at redditch making the whole fleet volvo b7rle/eclipse.

I thought the same, Rotala must need the cash

[tank90]

Well I was thinking Black Diamond as well as they could be put on say the 4, but yeah good for Red to have them.

[jc]

Those B7rles have suffered with reliability issues in Bristol ... would we really want them here? ;)

[PM]

Those B7rles have suffered with reliability issues in Bristol ... would we really want them here? ;)

Cheers JC didnt know this but thinking about it they were secondhand anyway werent they?

[winston]

Those B7rles have suffered with reliability issues in Bristol ... would we really want them here? ;)

Surely nothing a bit of TLC shouldn't cure, if they are known to be unreliable anyway, what makes Rotala think that they will be able to sell them on? They've already dropped the price from £60K to £57K

[Ash]

Despite there age the darts especially the red and white ones seem to be quite reliable and i rarely see them broken down and seem to tackle the hills well when there on the 4H and 4M services having no problems climbing them. Not sure the 4 will get any branding from diamond as it uses a mix of different type of buses and would need quite a few buses branded for it but would like to see the black countyr connection branding back thought it worked well and looked smart on the mcv's. One thing i would like to see is the advertising of the return fares on the buses i'm sure if people knew that black diamond offered a £2.50 return fare on the 4 and 301 more people would be inclined to catch them, but guess they will increase when the new fares come into effect but it has been £2.50 on the 4 (404E) for 2 years so cant complain if they do increase them.

[jc]

They came from Whitelaws in Scotland (i think that was the name) whos livery they kept until moving to Bristol for the Uni service, however have since been replaced by newer examples! They were rather battered last time i went down there