SV Fleet News

36 fleet news items added in 2008.

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03/12/08	A new white/blue Mercedes-Benz Sprinter dropside has been seen in the lorry yard at Acton today. Hopefully we will have more details soon.
30/11/08	Reported fleet additions are dominated by Vauxhalls this week. For the central fleet, many Combo vans have been seen at dealerships awaiting delivery, while Arriva London has started replacing its Combos (used on crew ferry turns) with more silver Corsa cars.
11/11/08	The allocation of numbers to the leased fleet is surging ahead, with new deliveries in the mid 66xxs. There is also one van numbered 7586V but I am assuming that this is an error! There are still lots of vehicles in the 65xx range yet to be delivered and/or reported. Also new are a couple of Corsa cars for Arriva London, presumably to make a start on replacing the large fleet of Combo vans at Tottenham and Lea Valley. Number 125 has been added to the database, while number 123 has also been seen. While on this subject, we still have some gaps in the Corsas at Barking. Please keep an eye out for numbers 94, 95, 99, 101 and anything from 102 upwards.
04/11/08	The new Metrobus crew ferry fleet comprises 14 Renault Trafic minibuses, based mainly at Orpington. They are almost (but not quite) numbered in registration order and they have replaced all 14 of the earlier Ford Transit crew vans. London Buses Passenger Data fleet has another Ford Transit minibus in the form of 6460F, while various new tube-liveried Transits have been reported at Acton with numbers up to 6592F.
20/10/08	The number of new Metrobus Renaults in the 80xx series has now grown to 10 and the company website now gives revised fleetnumbers so that they are in registration order. Having said that, the latest 5 do not yet appear to be licensed, according to the DVLA. A first picture of these suggests that they are in fact minibuses and look likely to replace the Ford Transits.
12/10/08	A list of vehicles added to the database today include some more new vans for Metrobus (from their brilliant website - no allocations are known yet), some unmarked crew ferry cars for First London at Hayes (these have been included as they seem to constitute a batch of sorts), a new LUL Response Car for Arnos Grove, another Ford van with a duplicated fleetnumber, a dark blue Tourneo in the numbered fleet, and some other bits and bobs. Who said SVs were dull?
23/09/08	Two new '58 reg Ford Transits were spotted on delivery to Acton Works yesterday. Alas, both carried fleetnumbers that had already been claimed by other vehicles. Ho hum. Also recently delivered are at least two VW Transporters for the Carlisle Lane TfL operation. These are the first reported SVs in the 66xx range, and currently wear plain white livery. They have replaced the three silver Transit Connect vans. Following a request, the operation and vehicles at Carlisle Lane will in future be referred to here as TfL Highways, to distinguish it from the main TfL Streets business.
15/09/08	The first '58 reg is in and unsurprisingly it is on a Metrobus vehicle. Thanks to Damon for the report and picture. It looks like Blue Triangle renewed their entire SV fleet earlier this year, with at least 9 small Vauxhall vans now in use. Unless I hear otherwise, I will probably mark all their other vehicles as withdrawn shortly.
11/09/08	I have just done a catch up on recent fleet developments although there is nothing particularly out of the ordinary. No sign of any '58 reg SVs yet so the prize for the first report is still up for grabs. An interesting sighting suggests that Ford Escort van 4955F may still be in use. With latest deliveries in the high 6500s, that makes for quite a spread of numbers!
16/08/08	One of the lorries delivered to Acton earlier this year has turned out to be numbered after all. Actros artic 2603 (WX57NPV) presumably arrived before the decision to abandon numbering of owned vehicles was made, and this number is therefore the highest to have been used. Metrobus have renewed their van fleet with four new Ford Transit Connects for controllers and three second-hand Transits for the engineers.
13/07/08	New on the bus company front are a series of plain silver/grey minibuses for the East London Bus Group. Reports so far have been of vehicles numbered 96006 to 96016, which would appear to be a continuation of the old Stagecoach SV series. Also new are some silver Corsa cars for Arriva London, serving route 135. Numbers 93, 96 and 97 have been reported, and 95 is also about. These seem to follow on from Combo vans 87-92. In the central fleet, 3 SVs in the 65xx range have now been reported. Sadly two of them carry the number 6515F! Another new lorry at Acton is a Stralis flatbed with crane.
22/06/08	A couple of oddities have been noted recently, along with the first 65xx vehicle (kudos to Mr Warman for reporting 6515F). A couple of numbered Ford Focus cars were seen entering Acton works. Very few cars (as opposed to estates) feature in the numbered fleet. Also seen here were a blue Transit van and a couple of white ones. Also, the new Mercedes-Benz and Iveco lorries are now in use. Reports of the artic (if indeed there is one) would be appreciated.
09/06/08	Thanks to Graham for finding this article about the new LBSL IRUs. Most interestingly, it states that another 20 vans are on order. It mentions that a further 10 current vans will be replaced later. Given that the last batch of LBSL vans was the 20 Mercs in autumn 2005, is it possible that the two quantities were transposed? http://www.tnn.co.uk/IndustryNews/plonearticle.2008-05-19.9841466127. Also, a picture sent in by Malcolm suggests that at least some of the First London ferry cars once at Orpington are now at Northumberland Park. He caught YH04XTL at Turnpike Lane, presumably for route 231.
06/06/08	The reason that the new lorries at Acton do not have fleetnumbers applied yet is that they do not have fleetnumbers! Given the low intake, it has been decided to refer to new vehicles by registration alone. The main SV numbering sequence therefore ends at 2602. Fortunately, the series used for leased vehicles (which is currently getting close to number 6500) will continue in use. By the way, this avoids the problem of what to do when the owned series reaches the leased series (ie at 3000). However, at current rates, this would have taken place in about April 2046! Noticed today was that the new IRU vans have their full reg number on the roof. I wonder if we can 'spot' them using Google Earth?
25/05/08	Several fleet lorries are reported parked up at Acton (with logos and numbers removed) pending disposal. These include dropsides 2522F and 2523F, artic 2551M and demountables 2554F and 2555F.
17/05/08	Another Iveco Stralis has turned up, registration LK08LDY but no fleetnumber yet. Conversely, 6303H, one of the missing Honda Civic cars has been reported but sadly without the registration number.
08/05/08	A further delivery to the lorry fleet at Acton is an Iveco Stralis demountable registered LK08LDV. This carries white/blue livery but is not yet lettered/numbered.
29/04/08	Further to recent updates, it seems that the two dropside trucks and the unregistered chassis cab are all Mercedes-Benz Axor models.
28/04/08	Another new arrival at Acton is a 2-axle MB Econic Refuse Truck. This differs from recent 3-axle Econic WX57UMV in having a more normal height blue skirt. Also in the yard recently has been an un-registered MB (Actros?) chassis or demountable. Fleetnumbers for all the recent arrivals are still awaited.
24/04/08	At least two more new lorries have arrived for the Acton-based fleet. Fleetnumbers and model details are awaited but they appear to be Mercedes-Benz Actros dropside lorries.
08/03/08	The allocations for the new ERU fleet were updated today and I noticed for the first time that the numbering of the two different types is not clear-cut. 2592/3/4/6/8 have the longer cabs while 2595/7/9/600/1 have the shorter ones. It would be so much neater if 2595 and 2598 swapped numbers!
06/03/08	IRU number 6346M is among a small bundle of new vehicles added today.
04/03/08	The first '08 reg vehicles have been added to the database comprising 2 Vito minibuses listed on the Metrobus website (but not actually seen yet) and a Vauxhall combo numbered 6471V in the main fleet. Other interesting additions include some 3-wheel Piaggio scooters for Transdev. On the IRU front, the van at Kingston has been identified as 6345M which presumably means that at least one more (6346) remains to be reported. The batch must either total 26 or 27 (if 6371M turns up!)
01/03/08	Some interesting new vehicles have been seen in the last week. Acton has a new 3-axle MB Econic dustcart plus an unidentified artic and demountable. There is also a 3-axle exhibition unit painted in red livery for TfL Citizenship and Safety programme, teaching kids how to use buses. The rear of this vehicle is painted to resemble the front of a Citaro bus. A couple of un-numbered cars have been seen with Metronet logos.
22/02/08	Well, well! WM57DXZ is not 6348M, but WM57DZK is! This does make the batch a nice round 25, and hopefully DXZ will shortly be identified as either 6346M or 6371M.
21/02/08	Second update in one day! Another pair of IRUs has been reported, numbered 6352M and 6353M. The Kingston example should therefore be 6348M. Unless of course it is 6346 or 6371!
21/02/08	Another two IRUs have been traced (6354M and 6365M). Provided that the range is 6347-6370, then just three more remain to be reported, these being 6348M, 6352M and 6353M. One of these should be WM57DXZ, noted at Kingston.
18/02/08	6356M is confirmed as WR57ZGX while 6367M is WM57DYD.
16/02/08	Another four IRUs have been added to the database in the past few days. Assuming that the batch totals 24 numbered 6347M to 6370M, then 6348, 6352, 6353, 6354, 6356, 6365 and 6367 remain to be reported. Of these 6356 is almost certainly WR57ZGX, while one is WM57DXZ.
08/02/08	Recently added to the database have been more examples of the Incident Response Units for LBSL, the first VW Touran car reported (this is like a Galaxy or Zafira), a rare Movano van in white/blue and a silver Transporter. Wot, no Transits?!
05/02/08	The batch of Sprinter Incident Response Units may be larger than at first thought, two recent additions being numbered 6347M and 6349M. Details of these and some other new vehicles will be added to the database in the next couple of days.
02/02/08	The IRUs continue to arrive. 6359M and 6362M are indeed WR57ZGU and WR57ZGP as predicted, while 6366M is in a third series as WP57ZLX. No reports yet of any new trucks at Acton, although it had been hoped to have some in use before the LEZ is introduced on 4th February.
24/01/08	Two more LBSL IRUs have been added. In addition to these, WR57ZGP has been seen at Stratford. Some educated guesswork suggests this may be 6362M, while 6361M should be WR57ZGS, 6359M WR57ZGU and 6356M WR57ZGX. What the registrations of 6365M to 6369M are remains to be seen. Reports please! Most of the minibuses in the LUL-related fleet are having some seats removed to bring their capacity down to 9. This is so that tacographs will not have to be fitted, the legislation regarding this having changed recently.
19/01/08	Another two Incident Units are 6360M and 6370M, suggesting that the batch may total as many as 14. By the way, we still need IDs on a couple of the maroon Honda cars. 6303H and 6308H have not been reported, while LG57YJM needs a fleet number tie-up.
10/01/08	At least two more LBSL Incident Response Units have arrived, numbered 6357M and 6358M. As the first reported vehicle was 6364M, it may be that a few more are due. One other vehicle to look out for is a Ford Transit Connect in plain dark blue thought to be numbered 6272F. Registration number not yet known.
02/01/08	2007 was a fairly interesting year in terms of service vehicles. The owned fleet saw 11 additions, more than in any year in since 1998, these being mainly made up of the impressive new ERU tenders. In the leased fleet, aside from loads of Transits, a batch of maroon Honda hybrid cars stood out while 20 VW Transporter vans for Metronet were slightly different. The troubles at Metronet seemed to have had no affect on the intake and fleetnumbers surged onwards into the 6400s. The bus companies took few new vehicles during the year but there were lots of second-hand acquisitions. Looking ahead, 2008 should see more additions to the owned lorry fleet and, probably, some more Ford Transits! Keep the reports coming.

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