Crossways - a model bus fleet

[birch4]

For anyone that may have been following my other topic on RMweb about producing a model of a HST, they may have noticed that activity of late has gone relatively quiet.

 

Well, the reason for that is Crossways, my model bus fleet based in Gloucester which operates in 1:76th scale. Most of my modelling activities go into vehicles for the fleet, and (I shall wait for the torrents of noooooo) therefore railway modelling often goes on the backburner.

 

So, my excuses over, I thought I may as well introduce the fleet to people on here. If there is enough interest I may post updates hon here from the fleet, but I accept that this being a model railway forum it may be the wrong place for the fleet.

 

The fleet started back in 2012 with a coach and a minibus. The coach was used on a Shearings contract and the minibus as a feeder vehicle. The fleet grew rapidly within the next couple of years, and in 2014 a fleet livery was introduced, as can be seen in the second picture. However, a simplified livery had to be used on smaller vehicles, as the normal livery was too impractical to apply to these smaller vehicles (picture 3).

 

Vehicles for the fleet come from a variety of sources. I try and do one scratchbuild a year for the fleet, but vehicles also come from kits and repainted diecasts.

 

March of this year saw the fleet (fictionally) take on the contact to operate the Cheltenham Race Shuttles, we needed in excess of 80 vehicles, so buses were hired in from a number of fellow model bus fleets to make up the number.

 

If you would like to find out more about the fleet and the race shuttles, there is a website at www.crosswaysbus.webs.com, and a flickr page at https://www.flickr.com/photos/crosswaysbus/

 

Below are some photo's of fleet members.

 

 

An early view of the fleet, before fleet livery was introduced.

 

 

The current fleet flagship is GL65 RTZ, a Scania Irizar Pb, seen wearing fleet livery. This is a repainted Oxford Diecast.

 

 

BX63 YTR is a Mercedes Sprinter Minicoach, which is wearing the simplified livery for smaller vehicles. This is a conversion and repaint of a Siku diecast.

 

 

GL15 EBF is an Optare Solo SR slimline, which is used on route 66H (Gloucester to Stroud via Haresfield), and wears fleet livery. This is scratchbuilt.

Edited April 1, 2016 by birch4

[Echo]

Buses are fine with me! Looking forward to this with great interest.

 

BTW - With a name like Birch4, I would have thought that the old fleet of Birch Bros would be a good choice of bus company

[HillsideDepot]

Don't tell anyone else, but bit of a bus fan here too, so I'd be interested to see Crossways' fleet    

[sp1]

Will they be posed on a bridge.............?

 

 

 

 

 

 

(Sorry)

[birch4]

Hi 

 

Apologies for taking so long to get there with the rest of the post but it is finished now, and thank you for the replies already, I didn't know what to expect when I originally posted this. Sorry to dissappoint sp1!

 

Birch Bro's was one of the names that I originally considered, but Gloucester is a bit far away from the Birch Bro's old territory! I also wanted something new, hence the name Crossways, only to find since that it is used for a travel firm!

 

Thanks

 

Ryan

[Hesperus]

They look great,  you could easily have convinced me that it was a real operator.

 

Do they have an old minibus used as a depot hack?  I know of a couple of LDV Convoys that stayed with smaller operators for ages in this role.

[Ragtag]

I've got a soft spot for buses as well, those repaints look nice. The Irizar in particular looks very tidy, are the red and green lines painted or transfers? Any chance of some more shots of your fleet beyond those on flickr?

 

As an aside, one thing that's always puzzled me about many of the fictional fleets in the model bus world is how the modellers print out the logos etc. on relatively thick paper/card then stick 'em on the model. Is there a reason people don't try their own transfers (issues around certain colours excepted, of course)?

[birch1]

Hi

 

Apologies for the change of accounts firstly, I have finally managed to work out the password for my main account, so hopefully my activities shall be on this one from now on.

 

 

 

''Do they have an old minibus used as a depot hack?  I know of a couple of LDV Convoys that stayed with smaller operators for ages in this role.'' (Hesperus)

 

Unfortunately not! A depot hack/ staff transport vehicle is currently in progress though and nearly complete.

 

 

Is there a reason people don't try their own transfers (issues around certain colours excepted, of course)? (Ragtag)

 

There are a number of reasons, particularly for fleet operators like me. Any transfers would have to be custom made, which is always expensive. Unlike making a real model these transfers are unique to whatever operator they are for, so you cannot just go and buy some stock transfers from somewhere.

 

The other option is to use the Crafty computer paper, which I have now started using and the PB uses it (all others use the paper method like you state). Which many people don't get along with, as they are deterred by having to varnish them afterwards and many find that the ink still runs anyway. Therefore some just find it easier to use paper.

 

As for photo's, if you go onto the fleet section of the Crossways website you will find a photo of every fleet member, but I will post some more pics on here in due course once I have found them.

 

Finally, someone messaged me to see a larger version of the Crossways logo, so here it is for you sir!

 

 

[PhilJ W]

A few bus companies use old taxi cabs for staff transport or a people carrier or even a large estate car. Oxford produce a couple of taxi models that would be useful.

[Ragtag]

I bought some of the crafty paper myself a few weeks back whilst it was on free delivery, have yet to give it a try though (most of the things I'm repainting atm are going into Northumbria colours...who of course used white lettering... ). How did you get on with it? It does seem to give a nice finish.

[HillsideDepot]

I bought some of the crafty paper myself a few weeks back whilst it was on free delivery, have yet to give it a try though (most of the things I'm repainting atm are going into Northumbria colours...who of course used white lettering... ). How did you get on with it? It does seem to give a nice finish.

Ah Northumbria Motor Services, one of my favourite companies - and what a livery!

 

I was a student at Newcastle Polytechnic from 89-92 so saw the Deltas and long wheelbase Alexander Olympians join the traditional NBC VRTs, Nationals and LHs. Also ex NBC, but hardly typical were the fantastic ex Green Line ECW Olympian coaches. I remember being on one of these working a 603 to Hexham one evening and we were stopped at the pelican crossing outside Newcastle Central station, alongside a Busways Atlantean. The Busways driver leant out of his cab and tapped on the doors of the Olympian. The Northumbria driver opened the doors "yes mate?" "Are you in service?" asked the Busways driver. "Yes" replied the Northumbria driver, "well you wanna put the lights on then". "The saloon lights are on; I'm driving a coach!" at which point the traffic lights had turned green, the TL11 gave a mighty roar and we shot off into the night! The coaches had dark tinted windows and the lighting was from coach style lights above each seat, so the vehicle did look dark from outside. Happy memories!

 

Anyway, what I was going to say was, were the Northumbria names white or were they reflective, so off-white/slightly grey like the stripe on Badgerline (my favourite company) vehicles? It's a while ago, so my memory might be wrong, but there is something in the depths.

[Ragtag]

Can't comment about reflective, but most photos do seem to show grey lettering. Can't believe I didn't notice! Sorry for the OT OP.

[Butler Henderson]

Do not get too bothered with all being in "fleet" livery - real operators do not - Yorkshire Tiger, a cheap Arriva subsidy, now has a number of tatty standard Arriva liveried vehicles rather than their orange with black stripes livery and independent North/West Yorkshire operator Connexions has some vehicles in its green / white livery, others in plan white, others in as acquired liveries - one being a red liveried single decker with Metrobus branding. Most do have the fleet name on them, or the earlier Harrogate Coach Travel, yet a brand new Solo in fleet livery is devoid of any fleet name!

Edited April 3, 2016 by Butler Henderson

[ColinK]

Your scratchbuilt Optare Solo is excellent, especially as its such a difficult shape.

[birch1]

Hi

 

Thanks for more kind comments , following  are some replies to a couple of posts.

 

As for the comment on the crafty paper, that is another reason  behind  people  not using transfers. I once tried to get round the problem by printing slightly  off white. Whilst it printed fine and you could see it, for some reason the text never showed up when you put the transfer on the model, so I gave up eventually.

 

Do not get too bothered with all being in "fleet" livery - real operators do not - Yorkshire Tiger, a cheap Arriva subsidy, now has a number of tatty standard Arriva liveried vehicles rather than their orange with black stripes livery and independent North/West Yorkshire operator Connexions has some vehicles in its green / white livery, others in plan white, others in as acquired liveries - one being a red liveried single decker with Metrobus branding. Most do have the fleet name on them, or the earlier Harrogate Coach Travel, yet a brand new Solo in fleet livery is devoid of any fleet name!

 

As for the above comment, there are a number of reasons for this. One  could be that they have only just acquired  the vehicle, and so are waiting for a chance to get it to the paintshop. Another is that it could simply be a low quality low cost operator, Who don't want to bother with expensive  paint jobs. However, in my experience most do keep to a certain livery style, and to be honest I like having a general fixed livery as to me it gives some unity!

 

A few bus companies use old taxi cabs for staff transport or a people carrier or even a large estate car. Oxford produce a couple of taxi models that would be useful.

 

That is very true, the cabs have been popular with some other operators that I know of. 

 

Anyway, there should hopefully be some more pics within the next couple of days.

 

Ryan

Edited April 3, 2016 by birch1

[birch1]

I have just found another photo of a fleet member so thought I would post it on here.

 

 

The sprinter on the right is BX63 YTR, as featured above, however on the left is our other Sprinter, registered SB57 TMB. This our current depot hack/ staff transport vehicle. However, it will be replaced in the next couple of days by another smaller vehicle to allow it to undertake more private hire work for the company.

 

The model is a CMNL diecast.

 

[JDW]

That does look like a very professional, well thought out livery, and the logo especially.  I quite like it.  Maybe you should be asking Mr Stenning for a job...?  I designed my own livery once too, I have some drawings and a 1:87 Setra tri-axle that I painted, but that's as far as it got - the next vehicle planned should have been a 1:1 scale coach, but various things got in the way and we never got it off the ground (a combination of cost, plus the other person involved getting married and having kids!).  It was metallic dark blue with a silver skirt, plus a thin silver coachline just above the skirt to give it a bit of detail.  

As someone else mentioned above, I'm not a fan of fleets in a mix of previous liveries, it looks messy and unprofessional, as you said, it gives the impression of a low-quality, low-cost operator.  That said, we planned ours such that we could easily reverse it if we ended up buying a silver coach (often one-colour repaints are included in the sale price), and apply the skirt/stripe with dark blue vinyl, or even as a last resort apply a blue skirt/strip to a plain white dealer-stock vehicle if we needed to in a hurry.

 

I drive for First (as is well documented elsewhere on RMWeb, including embarrasing photo), and we have a 5 Scania Irizars, only 12.2 metre 2-axle ones, but I do quite like them.  One is the ex-AFC team coach, the other 4 49 (I think) seaters, one of which came from NatEx and was in a bit of a state before we had it refurbished, it came back painted the wrong shade of white and looks awful!  Instead of the standard coach shade of white, the refurbishers (I shan't say who!) used the new shade of white as used in the new bus livery, I forget what its called but it has a slight purple hue to it, totally different when you park it next to the others.  It looks better now its been fully liveried, at least.  I can't find a picture of it since its been repainted, you'll just have to take my word for it, maybe there's a reason no one has taken one!  (Its 23314 I think if you're that interested, 23305/6/7 being the others, 23330 the team coach).  We have a couple of 65-plate Mercs too, which look very plain and bland next to the Irizars, despite being much newer.

On the bus side, we've gotten rid of most of the 'old' liveried vehicles, except the few Volvo single decks and Trident double decks with little life left in them, most buses are in the new corporate scheme, though a growing number are in the black and grey "Platinum" version, though some of those are already looking a little tatty, whilst a few of the coaches are still in their blue/white coach livery.

[birch1]

Hi

 

Thanks for yet more kind comments!

 

 

 

most buses are in the new corporate scheme, though a growing number are in the black and grey "Platinum" version, though some of those are already looking a little tatty (JDW)

 

It may just be me, but I never thought that the Platinum livery gave as high a class a feel as some of the other offerings from Stagecoach, Arriva, Blackpool, GHA etc.

 

In other developments, I stumbled accross a Corgi Wright Eclipse Gemini 2 at over half price in a local model shop yesterday, I managed to dismantle it today (and clumsily break both front and rear windows in the process! I shall have to try and find replacements at some point.), pic below:

 

 

Would people be interested in more 'work in progress' pics like these, or simply to stick to the finished pics as above?

[Ragtag]

WIPs always welcomeed by me - must post my progress with the National.

[JDW]

Yeah, its nice to see something a bit different, and its all related at the end of the day, whether its a modern DMU, steam loco, shop front, water crane, allotment scene or road vehicle, all those things add up to be a part of the whole model railway, so why not post more, it might help or inspire others to follow.

 

Maybe the broken windows are karma for chosing to repaint that nice Delaine liveried bus... Even at half price, you could have found something more worthy of repainting!  

 

As for the Platinum, we have 4 different versions so far (original turquise 19s, followed by green 12s, plus one generic gold one, and then the latest E200MMCs in a darker gold) I'm not a fan of the green version, but the others look ok, and the E200MMCs are MUCH better buses than the previous ones, and streets ahead (excuse the pun!) of a Wrights Streetlite, which are awful contraptions - and yes, I've spotted the one lurking on your website!

 

The Platinum 19s had TVs showing BBC News 24 when they were new, it was a disaster and was abandoned after a few months, the 12s have AV next stop announcements, better but only a half-hearted attempt, with a few flaws in operation, and the brand new E200s are looking a bit tatty already, though that's down to lack of passenger respect than anything else.  

[quicksilvercoaches]

Nice to see Crossways getting an airing here. Don't worry, you're not the only model bus operator on RMWeb - I guess it's obvious from my username who I am but for those who don't know I've been running my own fictional coach fleet for almost 17 years now. I'm not even into railways and I hang around here for the scenic and road vehicle side of things! Some but not all of my models can be found on Flickr at https://www.flickr.com/photos/quicksilver_coaches/albums/72157624857783370

[Ragtag]

Some nice models there, a fan of the Supreme myself - champing at the bit for Mark Hughes to get that kit released.

[birch1]

With the annual exam time shutdown now over work has now resumed in the Crossways workshops on a number of projects for the fleet.

 

 

Two of these 'work in progress' vehicles are minibuses, the first being this Mercedes Vito. It is  repaint of a Cararama diecast, and awaits registration plates and fleetnames.

 

 

The second vehicle is this Ford Transit Minibus, converted from the Oxford Diecast Diet Coke van. There is still quite a way to go on this model, with the old paint needing stripping, and the new roof needing detailing before painting, as well as an interior being needed.

 

A new coach is also nearing the painting stages, as well as two second hand vehicles.

 

 

In other news, the Heritage fleet has been withdrawn, as the DDA deadlines have meant that they can no longer be also used as spare vehicles for our bus services. A new depot has also been opened in Cirencester.

 

 

 

[RThompson]

You could always retain your leyland Lynx as a school bus only if required?

[birch1]

You could always retain your leyland Lynx as a school bus only if required?

 

I had thought about it yes, but in the end decided that it was a little too old for that.