Hong Kong export

Saturday 9 April 1983 – I was very fortunate to be able join a tour of the Eastern Coachworks factory at Lowestoft with the Eastern Counties Omnibus Society/Eastern Transport Collection Society and took this photograph of a Leyland Olympian being bodied for China Motor Bus Company, Hong Kong. Thirty odd years later as I type this caption, and refer to the PSV Circle OP1 booklet published in 1990, I now have a quandary. There are only two ECW bodied Olympians listed in the publication both of which entered service in September 1981 (BR1/2) and they were two axle models. That is two years earlier than the bus shown here. So whether this bus was a demonstrator that ECW built to entice CMB I don’t know.

Saturday 9 April 1983 – I was very fortunate to be able join a tour of the Eastern Coachworks factory at Lowestoft with the Eastern Counties Omnibus Society/Eastern Transport Collection Society and took this photograph of a Leyland Olympian being bodied for China Motor Bus Company, Hong Kong. Thirty odd years later as I type this caption, and refer to the PSV Circle OP1 booklet published in 1990, I now have a quandary. There are only two ECW bodied Olympians listed in the publication both of which entered service in September 1981 (BR1/2) and they were two axle models. That is two years earlier than the bus shown here. So whether this bus was a demonstrator that ECW built to entice CMB I don’t know. The curious little shape in the bottom right corner of the photograph is not a blemish on the print but a souvenir piece of blue Formica used for the interior panels on this bus.