Construction

The Olympian was built as a result of the Leyland Titan (B15), an integral double deck bus which was ordered en masse by London Transport. At the time there was a demand for non-integral vehicles; operators wishing to remain with more established manufacturers. Thus Leyland created the B45 project, which was named Olympian, in 1979. This was in many ways an update of the popular Bristol VR (Bristol Commercial Vehicles merged with Leyland in 1965), with many VR customers choosing Olympians. Later the Olympian also replaced the Leyland Atlantean.

It was available in 2 lengths, with wheelbases of 4.95m and 5.64m, giving total lengths of 9.56m and 10.25m. Engines were either the Leyland TL11 unit (an 11.1-litre development of the Leyland O.680), or the ever-popular Gardner 6LXB or 6LXCT. Some later Olympians had Cummins L10 engines. One even had a 5LXCT.

For the export market a tri-axle version was built, which was very popular with operators such as Kowloon Motor Bus. Later, Leyland developed the air-conditioned version of Olympian, with its air-conditioner driven by the main engine, not a separate engine.

Alexander constructed the bodies for the majority of tri-axle and air-conditioned Olympians.

Bodies

The Leyland Olympian was built with a wide variety of body types:

1.Eastern Coach Works (ECW) - highly popular.
2.Alexander, with various R-type bodies; very popular with Irish and Scottish operators as well as the export market.
3.Northern Counties, who built numerous styles for the Olympian
4.Charles H. Roe (Roe)
5.Optare
6.East Lancashire Coachbuilders (East Lancs)
7.Marshall
8.Leyland (jig-built kit bodies from ECW)

The ECW body was built to two heights, low-bridge 13ft 8in or high-bridge 14ft 2in. The ECW, Roe, Leyland and Optare versions were outwardly very similar in design, thus identification can be difficult. ECW also manufactured a coach body on the longer chassis for long-distance use, which carried noticeably different styling.

A dual-door variant of the Olympian was manufactured by ECW especially for London Transport, and this became known as the L-class, since this was the letter used by LT to denote the class of vehicle. It was not as popular as the purpose-built Titan, so only 350 entered service under LT. A small number remain in service in London, with the L-class and other Olympians proving popular with small operators across the United Kingdom.

Changing hands

In 1988 Leyland Bus passed to Volvo, who continued only the Olympian due to its vast number of outstanding orders. 200 air-conditioned Olympians for Singapore Bus Services were the last order of buses to be manufactured under the 'Leyland' brand. The completion of these orders saw the discontinuation of the Leyland Olympian and the closure of the manufacturing plant in Workington, England. The name would live on when Volvo launched the Volvo Olympian, which was built in Irvine, Scotland.

Leyland Olympian. (2007, August 17). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia.