Trailer bus

The bus was 29 ft long, made up of steel chassis and cabin built of natural oak with tram like interior.

As a solution to possible grounding hazards on humped bridges, three prototypes were built in 1924, but proved to be problematic, and later converted to rigid bodies in 1927.

[2] In 1930 Nairn Transport Company which ran 550 miles of transport services from Damascus to Baghdad experimented with a trailer bus which was hauled by a Buick Roadster which had a very successful run motivated by this the company later built a customized double-decker trailer bus in 1934 which had carry capacity of 40 passengers divided in first class and normal class.

From 1958 onwards, many trailer buses passed to the state-owned Metropolitan Transport Trust as the private operators were bought by the Western Australian Government.

A number were also purchased by the Western Australian Government Railways from 1945 to 1948, with the trailer bodies built by Fowler Constructions and Campbell & Mannix.

[5] In 1948, ten British-built[7] trailer buses saw service as staff canteens for London Transport (in country green livery)[8] with one passing to the Cobham Bus Museum in 1972.

[9] The tractor units were delivered as short Crossley DD42s, and these were matched in the Netherlands with DAF built trailer chassis fitted with bus bodies.

From 1967 to 1968 the Indian city of Mumbai had double-decker trailer buses with seating capacity of 100 passengers, run by Brihanmumbai Electric Supply and Transport company.

[12] As early as the mid-1940s, trailer buses began to quickly fall out of favor for a variety of factors:[13] Trailer buses saw service until at least 1984 in South Africa,[14] possibly due to the rugged terrain in its remote areas, and the availability of specialist bus builders as opposed to truck dealers and basic body builders.