Aviation Specials – June 2018

Celebrating a British icon 97

accumulating a fleet of 435 fairly

basic Guy Arab double-deckers

between 1942 and 1946. Guy

Motors, based in Wolverhampton,

had not been a major player in

the bus world but had gained a

reputation for sturdy vehicles.

While London Transport’s main

bus suppliers, AEC and Leyland,

were concentrating on other

war work, Guy was authorised

to build its rugged Arab chassis,

to be fitted with bodywork to a

strict specification that made the

best use of scarce resources. So

there were to be no curves, the

minimum of opening windows,

wooden slatted seats when other

materials were not available, and

a simple destination display at

the front only.

The new utility Guys were in

stark contrast to the flowing

modern lines of the early RT

types built only months earlier,

but they were essential to keep

London moving.

Lives after London

LEFT: Two of the

ex-London Guys

sit at Edinburgh

Corporation’s

Shrubhill Works in

the course of mid-

life refurbishment,

which included

replacing the

ornate Duple

fronts with

glassfibre Leyland-

style fronts in line

with much of the

fleet. The original

Guy radiators

can be seen.

GAVIN BOOTH

ABOVE: Stripped of their utility bodywork, the chassis of three former London Transport Guy Arabs sit in Edinburgh Corporation’s

Central garage awaiting work on the chassis before dispatch south for new bodies. From left to right, they are G215, G214 and G272,

all of which were new in 1945. IAN MACLEAN