New Flyer Industries Discussion and Photos

[transit boy]

How'd she look (any pics)??.

no I do not have a camera and she look nice.

[BusRider]

I was by flyer yesterday and I think I saw a Xcelsior in Brampton Transit colours

When I was last down there I noticed it to! (well DE40LFR pointed it out). Didn't get any shots though.

[DE40LFR]

Yes, the Brampton Xcelsiors are a common sighting at the plant these days as well as the Ottawa D60LFRs as they are still in production

[M. Parsons]

Its still better than riding brand new Novas with leaking roofs. And yes, its happened more than once. In fact, I rode an 06 Nova today that was leaking in 2 places, and at least one of our late 2009 novas leaks as well. Of course, I can't really speak from the maintenance side of things.

Speaking about leaking roofs... I've noticed that ALL of Edmonton's D40LF®s are having theirs roofs fixed. Every single one because of leaks.

[DE40LFR]

Speaking about leaking roofs... I've noticed that ALL of Edmonton's D40LF®s are having theirs roofs fixed. Every single one because of leaks.

Thats funny. The demo for WT bus 900 had some roof leaks near the rear door right underneath a seat. People would avoid sitting there!

Hopefully they fix that up!

[* Mr. Black *]

Yes, the Brampton Xcelsiors are a common sighting at the plant these days as well as the Ottawa D60LFRs as they are still in production

do you mean ZUM Xcelsoirs? or Brampton Transit??

[BusRider]

do you mean ZUM Xcelsoirs? or Brampton Transit??

Brampton Transit. Not Zum.

[Mr. Engineer]

I was wondering how long it would be till the Diesel Xcelsiors went into production. They're supposed to be here by winter. I guess some of them will be, now. Thanks for the info.

[MaT]

I thought the order was for ZUM and not for for regular service...I don't recall an order for BT other than for ZUM. Do you have any pics? I'm kinda having trouble believing it personally, no offence lol.

[Mr. Engineer]

I thought the order was for ZUM and not for for regular service...I don't recall an order for BT other than for ZUM. Do you have any pics? I'm kinda having trouble believing it personally, no offence lol.

There are actually two Brampton orders in progress. The first was for 50 (or 60) XDE40s, which was signed at the end of 2008. That was for ZUM. However, a few months ago, BT signed a second contract with NFI for XD40s for normal transit. 30 XD40s are coming this winter, and another 17 XDE40s in the spring. The news releases are on NFI's website.

EDIT: Just looked at the release. The diesel order is a total of 77 XD40s with 30 for this year. They excersized options for 16, not 17, XDE40s for ZUM as well. The release is part of their end of Second Quarter report. So the contract was signed sometime between April and June of this year.

[BusRider]

I thought the order was for ZUM and not for for regular service...I don't recall an order for BT other than for ZUM. Do you have any pics? I'm kinda having trouble believing it personally, no offence lol.

That's okay, I saw it myself and didn't believe it.

[DE40LFR]

I thought the order was for ZUM and not for for regular service...I don't recall an order for BT other than for ZUM. Do you have any pics? I'm kinda having trouble believing it personally, no offence lol.

Well that's okay. I also saw them but didn't take any pics. You can believe it when they arrive!

I believe these ones were in the plain BT paint scheme like the ones used on the LF's. Didn't suit the Xcelsiors in my opinion!

[Mr. Engineer]

Well that's okay. I also saw them but didn't take any pics. You can believe it when they arrive!

I believe these ones were in the plain BT paint scheme like the ones used on the LF's. Didn't suit the Xcelsiors in my opinion!

I never thought that scheme would suit them.... IMO, it only suits the Nova LFS, which were BT's first buses to come in that scheme. I suppose it passes on BTs rebuilt Orion VIs too. But everything else just looks so bare with that scheme....

[Orion V]

There are actually two Brampton orders in progress. The first was for 50 (or 60) XDE40s, which was signed at the end of 2008. That was for ZUM. However, a few months ago, BT signed a second contract with NFI for XD40s for normal transit. 30 XD40s are coming this winter, and another 17 XDE40s in the spring. The news releases are on NFI's website.

EDIT: Just looked at the release. The diesel order is a total of 77 XD40s with 30 for this year. They excersized options for 16, not 17, XDE40s for ZUM as well. The release is part of their end of Second Quarter report. So the contract was signed sometime between April and June of this year.

http://www.brampton.ca/en/City-Hall/meetin...100512cc_Q2.pdf

[smallspy]

Oh, Im well aware that maintaining artics is far more 'involved' than maintaining 40 footers; that's a given. All Im saying is that if they're needed to get service to where it should be, then they should be bought, ASAP. At the very least, the service model should have been better planned before making the order, or the number of vehicles in the initial order should have been increased to provide a cushion in case of unexpectedly high usage.

Wrong answer.

Brampton Transit is running buses every 7 1/2 minutes at rush hours. That is not even remotely close to the threshold of needing to upsize your buses. It makes far, far more sense to run more frequent, standardized 40 foot buses, as that way passengers know that they can go outside at any time and expect to not have to wait long for a bus. 7 1/2 minutes can be a long time if it is cold or raining, and 15 minutes even more so.

Then there's the issue of making sure your maintance facilities are up to scratch. And the fact that parts like engines and transmissions won't last as long. And additional maintenance headaches, such as joints, that simply don't exist on a 40 foot bus. The reason why the TTC was happy to get rid of their GM artics was because they found that they cost more than three times to maintain than a regular 40 foot bus, and the Ikarus' weren't much better from that standpoint.

And Im not sure about anyone else here, but to me, the Xcelsior never really seemed like it would end up being much different than the D40LF. I doubt that NFI meant for it be much more than that. Even the literature about the Xcelsior lends to the idea that it wasn't meant to be more. From a user's persepctive, I kinda glad that its not a significant departure from the D40LF. It didn't need to be. Its still better than riding brand new Novas with leaking roofs. And yes, its happened more than once. In fact, I rode an 06 Nova today that was leaking in 2 places, and at least one of our late 2009 novas leaks as well. Of course, I can't really speak from the maintenance side of things.

And this is as opposed to riding in brand new D40LFs - and I'm talking one or two months old, not a couple of years - with leaking roofs? Or weeks-old XDE40s with missing hardware inside?

Dan

[Mr. Engineer]

Wrong answer.

Brampton Transit is running buses every 7 1/2 minutes at rush hours. That is not even remotely close to the threshold of needing to upsize your buses. It makes far, far more sense to run more frequent, standardized 40 foot buses, as that way passengers know that they can go outside at any time and expect to not have to wait long for a bus. 7 1/2 minutes can be a long time if it is cold or raining, and 15 minutes even more so.

Then there's the issue of making sure your maintance facilities are up to scratch. And the fact that parts like engines and transmissions won't last as long. And additional maintenance headaches, such as joints, that simply don't exist on a 40 foot bus. The reason why the TTC was happy to get rid of their GM artics was because they found that they cost more than three times to maintain than a regular 40 foot bus, and the Ikarus' weren't much better from that standpoint.

And this is as opposed to riding in brand new D40LFs - and I'm talking one or two months old, not a couple of years - with leaking roofs? Or weeks-old XDE40s with missing hardware inside?

Dan

But isn't this what I said? I said if they're needed and the money is there, then they should be bought. If additional 40 footers work better for now, then so be it... That still means that they should have been, or shoud now be bought. The maintenance facilities themselves ARE up to scratch. But that's exactly what I said.....

Oh, Im well aware that maintaining artics is far more 'involved' than maintaining 40 footers; that's a given. All Im saying is that if they're needed to get service to where it should be, then they should be bought, ASAP. At the very least, the service model should have been better planned before making the order, or the number of vehicles in the initial order should have been increased to provide a cushion in case of unexpectedly high usage.

As for initial quality, we all have our own experiences. You've ridden in new and leaky D40LFs, and Ive ridden in new and leaky LFSs. Same difference. All im saying is, I prefer the XDE40s in they're current state when compared with our brand new LFSs.

[M. Parsons]

Oh, Im well aware that maintaining artics is far more 'involved' than maintaining 40 footers; that's a given. All Im saying is that if they're needed to get service to where it should be, then they should be bought, ASAP. At the very least, the service model should have been better planned before making the order, or the number of vehicles in the initial order should have been increased to provide a cushion in case of unexpectedly high usage.

But isn't this what I said? I said if they're needed and the money is there, then they should be bought. If additional 40 footers work better for now, then so be it... That still means that they should have been, or shoud now be bought. The maintenance facilities themselves ARE up to scratch. But that's exactly what I said.....

So, you're saying that artics should have been purchased and put into use now, even if they won't be needed for sometime?

See, this makes no sense at all. You want the extra money spent on an artic, plus the extra money to operate and maintain artics when the service doesn't need them yet?

Waste of money.

Pardon my ignorance, but how has ZUM's ridership been?

Some quick figures out of Edmonton on 40' vs 60' costs:

Labour & Parts Avg. KM/Bus Labour & Parts/ KM

2001 D40LF $12721 56266 $0.23

2001 D60LF $12132 28248 $0.43

2003 D40LF $4416 61324 $0.07

2003 D60LF $6343 34576 $0.18

As for initial quality, we all have our own experiences. You've ridden in new and leaky D40LFs, and Ive ridden in new and leaky LFSs. Same difference. All im saying is, I prefer the XDE40s in they're current state when compared with our brand new LFSs.

You prefer a bus with stanchions cracking and coming out of sockets, and interior panels loose and coming off? And apparently roofs leaking as well?

I'd be wouldn't be happy with any.

I think Brampton was stupid going with the Xcelsior. The first fleet of these things in service... Brampton will be the ones that experience any issues that didn't show up in the demos that were probably carefully built.

Frankly, I hope that these are easily fixed design flaws in the Xcelsior. I'd be very pissed off if I had the first fleet of Xcelsior's and it was just poor workmanship from New Flyer.

[D40-90]

I think Brampton was stupid going with the Xcelsior. The first fleet of these things in service... Brampton will be the ones that experience any issues that didn't show up in the demos that were probably carefully built.

Frankly, I hope that these are easily fixed design flaws in the Xcelsior. I'd be very pissed off if I had the first fleet of Xcelsior's and it was just poor workmanship from New Flyer.

Some one has to take the risk and be the first to something. There's nothing wrong with that. Can you inagine no one trying out new things. We might as well still have the Newlooks in production. I know some of you would like that.

[M. Parsons]

Some one has to take the risk and be the first to something. There's nothing wrong with that. Can you inagine no one trying out new things. We might as well still have the Newlooks in production. I know some of you would like that.

There should be no risk when millions of tax dollars are being spent on buses from one of the biggest bus manfactuers around.

[Mr. Engineer]

So, you're saying that artics should have been purchased and put into use now, even if they won't be needed for sometime?

See, this makes no sense at all. You want the extra money spent on an artic, plus the extra money to operate and maintain artics when the service doesn't need them yet?

Waste of money.

Pardon my ignorance, but how has ZUM's ridership been?

Some quick figures out of Edmonton on 40' vs 60' costs:

Labour & Parts Avg. KM/Bus Labour & Parts/ KM

2001 D40LF $12721 56266 $0.23

2001 D60LF $12132 28248 $0.43

2003 D40LF $4416 61324 $0.07

2003 D60LF $6343 34576 $0.18

You prefer a bus with stanchions cracking and coming out of sockets, and interior panels loose and coming off? And apparently roofs leaking as well?

I'd be wouldn't be happy with any.

I think Brampton was stupid going with the Xcelsior. The first fleet of these things in service... Brampton will be the ones that experience any issues that didn't show up in the demos that were probably carefully built.

Frankly, I hope that these are easily fixed design flaws in the Xcelsior. I'd be very pissed off if I had the first fleet of Xcelsior's and it was just poor workmanship from New Flyer.

You still haven't read/understood all of what I said. I mentioned that if necessary, the initial order should have been larger to accomodate for over usage. By original order, I meant 40 footers. Quoting maintenance figures does not change the fact that I ALREADY KNOW that it takes a lot more effort and $$$$$ to maintain artics. Nor does it change the fact that service needs to be better and more reliable. I also said, that if artics are NECESSARY then they should be bought. Passengers paying $3 a ride care very little that an artic can take up to 2x more money to maintain when they're being left at the street side because 40 footers can't handle the loads. I get pretty pissed when Im late for my class because there's no space on the bus. If this can be corrected with more 40 footers, then so be it. But of course, that's what Ive already said..... And for the record, ZUM's ridership is good. Its just there are MANY times that extra buses are needed. BT should have known that ridership would have been high prior to the start of service, simply because of where this route is running to. York University is not a minor destination during rush. Thousands of York U students use ZUM, and that still doesn't count for the other thousands of people who use ZUM as a faster connection to Toronto.

Some one has to take the risk and be the first to something. There's nothing wrong with that. Can you inagine no one trying out new things. We might as well still have the Newlooks in production. I know some of you would like that.

There should be no risk when millions of tax dollars are being spent on buses from one of the biggest bus manfactuers around.

Just because millions of tax dollars are being spent does not negate the fact that these are the first ever full production models. Im sure BT knew that there would be kinks before they signed the contract. Im studying engineering, and one of the first things they taught us last year was that there will be kinks in the early running. There's no way to avoid that. There are always unforseen situations that have be dealt with after the design phase. Its a fact of life. The HVAC issues are a perfect example. Thermo King built and tested the things, right? So why are they not working? Its a kink that is being worked out as we speak. If it was a big enough problem, NFI wouldn't keep manufacturing other customer's orders with the same HVAC, would they? Again, they would have to undertake a design change AFTER the main design phase has ended. It happens more often than you think. Yes it results in additional cost, but its gonna happen regardless.

[DE40LFR]

... and that's the risk of purchasing a bus that has just been released an no one hasn't really had it before. Obviously there are going to be a few issues as nothing is going to be perfect, but to what I understand, New Flyer is trying to fix these up to be up to standard, as well as make a few modifications to their next batch of Xcelsiors.

It wouldn't necessarily be a waste of tax payers money if there was a bidding process involved in the purchase of these buses. If NFI had the lowest bid, it would be the cheapest option. However, If BT blindly chose to buy the Xcelsior, that would be a pretty risky move and maybe an expensive move!

Therefore, I'd say that theres no way BT or NFI could be immune to design flaws due to the new-ness of the Xcelsior. But I think that NFI and BT are doing what they can to address these issues and repair them and make them better in the future.

[smallspy]

But isn't this what I said? I said if they're needed and the money is there, then they should be bought. If additional 40 footers work better for now, then so be it... That still means that they should have been, or shoud now be bought. The maintenance facilities themselves ARE up to scratch. But that's exactly what I said.....

You said in at least three different posts that they SHOULD have purchased artics. When I learned english, using the term "should" indicated that it would have been the better choice to choose something else. I think you're wrong, and frankly the numbers that I used bear that out.

As for initial quality, we all have our own experiences. You've ridden in new and leaky D40LFs, and Ive ridden in new and leaky LFSs. Same difference. All im saying is, I prefer the XDE40s in they're current state when compared with our brand new LFSs.

You made a throw-away comment regarding your experience in a vehicle that was never really part of the discussion in this thread. I made a throw-away comment regarding my experience in a vehicle that was made by the manufacturer in question. What more do you want? Why the hell bring up the Nova product other than to prove your raging hard-on for New Flyer?

Dan

[Mr. Engineer]

... and that's the risk of purchasing a bus that has just been released an no one hasn't really had it before. Obviously there are going to be a few issues as nothing is going to be perfect, but to what I understand, New Flyer is trying to fix these up to be up to standard, as well as make a few modifications to their next batch of Xcelsiors.

It wouldn't necessarily be a waste of tax payers money if there was a bidding process involved in the purchase of these buses. If NFI had the lowest bid, it would be the cheapest option. However, If BT blindly chose to buy the Xcelsior, that would be a pretty risky move and maybe an expensive move!

Therefore, I'd say that theres no way BT or NFI could be immune to design flaws due to the new-ness of the Xcelsior. But I think that NFI and BT are doing what they can to address these issues and repair them and make them better in the future.

I think we all will have a better idea of what the Xcelsior product will be like in the long term, once the first few orders have gone through. By then most, if not all the current problems will be corrected.

You said in at least three different posts that they SHOULD have purchased artics. When I learned english, using the term "should" indicated that it would have been the better choice to choose something else. I think you're wrong, and frankly the numbers that I used bear that out.

You made a throw-away comment regarding your experience in a vehicle that was never really part of the discussion in this thread. I made a throw-away comment regarding my experience in a vehicle that was made by the manufacturer in question. What more do you want? Why the hell bring up the Nova product other than to prove your raging hard-on for New Flyer?

Dan

Perhaps I just feel that the NFI product is better?

Plus, I do believe that they should have bought artics, regardless of your figures. But I also said that if these problems could have been avoided, or can now be eliminated using 40 footers instead, then, by all means, do it....

[general682002]

Perhaps I just feel that the NFI product is better?

Plus, I do believe that they should have bought artics, regardless of your figures. But I also said that if these problems could have been avoided, or can now be eliminated using 40 footers instead, then, by all means, do it....

I have an assignment for you, ask a mechanic in Brampton when it comes to dealing on who's on more inside the shops for repair, Nova vs. NFI!

Flyers are ok buses I find, more drivers I've spoken to liked the Flyers more than Nova.

[vivablue5215]

Flyers are ok buses I find, more drivers I've spoken to liked the Flyers more than Nova.

Unless you're in GRT.