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Gillig product discussion


ABQ RIDE

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10 hours ago, Transit man2015 said:

Yes VTA in California has it on their hybrid buses it’s weird in my opinion

I googled this and found a few photos of the VTA buses. I had been starting to think it might be some kind of weight-savings measure, weighing less than the full BRT front cap, and perhaps a strategy for squeezing the most range out of an electric design. But seeing that it’s been used on more conventional buses, I’m just trying to figure out the point!

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On 4/28/2018 at 5:42 PM, gilligfanboi said:

I was just browsing Gillig’s site today and came upon the battery electric page for the first time today:

https://www.gillig.com/beze

The attached photo is cropped from the main pic on that page. Did I miss something? When did they introduce this front cap that looks like a combination of the standard and BRT styling options? Is this on any production buses anywhere?

C67A4081-E069-4335-B422-6BCD3B08A97B.jpeg

You can order this front end on any Gillig bus for that matter whether it is CNG, Diesel, hybrid, etc. 

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18 hours ago, XN40 said:

You can order this front end on any Gillig bus for that matter whether it is CNG, Diesel, hybrid, etc. 

Is it available with or without the BRTplus roof cap? Any idea what the point is? Are they trying to phase out the original front cap?

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I hadn't realised that Cummins had started making electric powertrains. That's a sensible move from their point of view but where do they get the experience and expertise to guarantee performance and reliability to demanding customers? In contrast New Flyer uses electric motors from Siemens, which has over 100 years experience in electric traction - railways, tramways and trolleybuses

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On 5/12/2018 at 5:06 PM, martin607 said:

I hadn't realised that Cummins had started making electric powertrains. That's a sensible move from their point of view but where do they get the experience and expertise to guarantee performance and reliability to demanding customers? In contrast New Flyer uses electric motors from Siemens, which has over 100 years experience in electric traction - railways, tramways and trolleybuses

The question is who is supplying Cummins with the components? I highly doubt Cummins has started winding their own traction motors. Who built the traction motors in Allison parallel hybrids? Who built the traction motors for the BAE hybrids? I don't know, and I am genuinely curious.

Hell, who built the traction motors in the Vossloh Kiepe E40LFR's? Not Kiepe, as I recall they are actually Skoda traction motors.

So at the end of the day, the traction motors could be a moot point. Cummins is probably more so the systems integrator with all of the components. Certainly, Cummins I'm sure has some experience in the electrification of drivetrains in the form of such features as the electrically driven cooling fans, rather than belt driven. How much, I'm honestly not sure, but, I'm sure they've gained experience already on some of this.

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12 hours ago, M. Parsons said:

Hell, who built the traction motors in the Vossloh Kiepe E40LFR's? Not Kiepe, as I recall they are actually Skoda traction motors.

They may have spec'd Skoda motors on Vancouver's E40LFs, but Kiepe has been well known to spec and build their own control systems, right down to the traction motors.

 

Dan

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1 hour ago, smallspy said:

They may have spec'd Skoda motors on Vancouver's E40LFs, but Kiepe has been well known to spec and build their own control systems, right down to the traction motors.

 

Dan

Quite. Kiepe has been the main contractor for the traction equipment for New flyer trolleybuses to Vancouver, Seattle and San Francisco. They simply chose to buy in traction motors from Skoda (lower cost? speed of delivery?). But they could have manufactured in-house.

As this is a Gillig thread, has anybody posted about the new Next Generation Trolleybuses being ordered by Dayton Ohio? These are full dual mode battery trolleybuses capable of running 15 miles in battery mode. The batteries are recharged while running under the trolleybus wires - yay no need for the 10 minute charging waits that pure battery buses need. Interestingly the transit authority seems to be contracting directly with Kiepe Electric, who in turn are using Gillig bus bodies.

 

Dayton Next Generation.jpg

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  • 3 weeks later...
On 5/4/2018 at 8:28 PM, gilligfanboi said:

Is it available with or without the BRTplus roof cap? Any idea what the point is? Are they trying to phase out the original front cap?

This was originally designed for Santa Clara VTA, but apparently, any Gillig customer can buy it and you dont need BRT styling as you could buy a Diesel bus with this front end and no roof decorations.

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55 minutes ago, RailBus63 said:

Gillig has always been very customer-focused in that way.  Special doors (or no front doors), or the BRT front without the roof fairings and back end?  No problem.  

Speaking of doors, I wonder which TAs have the mid-width slide guide rear doors.  This seems to be a rare option, as most seem to either go with the narrow flip-out rear doors or the wide plug rear doors.

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16 hours ago, ABQ RIDE said:

Speaking of doors, I wonder which TAs have the mid-width slide guide rear doors.  This seems to be a rare option, as most seem to either go with the narrow flip-out rear doors or the wide plug rear doors.

I don't recall ever seeing those on a Gillig.

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I can say this,

We were trying to get some prices from the manufacturers for buses for a Shuttle contract. Even though Gillig was basically unable to help us, as they were not willing to go through the hassle, of getting buses approved for sale in Canada for a potential 5 bus order. They were still very easy to contact, and were still willing to talk to us. More-so than New Flyer. Nova was also pretty easy to deal with though. Contract didn't pan out, but I was pretty impressed with the willingness of Gillig to set a bus up just the way you want.

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5 hours ago, Bravo Actual said:

On this note, has there EVER been a Gillig bus or two run in Canada? Even second hand?

Big Bus had three that were let in and Licensed by the province. One has been scrapped and two were converted to Open Tops and sent to Big Bus Victoria, which I'm not certain is in business any more. We also had the only accidentally Legal Crown Supercoach II in Canada. These are all school buses. There were also some Gillig Phantoms being used at Pearson Airport. I think they were Phantoms, 30 footers I believe. Someone can correct me on that one if I have it wrong.

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On 6/2/2018 at 6:51 PM, Bravo Actual said:

On this note, has there EVER been a Gillig bus or two run in Canada? Even second hand?

A Gillig Phantom hybrid visited Edmonton for ETS to look at. It didn't operate in revenue service.

Edison Transportation had a large number running in Canada during the 2010 Olympic's.

On 6/2/2018 at 12:13 AM, RZ350 said:

as they were not willing to go through the hassle, of getting buses approved for sale in Canada for a potential 5 bus order. 

As much as a 5 bus order is quite small, Proterra seems willing to do what they need to as they're supplying 10 buses to the TTC for their electric bus project.

Proterra also bid on the ETS electric bus tender which was for an initial 5 buses, with the possibility of up to 35 more and that was contingent upon funding, successful operation of the first 5 etc. With Federal funding however, it seems the full 40 will happen.

It seems Proterra is willing to get their buses approved for sale in Canada for a low initial volume of units, so I don't think it's that tough to get done 

Of course, Proterra and Gillig are different... Proterra is supplying electric buses and trying to gain market share, while Gillig has significant market share in the US with a proven product. Could be that in general, Gillig doesn't want or need the Canadian market.

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23 hours ago, RZ350 said:

 There were also some Gillig Phantoms being used at Pearson Airport. I think they were Phantoms, 30 footers I believe. Someone can correct me on that one if I have it wrong.

I think those are the ones that ran for the now defunct Canada 3000 airline?

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 4/28/2018 at 7:42 PM, gilligfanboi said:

I was just browsing Gillig’s site today and came upon the battery electric page for the first time today:

https://www.gillig.com/beze

Well I got to give Gillig a little credit for at least attempting to update the 1980's vintage headlights on the standard front. Still I think that is a rather funky looking redesign. IMO even a 2003 Caetano Nimbus bodywork* has a more stylish appearance with the headlights:

*EDIT, should clarify bodywork as it's a British bus, so technically it's a Dart SLF.

27365985127_29084232da_t.jpg

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On 6/2/2018 at 8:51 PM, Bravo Actual said:

On this note, has there EVER been a Gillig bus or two run in Canada? Even second hand?

Many Gillig buses were operated in shuttle service during the Vancouver Olympics. This was probably the largest Gillig operation in Canada.

I think the buses were never technically imported into Canada, they ran with American IRP plates.

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