(22 Jan 2016, 8:30 pm)Adrian That's rubbish. If you ordered a new car, it'd still be a new car whether it be built to order or whether it be dealer stock. The only difference is the interior. How do you know WiFi was thrown in, and not ordered separately?

(22 Jan 2016, 9:11 pm)South Tyne Lad The thing is where talking about buses, Ordering a Car is totally different because you are ordering for yourself, Ordering a Bus you have to Consider with the Passengers and Future Passengers in Mind ( Or should do )
Some people on this forum have posted about how E-Leather, Wifi, Plug Sockets ETC is now Priority on all orders........Then GNE order Dealer B9s which has a ABSOULOUTLY DIFFERENT interior for a High Profile Spec service.  

GNE Chucked the Wifi in after they bought the Dealer B9s.

(22 Jan 2016, 8:57 pm)DaveyBowyer Does it matter whether the Streetlites will be Euro 5 or Euro 6 or for that matter, ANY bus? As long as the buses ordered are:

- Reasonably efficient
- Reasonably reliable
- To company and passenger requirements

Then that is fine. At least GNE are willing to invest in their fleet unlike Arriva who are happy to use 13-14 year old cast offs from London on their MAX routes and 57 plate E400s on a 'premium SAPPHIRE service' which have been battered during their time at Blyth and Redcar for the majority of them.

And, the only reason that GNE ordered B9TLs for the 47 was because of:
- Their price (end of line discount and kept in dealer stock)
- Commonality with Riverside's decker fleet (TEN and TTX)
- Proven vehicle type
- Streetdeck wasn't proven at the time of the order
- 47 despite being a profitable route and requiring extra capacity, didn't justify the expenditure of all the extra bells and whistles like the TEN, Fab 56, Cobalt Clipper etc although the 45/46 do have the extra bells and whistles

If GNEs Merc engined Citaro's can last nearly 9 year (original Red Arrows batch), then surely the Streetdeck will last as long despite being a little bit slower (or the same depending on setup) than a conventional decker.

(22 Jan 2016, 9:11 pm)South Tyne Lad The thing is where talking about buses, Ordering a Car is totally different because you are ordering for yourself, Ordering a Bus you have to Consider with the Passengers and Future Passengers in Mind ( Or should do )
Some people on this forum have posted about how E-Leather, Wifi, Plug Sockets ETC is now Priority on all orders........Then GNE order Dealer B9s which has a ABSOULOUTLY DIFFERENT interior for a High Profile Spec service.  

GNE Chucked the Wifi in after they bought the Dealer B9s.

(22 Jan 2016, 9:35 pm)South Tyne Lad Even if the Streetlites are Euro 5, The Streetdecks can only be Euro 6 so wouldn't it not be better to have the same engine ( DAimler OM904 ) in the Streetlite for maintenance purposes?

(22 Jan 2016, 9:49 pm)Kuyoyo Why would they need to be the same for maintenance purposes when they aren't even going to be based at the same depot? You do yourself no favors with comments like this.....

As for Euro6 engine options for the Streetlite, if Wright listen to their customers, they would do right to offer the Euro6 Cummins engine. From what little I've heard, Arriva's engineering department aren't exactly impressed with the Damiler duo.

(22 Jan 2016, 11:19 pm)GMitchelhill The Red Kite B9s aren't the first dealer stock vehicles in the fleet.

Volvo (VDL) SB120 / Wright Merits were also dealer stock vehicles and some even entered service in dealer white. The reason for getting them, GNE needed new buses quickly, and they were the best option.

No doubt the same applied to the Volvo B9TLs for the Red Kite. GNE already had experience of the vehicle type, therefore requires less staff training on the vehicles. There isn't much point in ordering 4 of a new type of vehicle, find that they are complete lemons and go for a completely different type of vehicle for future orders. Go North East tried the Volvo B5TL on the 47 route, and found that it did struggle a little bit, so went for a wise move and went for the stock of 4 B9TLs. They days of small batches of unique vehicles are long gone. Prime examples of small batches brought new include the Dennis Lance SLFs and the Scania L94UAs. Though saying that some reasons that there wasn't more Lance SLFs was that delivery was delayed (4770-4773 were meant to carry registrations L470YVK etc). Also Wright and Dennis had a huge falling out over the fact that Dennis pushed Heathrow Airport to get Berkhof bodies on the chassis, resulting in no more Wright Pathfinders being constructed on the Dennis Lance SLF chassis. Just to add, the Dennis Lance SLF is the only vehicle type that Go North East (well Coastline) pioneered since L469YVK has the lowest numbered Dennis Lance SLF chassis that was actually registred, with the first one being a test rig.

As for the Scania L94UAs, well they were constructed for a bespoke route with low bridges, and were a bit more so of a vanity thing. We all saw how well a large fleet of Bendy Buses went don't we.

As for the Scania L94UBs, the chassis had been around a few years (1997) prior to the introduction of the Wright Solar body, so GNE weren't one of the first with the L94UB chassis. Also the body was developed at least a year before GNE got it too. Because GNE was a big Scania user, they decided to push ahead and go and buy the Scania N230UB Omnicity off the drawing board (think they were the second big operator to get them), and they ended up regretting it with the vehicles being plagued with issues which resulted in various Scania demo vehicles on loan to cover for warrenty work.

Go North East learned from this, and started evaluating more demo buses before ordering.

Also Go North East weren't one of the first few opeartors to get the Euro 5 Citaro, there were a few operators (Oxford, Plymouth, McGills and British Airways who ordered them beforehand, though I still have no idea why 5276 arrived well ahead of the rest of the batch.

(23 Jan 2016, 9:06 am)Jackamcardle 9106 is out today, allocated to service 683.

(23 Jan 2016, 10:27 am)Diamond One Got a pic of it? If so send us the link and I will favour it when I can p.s keep up to good work sir my advice would be to you work hard play hard

(23 Jan 2016, 10:50 am)Jackamcardle Daniel Duffy posted it on Facebook

(22 Jan 2016, 9:49 pm)Kuyoyo Why would they need to be the same for maintenance purposes when they aren't even going to be based at the same depot? You do yourself no favors with comments like this.....

As for Euro6 engine options for the Streetlite, if Wright listen to their customers, they would do right to offer the Euro6 Cummins engine. From what little I've heard, Arriva's engineering department aren't exactly impressed with the Damiler duo.

(24 Jan 2016, 5:25 pm)GMitchelhill More than likely 6038 was receiving repairs at Chester Le Street, and was just borrowed for the replacements.

(24 Jan 2016, 5:25 pm)GMitchelhill More than likely 6038 was receiving repairs at Chester Le Street, and was just borrowed for the replacements.

(24 Jan 2016, 7:13 pm)Kuyoyo Would anyone be able to advise which runs the Venture Solo on the 689 does while in Hexham? Planning to head up that way on Tuesday