(13 Mar 2015, 8:04 pm)aureolin wrote Not entirely sure why the number jumps to one side, but I'd imagine it's near impossible to test every destination on different varieties of destination displays.
I noticed a similar issue with the way the number on the '4' was displayed, when some Solars were being used. It was fixed almost as soon as I'd mentioned it on here though.
The number appearing on the left hand side opposed to the right relates to an incorrect switch setting on that vehicle. Different vehicle types have differently sized destination displays. Some are larger, some are smaller.
When we are creating new destinations, we create multiple versions of the same display for each size of destination a depot uses. To follow on from discussion in the "What's made you happy today?" thread, I have been working on the destination displays for "Lime" services 8/8A and 78/78A today. I've fully completed the revised set of destinations for Chester-le-Street depot. For full (front, side and rear) LED displays, there are about six different variants. There are normal LED frontal displays (as per the Tridents), colour LED displays (as per the Angel Hybrids), larger colour LED displays (as per the OmniCitys), normal LED side/rear displays and larger rear LED displays (as per the OmniCitys).
When we upload these destinations to the buses, we have to make sure that the switch setting for that bus matches up with what we have got in the programme. If not, we see some funny looking destination displays! I think (but could be wrong) that the vehicles with the route numbers on the left hand side of the display think that their frontal displays are in fact rear displays, where the number appears on the left hand side of the vehicle. Sometimes further issues arise when you start to play around with the settings, so sometimes engineers at the depots are unable to change these themselves. As depots aren't always in a position to keep a bus off the road because it is showing the number on the wrong side of the display, it's often a case of waiting for it to be off the road (for whatever reason) on a weekday so we can see to it. This is how we managed to get the "Crusader" branded Mercedes Citaro fixed - as it was at Saltmeadows for some reason or another.
I'm not entirely sure why 5161 displays "Sth Shields", as even the rear display should be set up to read "South". It's not "unprofessional" that this fault hasn't been fixed - there's just more than what meets the eye and quite frankly it's perfectly understandable that enthusiasts just see black and white and nothing in between as most are unaware of how a depot operates and the issues depots face on a daily basis. The issue with the Scania L94 vehicles on the 4 was fixed when the global Go North East programme was rolled out at Washington. I think it was planned for this to be done on a Sunday morning before the issue was noted on this forum, sadly! This forum has helped to make Go North East aware of certain issues quicker (and this has in turn gotten the issues fixed quicker too!)