BusTalk

[Q65A]

The Transbus program served as a stimulus for the U.S. transit bus industry. The estimated potential financial rewards of this major initiative were attractive to well-established bus builders such as GM and Flxible, as well as to a new entrant into the bus market. AM General Corporation (commonly abbreviated as AMG) was formed by American Motors in 1970 as a builder of military trucks and postal delivery vehicles. AMG’s headquarters were located at Wayne, Michigan, with manufacturing plants at Mishawaka, Indiana and Marshall, Texas. The company was an early and firm believer in the federally-sponsored Transbus project. In 1971, AMG responded to UMTA’s call by constructing an experimental 3-axle Transbus prototype. Perhaps sensing that the radical new bus might take some time to come to fruition, AMG developed a business relationship with Canadian bus builder Flyer Industries in September 1971. AMG acquired rights to manufacture and market the 40-foot Flyer D700A New Look transit bus in the U.S.; the deal also permitted AMG to sell trackless coaches based on the Flyer E700A design. The D/E700A looked like a moderately squared-off GM Fishbowl, incorporating familiar design elements such as a large curved windshield (Flyer’s was a 4-piece unit instead of the 6-piece GM design), tinted standee windows, slant-line passenger side windows, “slide-glide” entrance doors, and silver siding; unlike the Fishbowl (which used monocoque construction) the Flyer was of integral construction. AMG officially announced their plans to become a transit bus manufacturer by exhibiting a 40-foot air-conditioned prototype at the Transpo ’72 trade show in June 1972. The basic D700A design underwent further modification and modernization by AMG, which included addition of a rear rooftop exhaust pipe, blacked out rectangular passenger side windows, air conditioning, soft upholstered seating, and carpeted flooring. AMG followed long-established North American transit bus tradition by offering the Metropolitan in 35- and 40-foot lengths and 96” and 102” widths, powered by Detroit Diesel 6V-71N or 8V-71N engines and Allison VH hydraulic transmissions. The 40-footers rode a 284.75” wheelbase and were 124.6” tall (with A/C). By April 1973 AMG was ready to take orders for what became known to bus historians as the “First Series” of Metropolitan coaches. The 5- or 6-digit AMG model nomenclature system was straightforward: the first 2 or 3 digits (96 or 102) indicated coach width; the next pair of digits (35 or 40) signified coach length; the final single digit (6 or indicated number of engine cylinders. In later years, a single letter suffix (A, B, or T) indicated either series type (A or B) or electric propulsion (T). (Western Flyer, as Flyer was known after its 1971 sale to the Government of Manitoba, clearly must have been pleased with these AMG-inspired design changes: the new Metropolitan was built and sold north of the border as the Flyer D/E 800 from 1974 to 1979.) Large orders for Metropolitans were received from numerous U.S. transit operators (including WMATA and SF Muni). Initial deliveries came in 1974, and in a pattern that would be repeated 6 years later with the ill-fated Grumman Flxible Model 870, major design flaws soon became apparent in service, which included serious fires and structural defects. AMG scrambled to honor its warranty obligations while making needed engineering changes. After producing 1,633 “First Series” buses, AMG announced its hastily improved “Second Series” Metropolitans in June 1975; these units bore “A” suffixes in their model numbers. This series included a total of 800 buses delivered to many U.S. transit operators (including Santa Monica CA, Richmond VA, Albany and Buffalo, NY, and Indianapolis, IN). In September 1975, AMG announced yet another improved range of Metropolitans called the “Third Series” (which carried “B” model suffixes). These units were much more significantly upgraded than their predecessors. They incorporated revised A/C equipment housings that eliminated the rear rooftop “hump” that had been a hallmark of air-conditioned transit buses since the late 1950’s. A thermostatically controlled radiator cooling fan and the Allison V730 hydraulic transmission also were made standard equipment. Front wheelchair lifts were offered as optional equipment. The “Third Series” sold 2,779 units from 1976 to 1978, and could be found across the U.S. from Pittsburgh to Denver, L.A. and Seattle. AMG sued USDOT and UMTA in 1976 because the latter agency was willing to fund the purchase of 393 new GM RTS’s by the so-called “Houston Consortium”. When the lawsuit was dismissed, AMG felt that the U.S. transit bus market was not worth their investment (especially since the Transbus program to which AMG clearly was devoted would never materialize). Production of diesel Metropolitans ended in 1978. From May 1978 to March 1979, AMG collaborated with MAN to build the latter company’s 102”-wide, 55- and 60-foot diesel articulated transit buses at AMG’s Marshall (TX) plant; 399 Model SG220 units were delivered with AMG nameplates. After March 1979, MAN continued production of these artics under their own name. In 1979, AMG briefly returned to the transit bus business when Seattle and SEPTA took delivery of 219 Model 10240-T trackless trolleys: the Emerald City received 109 units while Philly took 110 trolley buses. No more buses were built thereafter: production of military and postal vehicles likely was much more profitable, and had fewer potential competitors. Given that AMG buses were moderately popular nationwide (5,834 buses sold from 1974-1979) and in view of the very large size of the NYC transit bus market, it is surprising that only a small group of AMG Metropolitans worked in regular service in The Big Apple. Queens Transit 199 (a 1973 Model 9640-6) ran in demo service but later was returned to AMG. Steinway Transit eventually bought 10 Model 9640B-8’s(STC #’s 401-410) in April 1978. Wearing traction orange and cream livery, the little fleet operated mainly in Queens express services until they were retired in 1982. No other NYC transit line is known to have operated AMG’s, even in demo service.

[Waynejay]

I never did get to ride those Steinway AMGenerals. I used to see them quite often and some of them you could hear long before you saw them.

[Mr. Linsky]

Bob,

Here's a really great photo of the AM General #199 demonstrator making its way to Jamaica on Queens Transit's # Q65 line.

Very handsome looking bus if I have to say so myself with some characteristics of GM's 'Classic'.

Photo courtesy of BusTalk.info Gallery and taken by Joe Testagrose in 1973.

Mr. Linsky - Green Bus Lines, Inc., Jamaica, NY

[Q65A]

Hi Mr. L!
The old QTC livery really does look good on that AMG; thanks for finding that photo in the archives!
I always liked the cream and orange QTC/STC livery better than the later orange and white color scheme used by QSC.
Imagine if you will an RTS-06 or an Orion V CNG mainly painted in cream with bright orange wheels and striping, plus black lettering...a much different look than today's white with blue.

[Mr. Linsky]

Bob,

That's what made the PBL's so interesting years ago with each having its own trademark livery, and one better and more colorful than the next (except North Shore!).

If there were awards for originality in paint jobs I would say that Queens Transit's cream and orange, Schenck Transportation's conbination of black gray and maroon (as pictured below) and Jamaica's deep reddish brown and cream would tie for first place.

And those individual color schemes made passenger recognition so easy.

I can't imagine what it must be like now and how confusing it must be to riders with every one of the thousands of NY MTA buses all in that same kitchen white with blue bands.

At the very least I thought they should have color coded the fronts of what were the PBL's lines both for recognition and nostalgia.

I guess we live in a 'generic' world now.

Photo courtesy of Vincent Syrek.

Mr. 'L'

[Cyberider]

Nice way to bring a good bus into a junk bus thread, Mr. Linsky! I always thought of the AM Generals as the first step away from the good buses of yesterday to the cracker box buses of today. Nice liveries on both buses but I'll take the Schenck Transportation Old Look any day!

[RailBus63]

I think AM General gave up on the bus business too soon. The poor reputation of this bus was largely based on engineering problems with the earlier production models. AMG gradually addressed these issues, and the buses they built during the last few years in business were much more reliable. They also thought that GMC and Flxible were going to dominate the American transit bus market, and missed out completely on the growing desire for non-ADB buses that began to take off in the early 1980's. Flyer took the same basic design and, thanks to modifications and improvements over the years, now is the number one transit bus manufacturer in North America.

[shortlineMCI]

[frankie]

I rode this bus many times between Jamaica to Mineola back in the '60's. I'm wondering where this photo was taken? The round bus stop signs were a common site in Queens, so this has to be either somewhere on Hillside Ave. or Jamaica Ave.

Buses traveling from Jamaica (Schenck & Bee Line) were allowed to pick up passengers along the routes, but inbound to Jamaica, it was express all the way from City Line.

Frankie

[timecruncher]

AM-General was a big military contractor. Like Rohr (remember, they owned Flxible for a while), they thought it would be easy money to get into the bus-building business when the then UMTA was spending hundreds of millions of dollars to re-fleet all of the newly-formed public transit authorities around the nation.

It appeared to me that they simply bought the rights to the New Flyer bus design, cheapened it a little, and began low-balling large TA orders of buses figuring that since they were government-run, nobody would care if the buses actually ran or not.

The buses looked good when new, and were very good on snow, but they were overweight, under-designed mechanically and electrically, poorly-assembled and a nightmare for every public transit agency maintenance department from the git-go.

For those of us who had to drive them, they were hard to steer and many were difficult to stop (or start) smoothly. Early units had a very early Rockwell anti-skid mechanism that went off if a 2-way radio was near, later models had a mechanical skid control that was installed backwards (oh yeah -- front brakes first on a rainy road was always fun), and general trim and framework was nowhere near the quality of even the then-cheapened GM coach.

In the end, AMG was unable to get quality control issues straightened out, and warranty claims ate up any profits they could manage. By then Rohr had encountered some of the same problems with Flxible and had sold to another sucker er-gummint contractor military conglomerate in Grumman.

AMG quietly and thankfully bowed out of the industry just as the RTS and the Grumman 870 were coming on the scene.

timecruncher
Schedulers give you the runs!

[RailBus63]

It’s interesting that Flyer never seemed to have the same problems with their almost-identical coaches that they built in Canada. Their version was gradually perfected and sold through North America, and of course later evolved to become today’s best-selling transit bus.

Jim

[timecruncher]

Very few New Flyer diesels were sold in the US. Mostly it was their trackless product that was sold south of the border. Seattle, San Francisco, Boston and Dayton all had them. CTA had a bunch of NFI new look diesels, and I think Minneapolis did as well. CTA managed to keep them on the streets for quite a long time but I believe they had lots of problems with them. I recall that they seemed to ride better than their AMG cousins. CTA's were all non-a/c, too!

Dayton's NFI trackless trolleys had serious rust problems -- don't know about Boston's. Muni still has a few on the streets if I am not mistaken, and Seattle's were scrapped and their motors put into Gillig Phantom bodies (good re-use of costly electrical components).

timecruncher
Cutting running time for 16 years!

[Hart Bus]

[timecruncher]

TARC AMG 10240 #158, a 1975 product shown here almost new at the Fairmeade layover on the busy Walnut Street route. These were crap buses, but they did look good when clean before getting banged up.



A few years later after moving to Cincinnati, AMG 10240B #926 is my bus on the 53 late run, shown here at McAlpin Loop in the toney Clifton neighborhood:



And finally, I never drove these in revenue service, but I drove the one in the historic fleet -- TANK 10235 #1901, nee 1979 (I think), sitting pretty next to their beautifully restored TDH3612 at the garage in Fort Wright, KY:



Note that the TARC units are 10240 and TANK 10235 (TANK's 35-footers were the first off the assembly line at AMG, and TARC's 40-footers were built right after Washington's were built). These were delivered before the A or B designation was added. The Metro units in Cincinnati were B models delivered in 1977. The main thing that sets them apart is that on the B models the a/c evaporator is down below in front of the radiator. This contributed to these buses uncanny overheating problems on Cincinnati's hilly routes.

Oh yeah -- the 3612 is sweet. (makes gurgling sound like Homer Simpson)...

Yes, Kentucky is all about acronyms for its bus systems. TARC, TANK, LexTran, whatever.

timecruncher
It ain't your run. Its my run, and I'll let you work it for the next 4 months!

[Q65A]

AM General Metropolitans really looked like square fishbowls, but they were not IMO bad looking buses.