Back in 1958, DAF started the production of the TB-series of rolling bus chassis. The letters TB stand for TramBus (streetcar-bus), which means that the entrance and driver’s compartment are ahead of the front axle. Many of the independent Dutch and Belgian bus and coach builders used it as the underpinnings for their products.
The DAF-Verheul bus on display in the DAF Museum rolls on the TB 160 DD chassis. The letters DD refer to the naturally aspirated, 5.75 liter inline-six diesel engine, good for 120 SAE-hp. The DS was the turbocharged version.
There you go, a trambus all the way. With the introduction of this type of chassis, the driver also became the conductor.
The TET was a public transport operator in the eastern Netherlands. It stands for Twentsche Electrische Tramweg Maatschappij, founded in 1904.
The driver’s~conductor’s office. Clean desk policy for sure.
An interior like this screams both classic and transit (city) bus.
Verheul was a major manufacturer of -especially- transit buses, both body-on-frame and unibody. The company has also built heavy trucks and tractor units for a while. The business all came to a very sad ending in 1970, when a blazing fire destroyed the production facilities.
After that, competitor Den Oudsten got the upper hand in the production of our standard buses in bright yellow. With DAF as the preferred chassis supplier, but that speaks for itself.
Related Bus Stop Classic articles:
1965 DAF-Smit Appingedam – Both Public Transport Bus And Coach
1987 Bova Futura FHD 12.280 – A 21st Century Coach, Introduced In 1982
Interesting chassis. Am I right in thinking the engine is between the driver’s seat and entrance doors, somewhat like Guy’s ill-fated Wulfrunian?
It certainly appears that way.
That was pretty common for a while, before the universal transition to rear engines. I remember plenty of buses in Austria this way.
Lots of school buses still like this in the US, outside the West Coast at least.
Yes, front engine. Later on, DAF also started to offer mid-engine (underfloor) and rear-engine chassis.
So a full forward control chassis with all major drive train components ahead of the steer axle too kind of V Bedford which we had thousands of it seemed, I guess every manufacturer had a bus chassis like that at one point in time.
I agree it was common enough on models like the Bedford SB, but they were more commonly used for coach or contract work rather than for stage route services with the driver collecting fares. That was usually done with underfloor or, later, rear engined buses. Mind I was brought up in London Transport territory, nearly all double-deckers and even some single deckers had conductors.
The name trambus dates back to the pre-WW2 years, it was used by Dutch manufacturer Kromhout, for example. Directly after the war, Ford also used the name trambus. So did Büssing.
The engine doesn’t have to be ahead of the front axle.
What transit museum is that?
DAF Museum Eindhoven, the Netherlands. There are a several DAF-based buses on display too.
It’s actually mentioned in the post. Ooops. I only noticed it now.
Another excellent find and photos Johannes. The profile of this bus looks very modern for the era. It reminds me slightly of the Orion I bus introduced in the late 70s. The clean side view would have aged well into the early 80s. The two off putting elements being the short wheelbase (the rear wheels seem several feet too far forward), and the slightly narrow window panes. As panoramic windows, with openings at the top, became widely popular in the 70s on transit buses around the world. For example, I could see two (or three) wider window panes forward of the rear doors replacing the four now.
The rear view definitely appears influenced by the earlier GMC New Look bus.
Windshield looks like it come off an old Twin-Coach transit.
Great post Johannes – very attractive bus. I had the same comment as Bob – the six-pane front windshield is exactly the same as that used on 50’s/60’s Flxible/Twin Coach transit buses. Jim.
Was the six-pane windscreen designed to give the driver better visibility?
Plus, if I’m not mistaken, to prevent that the driver was hindered by reflections in the windshield due to the interior lighting of the bus.
For that very reason, many Dutch transit buses from the fifties and sixties had a convex windshield. Do a GIS for bolramer streekbus to see what I mean. That particular windshield shape was an invention of an engineer working for the Dutch Werkspoor company.
/Users/pmauerhan/Desktop/IMG_1563.jpeg
I would like to find out the manufacturer/model of the bus pictured.