1279 at Freckleton © G.Meek 

Notes:

These vehicles replaced the original 1950 Leyland PD2/East Lancs "White Lady" double deck coaches (including 1248 DCK219 which was the first vehicle to be bought by the RVPG in October 1972 and now operated by Quantock Motor Services ).

These coaches only had 59 seats to allow for an extensive luggage area at the rear. They were used on express routes within Ribble Territory like the X60 Manchester - Blackpool or X43 Manchester - Skipton or X40 Manchester - Keswick.  

Like the rest of Ribble coaches they were in the reverse livery of cream and red and initially when painted into NBC colours they were painted all over Poppy Red but with a grey band above the bottom deck windows to signify the coach seats.

1279 appears to have spent its entire life at Blackpool Talbot Road Depot and was withdrawn in October 1977 and sold to Paul Sykes (dealer), Barnsley. During its time with Ribble it had clocked up 990,000 miles, good going for a vehicle that was often critiscised for being less reliable than the front engined Titan. Less than a month later it was sold to Gagg of Bunny and became his first vehicle. Mr Gagg operated it for almost 20 years and used to attend bus rallies with it. The bus then joined the preserved vehicles at the Nottingham Heritage Centre at Ruddington. it was acquired by the Trust in the summer of 2000 and after an initial attempt to drive it to Freckleton when first the fan belt failed and then the drivers windscreen shattered , it was eventually towed back in October 2000.

Since then it has had extensive work done to the exterior as well as its mechanical components making its debut at our running day based on the old Chorley Bus Station on Sep 23rd 2001. At the moment it is awaiting a new engine as the current one overheats a lot. In 2008 the seats were removed and are being re-moquetted in the correct moquette which has already been purchased.