The LONDON TRANSPORT Leyland CRThis page created 3rd April 2000, updated 2nd August 2023 using Notepad, by Ian Smith.
Introduction
The Rear engined Cubs were born out of their time.
The concept was much the same as for the Dennis Dart that followed fifty years later:
small compact bus, rear-engined with one person operation capability.
They were in a strong line of bus development being pursued by the single deck bus designers of London Transport.
There had been the revolutionary AEC Q's, earlier in the thirties,
with offside counter-rotating engine.
There had been the elegant TF coaches,
Leyland Tigers with engines flat under the floor.
So when LT came up with a requirement for more small buses to replace the remaining Dennis Darts (DA class) and small Bedfords (BD), the designers produced the Cub Rear rather than ordering more C class Leyland Cubs. The prototype, CR1CR1 was built in 1937, the chassis being delivered to Chiswick in October 1937 and the Chiswick-built body fitted right at the end of December. It was licensed at the beginning of January 1938, and shown off to officials and press in Westminster.
The 20 seater body had an outside-sliding main door, an offside emergency door, and no separate driver's door.
It was finished in a livery of three shades of green. (I can find no clear picture of the nearside, so originally thought that the door was internal.)
Although the press photos showed it with Watford (WT) running plates and 355 route displays,
the new bus was allocated to St Albans (SA). It ran there for a while,
then moved in March 1939 to Windsor where it operated alongside odd Cub C76.
The new bus was not without its teething troubles: it ran quietly, except for raucous gear changes.
Production buses: CR2-49An order for 48 production CRs followed even before CR1 entered service. There had been an intention to order 74, but there were only 41 DAs and 12 BDs to replace. Only 134 small buses were needed in total, and there were 76 normal-control Cubs, so the order had been cut to 59. Further reductions in requirement, with larger saloons taking over small-bus work reduced the number to 48 eventually ordered and built.
The production buses were not identical to CR1. They had a larger 4.7litre engine,
and the bodywork was redesigned to give a level window-line,
with the main door moved forward to improve access to the driver for single person operation.
The fairing behind the front nearside wheel was continued on the sliding door.
Seating and interior trim was the standard familiar for many years after the war to users of RTs, RFs and GSs.
They went into service from September 1939 at a variety of garages:
War-time doldrumsNot all were used: the demands on labour meant that twenty-seater buses were deemed over-indulgent, the cutback in private transport produced demands for bigger buses, and war manufacturing meant greater work-forces. So CR36 and CR38-46 went straight from delivery into storage, and others rotated between use and storage for a while, some going to Kingston, Uxbridge and Hounslow as extras, to be used if needed.Non-passenger uses were found for some of them. CR6 (from Kingston), CR38 and CR41 were allocated for use by the Paymaster, and were housed at Mortlake. CR6 then had its seats removed and became a lorry for the Chiswick Stores Department. Similarly bereft of seats, CR42 was used as a lorry by London Aircraft Production at Chiswick. CR36,40 and 45 were also used by Chiswick Works during 1940 and 1941. Those allocated to garages when new were mostly superceded by larger types. The Enfield pair were replaced by T-type Regals in September 1940. The Windsor buses had all been replaced by May 1941. Uxbridge replaced its CR allocations with T-types and more reliable Cubs in spring 1942. Hounslow's 237, which had a mixture of Cs and CR37 and 49, lost these two in July 1942. 33 CRs were gathered together into store at Forest Road in Walthamstow, the old AEC works. Presumably no-one much worried that they would be extingushed there by bombing of the East End. But that fate had befallen CR18, bombed to oblivion at Bull Yard in Peckham in September 1940. There they stayed.
1948 produced a niche for them to occupy. In July and August London hosted the Olympic Games,
and these small buses were useful to transfer teams and officials to and from Wembley and other venues.
Twenty-four CRs were pulled from their peak-busting activities and allocated to Cricklewood, Hounslow, Putney and Putney Bridge for the duration,
in most cases returning whence they came after the event. A steady stream of them passed through Chiswick Works for overhaul, some changing colour in the process.
A pair at Hornchurch were put back to regular use on the 238 and 252.
The Central Area buses were once more placed into store en masse in May and June 1949, when the flood of new RTs eased the Central Area situation.
Twenty-seaters were no longer required as peak-hour extras. The little buses went into store at Slough and Reigate.
Two years passed before the next flurry of Country Area activity. Many of the ordinary Cubs had been sold, and the new GS class had not yet appeared, but Country Area demnd was growing.
In September 1951 red CR4 and red CR43 were allocated to Epping for routes 381 and 393. They were joined the following month by CR10.
Meanwhile CR13 and CR14 went to East Grinstead for another spell on the 494. When CR10 left Epping in June 1942 it went to Tring for the short 387, soon joined by CR17.
But a further surprise came in May 1953 when CR43, which had been reinstated back in September 1951 for use at Epping on the 381 in Central Area livery, was repainted into Country Area green/white and sent to Leatherhead for the 481 "swinger" (Epsom Station to Wells Estate). There it was joined by long-term green companion CR13 from East Grinstead, where it had been the 494 steed for some years.
Then in July 1953 CR4, which had previously been reinstated for the 393 at Epping, was taken back out of store at Reigate and sent to join CR17 at Tring for the 387 (Tring LT Garage- Aldbury).
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The driving position was right forward, with a half-cab, with a sliding door behind the front wheels.
The 4.4 litre engine was mounted longitudinally on the centre of the rear overhang,
and drove forward to a gearbox, then down backwards through the final drive unit to the de Dion rear axle.
Like the other CRs, it was withdrawn during the war and placed in store,
re-emerging in 1946 to play a role as a Central Area spare, based at Streatham (AK),
where it continued to wear its green and white whilst working on rush-hour extras with conductors on routes such as the 133.
It was scrapped by LT in 1949.
The Central area buses were delivered in red, with white window surrounds, black mudguards and a black roof.
The latter was repainted matt grey before entry into service because of the air raid precautions coming into force.
The first, CR2 emerged just after the declaration of war, on 8th September 1939.
White trims and masked lamps emphasised the war treatment. The grey roofs were soon deemed to be too light,
and were replaced by a covering of red oxide or brown. Traces of the original black roof could be seen around the rear window and the display boxes.
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