This page created 1997, updated 8th June 2002
The first toy I can ever remember receiving was a Dinky toy STL,
that Dad gave me one Saturday morning when I was about 3 or 4,
i.e. in about 1951-2. It made an impression.
I still have it, sitting on my study shelf.
I expect many children's interest in buses was stirred by these fairly crude,
but still recognisable models, in their red and cream, or green and cream colours.
They were built by Chiswick from October 1936 to July 1937. For those good at arithmetic, who have spotted that the number range is 400 numbers while there were 360 roofbox STLs, there is good news: the laws of arithmetic have not changed. The missing forty were the Tunnel STLs, with specially profiled STL13 bodies for use through the Blackwall Tunnel. These have their own page.
The roofbox STLs started into service in October 1936, the start of a substantial tide that swept away the last of the NS class and scattered the smaller STs to the corners of the LT system. There were hiccups, of course: the 56-seater STLs replaced 56 seater LTs on route 41, only to be turfed off a month later, probably due to their higher axle-load over a bridge on the route. Other non-standard types around the system went too, eg the Dennis Lances at the end of 1937. The Leyland Titan TD class also started to go in 1938.
The 1937 replacement programme was so enormous that Chiswick could not legally
build all the bodies required.
So an order was placed with Park Royal Vehicles for
this batch of 175 bodies, and 100 complete buses were ordered from Leyland
(the pre-war STDs).
The STL15s were built using Park Royal's patented metal-framed system,
and looked very similar to the Chiswick-built buses.
Unfortunately these bodies with metal frames did not last long,
due to an unforseen interaction between the metal frames and the glues being used.
They became saggers very quickly, and thus early candidates for re-bodying.
So when the need arose for more lowbridge buses during the war, these figured among
the bodies that were junked to provide chassis for the 20
Wartime low-bridge STL bodies.
Three were the subjects of body experiments: two were converted for Pay as You Board Experiments, and one received the very last STL body built, the prefabricated parts Sainsbury Body.
Most of the others were repainted into one or both of the post-war liveries of red with cream relief, either round the upper windows plus a band round the middle, or the later version with just the cream band. Appreciable numbers went to the Country Area after the war, where rapid growth in traffic required unprecedented numbers of double-deckers on routes that had been rural and were now outer suburban.
Some succumbed to the SRT fiasco, but others survived until 1953-4 before being taken over by the ubiquitous RT.
One survivor, STL2377, has been throughly restored, with renewed framing and panelling:
These were the final main development of the STL design, before attention
switched away to the
RT.
They were distinguished by a new deeper radiator,
without a protruding starter dog, due to the flexible mounting of the 7.7
litre diesel engine. After the war these buses might have been expected to have a long life. But someone had a stroke of genius that just went wrong, resulting in a premature end for these fine buses. The idea was to use the STL16 bodies to replace the decrepit Park Royal bodies on older chassis, while the young 15STL chassis would have the benefit of new technology with RT bodies! The chassis were dismantled, shortened, straightened, plugged and redrilled to take the new bodies. Unfortunately the engines proved underpowered for the heavier body (only 7.7 litre, rather than 9.6!), and, perhaps worse, the brakes were inadequate to cope with the extra half-ton! As a result, these SRTs were soon rebuilt with RT chassis, and the relatively young but bodiless 15STL chassis found no buyers. Those that stayed as STLs lasted until 1953-4.
the roofbox bus histories
photographic references
Bus Stop
contents
ex-Daimler
Roofbox
Tunnel STLs.