London Transport Loughton Garage Leyland Nationals 1986 

What a great sound they were ! loved em

WOW. That takes me back in time, like to the late 1970's. I used to work at the Esso petrol station, before it was rebuilt. It used to be a Citroen dealership, showroom and workshops named Stagar Garages. Stagar being an acronym of Stadium Garage, our parent garage, based very close to the Walthamstow Stadium. Between our workshops and the bus garage was the Plume of Feathers pub, which we used to visit occasionally. And it's still there, unlike the bus garage. We used to go to the Cafe directly opposite us, and and get what was the best breakfast ever, for very little money. Those where the days.

Great to see a bit of old Loughton.

I love the sound of old heavy diesels, they were real engines, such a shame that we lost our bus and truck industries, oh the memories 😁

I drove these for about 16yrs. The best three words in the english language are ,"take the leyland". I still miss them now

This is a such cool video for so many reason. I am a great fan of Leyland Nationals but it is also so nice to see all the great cars that I miss to. Many thanks for this vide.

Oh what memories, I drove Nationals from 74 to 90 when they shut Dorking garage,What a beautiful evocative sound,some would say noise!! At first we used them for the Greenlines, I drove the712,713 and 714, to Luton, Dunstable and St Albans strait though the middle of London. The steering was so light, you could fling them about but we had a lot of problems in wet with the early ones, as the front would lock up as easy as anything and you were just a passenger, they cured with the second series. The heating/ventilation system was a joke as it drew stale up into the pod at the back and blew it down vents on either side of the ceiling and as hot air rises, in cold weather the heat never got below your waist,the other daft thing was as you could smoke in the back section and if some one lit up under the inducting fan you instantly could smell it throughout the bus,it didn't smell like cigarettes it was kind of sweet,One day when I was returning to Dorking on the 714 and approaching South Mims I smelt a funny smell, when I stopped a lady walked down from the back to a bag in the luggage area on top the n/s front wheel and got a pot of talcum powder,SHE HAD BEEN CHANGING A BABIES NAPPY, Ofcource the with the talc the bus was instantly sweat smelling again.

Love this video! Although I haven't driven the LT LS's, I've driven loads of various shades of green SNB's as a driver at St Albans garage from 1989. The sounds bring back so many memories. I'd love to drive one again but alas for me at the moment it's endless TE's and TEH's at Metroline's Edgware garage. Maybe time to invest in shares in one. Now there's a thought!

Simply superb

Wonderfully evocative for me, watching and riding on Ribble then North Western Nationals when I was a kid. They weren't half noisy.

Sheer Heaven!!! Boy they were starting to look worst for wear already by then. Intensive London conditions for you. This was filmed at the same time my area here in Sydney was losing their 10.9m examples to the tropics of Queensland. I'm making a model of the very last one I saw in 1986 with Deanes Coaches, a small private operator who purchased 8 unsold 1976 Australian assembled 10.9m units in 1978/79. I also have 8 LS EFE models in my collection 5 regular LSs, one Red Arrow National II LS and two 1973 trial batch ones with the white roof. Thus is the sort of footage I have been waiting half my life for. Visited London briefly in 1999 and only got to ride a Red Arrow Greenway with ZF transmission. Hated them at the time, but now nostalgic for them.

Cracking footage, Soi. I seem to spend half my life in Loughton these days - you can't move for Range Rovers. I remember it from RT/RF times though. Thanks for reminding me where the garage was- you'd never know now.

I used to drive them, Great solid, Sturdy fricckin tank of a bus let down by the woeful, Gutless, Smoky, Whiney Leyland 510 dog of an engine! Stick a DAF or Volvo lump in them and they were golden and went like stink and sounded great! I should know, Drove for Red bus in North devon! Had 510's, DAF and Volvo converted one's, Nationals look so cool and retro with there big external rivets and rear roof pods 👌

Great stuff. Thank you.

Wow this brings me back -- I worked in Debden at RANK - use to get the 250 from the Abbey to Loughton Garage then walk or get the tube from Loughton Station. In 87 we had the hurricane I still made it in from the Abbey -- No buses, no trains - biked to work - got a day off and one in extra day for turning up. Days gone..~trooper

Gotta love the Sound the Nationals Made! I've Driven a "Regular National "& the Refurbished ones at Hounslow..nice , but,they lost that great National Growl! Thanks for uploading!👍🏻

I used to work in that Texas store - brings back unhappy memories!

Amazing video i was 7 years old when u filmed this & i used 2 go on the Leyland National all the time where I live in the North East The Leyland National is my favourite Bus EVER & the Leyland National makes the greatest sound EVER & i have 40 model buses 9 of them r Leyland Nationals

I work the LS on S2 276 108 in London

Yep, I remember these too. In fact I may have travelled on some of these very buses back in the day as some of these must have come from Romford North Street before they headed to Loughton - NS used to run them on route 250 (the original version that linked Romford Station and the market with Epping and surrounding areas, originally with RFs and later with small Bristols before Nationals were brought in) and the 247B before both were killed off by a funding removal by ECC. Often used to pick them up at the Collier Row roundabout in front of Tescos travelling home from late lessons for my Comp Sci A level.

cant see any of these buses back soon as anything with an engine seems frowned upon in london lol

Brings bad memories ❤

Leyland National symphony orchestra👍👍👍👍👍👍 Absolutely loved these. The London ones were fully automatic and I grew up on automatic Nationals in Cardiff. So I always went bashing these on my London trips. I miss them enormously now. CMT Buses in Liverpool had loads of Nationals including some of my beloved Cardiff Bus ones. Do you have any vids of CMT or old 80s footage of Cardiff Buses? Another top video here very deserving of my thumbs up 👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍

One of my favorite streets, sawaadee kap.

Great video great buses

More observations from this video: nice TR7 convertible there6:09, Audi Quattro parked awkwardly on the corner8:34, Austin Ambassador8:40, they're less common than a Lamborghini Miura these days, and an early, but it seems prized, Lada there8:57😀 And the VW Golf following the bus at9:05, not particularly uncommon in itself but the numberplate SSS 111 must be worth, even then, considerably more than the car 🤔

Used to travel on these as a teenager. Then had a job reconditioning the fuel injection pumps for Kingswinford fuel injection ltd. Great to travel on these buses and also knowing I had a small part to play in keeping them running.

Ex Harrow Weald THX ones again, plus the AYR ones were ex Harrow Weald too! Superb buses.

Hi, love this video, brings back so many memories as I grew up in loughton at this time. Is there any way I could get a copy on DVD? Many thanks

Always loved the sound of the LT Nationals. We had 14 ex LT ones in Portsmouth at one point. Was this filmed in the fall of 1986 or the beginning?

I see working with Nationals all day didn't put all the staff off British Leyland products; there's a Maxi, a Triumph, a Princess outside the garage...

2:52 How rude

much prefer our e200mmc that we have now