[Ashley2]

Originally Posted by sourabhzen

Thank you Tushar for an informative photo report.

Somehow I feel the bus industry is progressing at a slower pace as compared to Car industry in terms of quality and technology. Most of the products are neither exciting nor attractive except MAN and Ethanol fuel based Scania city bus. I mean, look at the door handle on ACGL Pleazur and switches on most of the buses, the same were used in the buses 3 decades ago!

Originally Posted by Tushar

I think the main issue is the cost factor. The vast majority that uses buses in India wants cheap tickets and fleet owners want to get their return on investment as quickly as possible (look at the state of many state transport buses). So manufacturers make products that are largely utility focused because that's where the demand lies. The main difference between the passenger vehicle sector and bus sector is that in the case of the latter - the buyer is not the user.

If you look at bus, they may look primitive . But otherwise in chassis especially in the new range buses that will be supplied in JNnurm2, they are far more advanced than your everyday cars interms of technology.
Multiplex (Master - Master) to advanced electrical architecture, MID to Telematics all are superior technologies and far ahead interms of safety and technology. Infact ITS will have data transferred to the depot directly via Wifi when bus enters Depot. Data's include daily ticketing log, maintenance log etc. Almost all AC buses, have climate control AC's as against normal ones found in cars but for higher end versions.
Other than this the retarders, Driver height adjustment, Cruise controls, and most importantly AMT (leave away AT's) are available in buses for a considerable period of time before in everyday cars.

There are more subtle betterment in Chassis aggregates as well, like Air filter replacement indicator, PTO driven hydrostatic fan drive cooling system (instead of directly mounted fans in cars) which is far superior in terms of fuel savings and many more.

Also in body they are using Aluminium panels as aganist the steel panels in cars. Al completely eliminates corrosion and is light in weight.

Infact I used to think in many of cars except for the fit and finish technically they are way behind (especially in terms of engine). In case of Common rail engines in CV's some of the newer ones, there are pilot injection which drastically improves the engine noise in high rpms. Not sure this is available in all Passenger Car engines.

So outer looks are always different from what they are inner.

[moralfibre]

Seems like the government of Goa is one of the first few customers of the amphibian bus built by ACGL:

[SmartCat]

Originally Posted by moralfibre

Seems like the government of Goa is one of the first few customers of the amphibian bus built by ACGL:

Hmm. Isn't this a road hazard?

"Truck stabbed by an amphibian bus near Panjim" could be a headline we might see in newspapers soon.