A little about Bolton Transport 122

Bolton122 is a 1958 Leyland Titan PD3/5 with a highbridge 74 seat East Lancs body. New to Bolton Transport it survived to be absorbed into the SELNEC fleet in 1969 but was withdrawn from service in 1974. It has been restored once in private ownership but by the time I acquired it in 1999 it need some serious work doing to it if it wasn't to collapse in a pile of rust and rotten wood.

Having regularly travelled on 122 as a child I have some emotional connection to it and when I saw it crumbling away at the back of Wigan bus depot I knew I had to save it. To have survived so long and then be be abandoned didn't seem right. Little did I know precisely how much work was ahead...expensive work!

So far the work has entailed a new back platform, new upstairs floor and fixings holding the top deck to the bottom deck, repairs to step riser and bulkheads, major body-frame repairs to both sides including new internal panelling, new mudguard under cab, repairs to N/S front mudguard, new window rubbers, re-wire  to both decks, re-fitting and painting of the lower-deck ceiling and an almost complete re-build and re-wire of the cab structure and fittings. The chassis and various air and fuel tanks have also been steam cleaned, de-rusted and re-painted.

Currently work is ongoing on most of the woodwork to attach the lower deck panels and a good mechanical check-over. That's before I start on the seats!

All the seat cushions will need the moquette removing and the foam replacing at least but I don't have a full set yet!

So there's still plenty to keep me occupied as long as the £'s keep trickling in.