School Bus Fleet Magazine Forums
Home | Profile | Register | Active Topics | Members | Search | FAQ
 All Forums
 Professional Garage
 Enter Forum: Professional Garage
 Part 1 Poor bus build Quality
 New Topic  Reply to Topic
 Printer Friendly
Author Previous Topic Topic Next Topic  

Pablosi
New Member

9 Posts

Posted - 10/15/2019 :  07:00:25 AM  Show Profile  Visit Pablosi's Homepage  Reply with Quote
Is it just me or are buses not built well or designed well these days. They put $1000.00 and up computers on them to run the electrical systems and use butt connectors to fasten the wires along the way to the computer. I cannot believe this is happening this day and age. They mount body controllers on the outside of the vehicle in all the elements. These manufactures know the door on the access panel does not seal and there is plenty of room inside the vehicle. In my state LED lights are standard and again they use butt connectors to tie them in to the vehicle harness "WOW". The lights on a bus are for the children's safety not a tail light on a John Deer. The people installing the butt connectors at the plant don't even know how to crimp the wires or even strip the wire for that matter. I have many more complaints to come I am sure, but to sum it up. Why have all the technology in the world on the bus and use primitive ways of securing them. This only causes bigger harder to find problems, time and money wasted.

muddywater
Senior Member

USA
50 Posts

Posted - 10/15/2019 :  08:10:40 AM  Show Profile  Send muddywater a Yahoo! Message  Reply with Quote
Busses are made to fail, simple as that. If they were built with integrity, the stealerships wouldn't be able to generate the revenue that there service and parts department are now generating. I believe, just like the auto industry tried to do back in the 80's and 90's, the bus manufacturers are intentionally building a poorer quality product that will be repaired and replaced more often, so they can sell more busses, parts, and labor. My hypothesis is, that if a bus manufacturer would follow the example of Toyota, or Honda in the 90's, build a better quality bus, and capture a bigger market share, the over-all quality of all busses would increase over time.
Go to Top of Page

bwest
Administrator

United States
3820 Posts

Posted - 10/16/2019 :  09:13:49 AM  Show Profile  Reply with Quote
I've been in this business for over 26 years. The number one in quality when I started was Blue Bird. They would build things to last. It wasn't unusual to see a body outlast the chassis. In fact, before my time I was told that our school would actually buy new chassis to put under old Bird bodies. So, what happened? In my opinion, state reimbursement rules happened. In my state, if the bus is beyond 5 years old you are not receiving any reimbursement for the bus (we do still get reimbursement for parts, fuel, labor). So, lots of districts in our state started trading buses every 5 years. The resale value is about 20 to 25 percent of the purchase price. So, you trade in and pay 75 percent of the new price and then you are reimbursed 80 percent of that. Manufacturers caught on and, therefore, make things last 6 or 7 years. Further, Thomas and IC were really the first to make a junk bus. They took market share from Bird. Bird sase the trend and followed suit. These, of course, are just my opinions but they are based upon years of observations.

Bryan
Go to Top of Page

RonF
Top Member

867 Posts

Posted - 10/16/2019 :  09:31:41 AM  Show Profile  Reply with Quote
quote:
Originally posted by bwest

I've been in this business for over 26 years. The number one in quality when I started was Blue Bird. They would build things to last. It wasn't unusual to see a body outlast the chassis. In fact, before my time I was told that our school would actually buy new chassis to put under old Bird bodies. So, what happened? In my opinion, state reimbursement rules happened. In my state, if the bus is beyond 5 years old you are not receiving any reimbursement for the bus (we do still get reimbursement for parts, fuel, labor). So, lots of districts in our state started trading buses every 5 years. The resale value is about 20 to 25 percent of the purchase price. So, you trade in and pay 75 percent of the new price and then you are reimbursed 80 percent of that. Manufacturers caught on and, therefore, make things last 6 or 7 years. Further, Thomas and IC were really the first to make a junk bus. They took market share from Bird. Bird sase the trend and followed suit. These, of course, are just my opinions but they are based upon years of observations.



Further, Thomas and IC were really the first to make a junk bus. They took market share from Bird. Bird sase the trend and followed suit. These, of course, are just my opinions but they are based upon years of observations.

I will agree with the 100%

US Army retired CMBT
Go to Top of Page

valleybusman
Top Member

USA
799 Posts

Posted - 10/16/2019 :  09:35:21 AM  Show Profile  Send valleybusman an AOL message  Reply with Quote
I too have been at this for 40 years now . In my day Carpenter was the best bus body . I had a whole fleet and hardly ever touched the body . I think it's all about price to turn out the cheapest product . That is what districts and supervisors look at is price . I have a lot of IC's and 2 Thomas's I see the same issues but again it's what ever is cheapest . I have to ask the question how many times is the mechanic included in on what is the best bus ? My bosses always went for cost . I have had a few times where the supt. would ask me to check into what is the best bus and give my recomendations .
Go to Top of Page

RonF
Top Member

867 Posts

Posted - 10/16/2019 :  11:36:50 AM  Show Profile  Reply with Quote
quote:
Originally posted by valleybusman

I too have been at this for 40 years now . In my day Carpenter was the best bus body . I had a whole fleet and hardly ever touched the body . I think it's all about price to turn out the cheapest product . That is what districts and supervisors look at is price . I have a lot of IC's and 2 Thomas's I see the same issues but again it's what ever is cheapest . I have to ask the question how many times is the mechanic included in on what is the best bus ? My bosses always went for cost . I have had a few times where the supt. would ask me to check into what is the best bus and give my recomendations .




I am thankful now that our board to include the elected ones asked and listened to me.

US Army retired CMBT
Go to Top of Page

Sherm
Top Member

USA
621 Posts

Posted - 10/17/2019 :  05:07:17 AM  Show Profile  Reply with Quote
Bus manufacturers are no longer privately-owned companies; they are publicly-owned corporations. Therefore, the number one goal is profit and executives are enslaved to Wall Street. Every year they have to improve their margins and every year that gets harder and harder to do without drastic changes. Once a corporation hits the end of the line, they go out of business or get bought out. I learned this working at Ryder years ago.

That's how we ended up with IC, Thomas and Blue Bird. And one diesel engine for all three. That's why they all use crappy light lenses that fade out after 3 years. That's why they all have seats that literally fall apart; that's why build quality is marginal at best. They are trying to survive anyway they can so they can continue to generate a profit. At a lower level in the organization, you will find folks who really care about the customer but they are stuck between a rock and a hard place.

Someday, there will be two bus manufacturers and eventually, one. The same thing is happening with mobile phones, retailers, cable companies, health care companies and everything else.
Go to Top of Page

bwest
Administrator

United States
3820 Posts

Posted - 10/17/2019 :  06:51:48 AM  Show Profile  Reply with Quote
quote:
Originally posted by Sherm

Bus manufacturers are no longer privately-owned companies; they are publicly-owned corporations. Therefore, the number one goal is profit and executives are enslaved to Wall Street. Every year they have to improve their margins and every year that gets harder and harder to do without drastic changes. Once a corporation hits the end of the line, they go out of business or get bought out. I learned this working at Ryder years ago.

That's how we ended up with IC, Thomas and Blue Bird. And one diesel engine for all three. That's why they all use crappy light lenses that fade out after 3 years. That's why they all have seats that literally fall apart; that's why build quality is marginal at best. They are trying to survive anyway they can so they can continue to generate a profit. At a lower level in the organization, you will find folks who really care about the customer but they are stuck between a rock and a hard place.

Someday, there will be two bus manufacturers and eventually, one. The same thing is happening with mobile phones, retailers, cable companies, health care companies and everything else.



I agree with all except your last statement. There will never be one (well, unless Bernie or Warren gets their way). There will always be someone out there who thinks they can do better. If "the powers that be" listened to most mechanics, we would be buying good quality buses and keeping them 15 or 20 years. But, most buses are purchased in a bid process. In Illinois you have to have a dam good reason to not go with the low bid. We once bid buses and IC was 150 bucks per unit less than BB. I begged for them to reject the IC and go with the Birds. I told them we would have issues with the engines because of the massive EGR. They said "what do you know that a well educated engineer doesn't" They followed up by saying "the answer is nothing". I said I have practical experience. We got them and they were fine until they weren't. We ended up trading them at 8 years old. We spend over 13k in a 12 month period on one. The sister bus was exhibiting the same symptoms. So we parked them both and got new ones.

Bryan
Go to Top of Page

Sherm
Top Member

USA
621 Posts

Posted - 10/17/2019 :  11:49:20 AM  Show Profile  Reply with Quote
I hope I'm wrong about that statement but the way things are going, I just don't know.
Go to Top of Page

RonF
Top Member

867 Posts

Posted - 10/17/2019 :  1:22:49 PM  Show Profile  Reply with Quote

[/quote]

I agree with all except your last statement. There will never be one (well, unless Bernie or Warren gets their way). There will always be someone out there who thinks they can do better. If "the powers that be" listened to most mechanics, we would be buying good quality buses and keeping them 15 or 20 years. But, most buses are purchased in a bid process. In Illinois you have to have a dam good reason to not go with the low bid. We once bid buses and IC was 150 bucks per unit less than BB. I begged for them to reject the IC and go with the Birds. I told them we would have issues with the engines because of the massive EGR. They said "what do you know that a well educated engineer doesn't" They followed up by saying "the answer is nothing". I said I have practical experience. We got them and they were fine until they weren't. We ended up trading them at 8 years old. We spend over 13k in a 12 month period on one. The sister bus was exhibiting the same symptoms. So we parked them both and got new ones.
[/quote]

The problem with the whole bid process is that a lot of board members think you HAVE to go with the lowest bid. You don't. After all it's your money. I was able to get our board to switch to Blue bird from IC even though IC was $3000 cheaper because I presented to them the problems with IC and the cost of per mile and cost of ownership. Not just the check being written today of IC and Blue bird of the same model years using data I had and data from surrounding counties.
I've done this with every major purchase and changes. I have found when you can talk dollars and cents, they listen.

US Army retired CMBT
Go to Top of Page

Pablosi
New Member

9 Posts

Posted - 10/21/2019 :  07:58:59 AM  Show Profile  Visit Pablosi's Homepage  Reply with Quote
I have been in this business for over 22 years from the lowest level on the fleet side to the highest. These companies are stealing from the tax payer with their poor build quality and make the schools like it. From what I see on the bodies and electrical systems from 2015-2020 IC and Thomas are our least troublesome, now bluebird has issues like crazy. The funny thing is that the higher ups only see that 2 things
1) the purchase cost is cheaper
2) That it is under warranty so its covered .
The things they don't see are
A) The aggravated drivers that are having issues, and they want to know why they can't keep drivers and have more accidents.
B)The road call that takes mechanics out of the shop
C) Aggravated mechanics
D) Over worked transportation fleet staff trying to get the vehicle scheduled and covered under warranty. Most dealers only have at the most 4 rd techs to cover the entire state so extended down time of the unit is a factor.
E)The arguments with dealers if it is covered or not, along with bogus bills.
F) If it is this bad new, what do they think it will be like when the warranty runs out.

Basis of this story is PAY NOW or PAY A LOT MORE LATER
Go to Top of Page
  Previous Topic Topic Next Topic  
 New Topic  Reply to Topic
 Printer Friendly
Jump To:
 


School Bus Fleet Magazine Forums © 2022 School Bus Fleet Magazine Go To Top Of Page
This page was generated in 0.11 seconds. Snitz Forums 2000