Volvo B10L

The Volvo B10L is a rear-engined, low-floor single-deck city bus chassis built by Volvo between c. 1993 and c. 2005. An articulated version of the B10L, known as the B10LA, was also produced.

It was available in the United Kingdom and Ireland between 1994 and 1999, with a choice of two types of bodywork, the Alexander (Belfast) Ultra and the Wright Liberator. The Alexander Ultra body was based on the Swedish design produced by Säffle (a subsidiary of Volvo), who built the body on the first B10L imported to Britain. The Wright bodywork proved slightly more popular.

In the UK, the articulated B10LA was bodied exclusively by Wrights for First subsidiaries in Manchester (15), Leeds (15) and Glasgow (10). The Wright body for the B10LA is named Fusion.

The B10L enjoyed limited success in Britain. In 1997 the Volvo B10BLE was introduced to the British market, and this chassis rapidly became more popular. The B10BLE was cheaper than the B10L, and shared more in common with the step-entrance B10B, examples of which were already owned by many of its customers.

Customers

United Kingdom

*The largest fleet of Volvo B10L buses in the UK was purchased by Travel West Midlands (now National Express West Midlands), consisting of 80 conventional diesel-powered chassis with Wright Liberator bodywork, and 14 CNG-powered buses with the Alexander Ultra body. The Alexander Ultra models are now converted to run on conventional diesel, with 7 having been transferred to the Training Fleet.

*The second largest fleet was purchased by Translink, whose Citybus (later Metro) and Ulsterbus divisions acquired sixty new, plus a further two ex-demonstrators. All have the Alexander Ultra body. The fleet has seen a small number of withdrawals but is largely intact as of January 2007, operating services in the Belfast and Derry areas.

*Travel Dundee, formerly Tayside Public Transport, now known as National Express Dundee, received 30 Wright-bodied examples which started to arrive in February 1997.

Other UK operators who purchased B10Ls include:

*CMT Buses of Aintree, Liverpool (later part of Stagecoach Merseyside) - 10 Wrights
*First Greater Manchester North (Superbus branded routes, Wigan) - 5 Wrights
*First Glasgow - 10 Wrights
*First Northampton - 9 Ultras (of which 6 CNG-fuelled)
*Timeline, Wigan - 6 Ultras

The pioneer Säffle-bodied B10L was new to Mainline (now First South Yorkshire) but they did not decide to order any more and quickly disposed of it. As of November 2006 it was being used around Lincoln by Stagecoach subsidiary RoadCar. Ironically, the 15 Wright-bodied examples in the FirstGroup are all due to be transferred to First South Yorkshire (formerly Mainline).

Ireland

Eleven Wright-bodied B10Ls are operated by Bus Éireann around Cork, and sister CIÉ company Dublin Bus purchased five Alexander-bodied B10Ls for use in Dublin. A sixth, experimental LPG-powered, vehicle was leased and later returned.