11-metre air-conditioned Leyland Olympians

During 1988-1993 Kowloon Motor Bus introduced 150 Leyland Olympians with air conditioning. They include one prototype (AL1) and 149 production types (AL2-150).

After the failure of air-conditioned Victory-2 G544, Jubilant N364 and Metrobus S3M145, KMB decided to introduce another air-conditioned bus model in 1988. Because of this, an Leyland Olympian equipped with a Cummins LT10 engine and ZF4HP500 gearbox, and a Nippodenso air- conditioner was introduced in 1988. It entered service on Route 6 and the trial turned out to be a success. After this, another 149 air-conditioned buses of production type were introduced starting from late 1990. They are all fitted with Alexander body kits.

The first batch includes 20 buses, AL2 to 21 were introduced in winter 1990. They were fitted with fixed windows, which is quite different from the prototype AL1. Later more batches of buses were introduced with exactly the same specifications when comparing with the first batch. However the last batch, AL136 to 150, are built with a modified body design, which is very similar to the early air-conditioned Volvo Olympians (AV1-112).

Among these buses, AL27 was rebuilt with a new Alexander body (the AV2 to 111 type) and so did AL118 (AV112- type) with 2+2 seats. Both buses were seriously destroyed in fire accidents.

This page includes some photographs of KMB's air-conditioned Leyland Olympians in service. More photographs will be added in the future. Please click at the image for an enlarged version.

	AL26 Date: 18/01/2002
	AL27 After a fire incident the body of AL27 was rebuilt. From this side you can hardly find any difference between AL27 and AVs. Date: 28/07/2001
	AL64 When I created this page I missed out the existence of this photographs, but later in September when I was managing my files I found this photographs and immediately added it in the next update. Date: 28/07/2001
	AL108 Date: 19/01/2002
	AL144 AL144 is one of the buses from the last batch. The design of its front panel is very similar to Volvo Olympians but all handles in the compartment are not coloured in yellow. Date: 28/07/2001