1973 "Eagle 05 Front end protection for bus driver: Post #1

[Gary LaBombard]

Hello Everyone,
I do not like thinking I am the "Gloom & Doom" bus converter as I have spent so much time on my bus converting it and have found so many problems I know exist on other Eagles similar to mine.  Again I do not wish to insinuate all busses are rotted to death like mine was, All busses are not.  BUT, if yours start to show bad rust in areas that are of concern for you I can tell you that your EAGLE can be fixed no matter how bad it was or is. 

I am just giving you a teaser here as I promised Gary Hatt of BCM magazine I would send an article for him to publish in his magazine, I just have not had the time to accomplish this promise as yet.  I have been quite sick since March 5th, I still am in a bad pain situation in my ankle after getting another Sciatic Bone Spur removed that nearly crippled me.  But I still have a situation and will for weeks but I can at least sit in front of my computer for about 1-2 hrs and then have to go to bed to rest up my leg!!  I am really depressed because of this but maybe passing on information I believe some of you can appreciate to consider doing to your bus and and this will make me feel better knowing I helped at least one bus nut with a similar problem I had.

I tried finding the article in this format I read just a short time ago about a guy taking the front skins off his bus and found out he barely had any support there at all.  Well I thought about this over and over and just know some of you get pissed at me for exposing my problems I have had that perhaps you have them also but you are throwing the dice and gambling on not having any front end crashes with your bus!!!! 

I am enclosing photos of a busnut in Florida that ran into a tractor trailer I believe at 60 miles per hour and lost both his legs.  I was fortunate enough to need a new radiator and he had one for sale off this bus he lost his legs in.  I went to florida and picked up the radiator and saw his bus and wanted to share a few eye opening photos for you to ask, "How safe is my bus for a front end collision"??

Now I wish to add more information to this post and will need to post a couple of other post to have you see all my information."PLEASE DO NOT MAKE COMMENTS UNTIL ALL MY INFORMATION IS SUBMITTED BY ME", I will let you know when I am done as there is little room allowed to send all the photos I wish to send you.  The first photos are of the bus that was involved in that accident I told you about and then I will submit photos of my bus after I removed my front end skins.  I removed mine as I seen the problem of the bus from my friend that lost his legs and I sure wanted to be sure my bus would be made as safe in the front end as possible to protect the drive, way more than the original manufacture design.  You will see.  Here is fist photos

[Gary Hatt - Publisher BCM]

Thanks for sharing this valuable information Gary.

Gary

[Gary LaBombard]

Here is photos of my bus after removing the skins of the front end of my bus, there is no PROTECTION for me the driver and I know this was the same problem of the bus where my friend lost his legs.  Well you will see in later post a little of what I did to hopefully give myself a little self comfort that I did the best to protect myself.  Now I know there will be naysayers that will calculate the speed of an accident that you can absorb etc. stull like that, but each of us has a decision what to do with our buses that are getting older, and older and older.  Here are my photos of my skins removed:  

[Gary LaBombard]

Here is  photos of my attempt to make more protection for me as the driver in case of a head on collision.   

[Gary LaBombard]

Here is some painted photos of my driver protection cage.  again, I do not want to have anyone upset with me on these publications of mine, I am only looking for your safety, I have worked on my bus 16 years now trying to make my bus as safe as I think I could.  I hope I did not miss anything.  I plan to have my bus inspected by state inspector which is not required here in SC but I want to do it for my own self to feel I did everything possible to be safe. Here are a few photos of painted with rustbullet.

I am in such pain I have to quit now but this is the idea of the information I will be sending Gary Hatt very soon, I am sure he will put notice here or on the front page of the issue it will all be published in.

[Van]

Nice job Gary

[TomC]

This one reason I used a transit bus-it has a gigantic rubber bumper with 6 big gussets supporting it. Course rear ending a truck won't help. Good Luck, TomC

[eagle19952]

This one reason I used a transit bus-it has a gigantic rubber bumper with 6 big gussets supporting it. Course rear ending a truck won't help. Good Luck, TomC

probably get the same result hitting a bridge abutment also.