Dennis Domino
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In mid-1980s, Dennis wanted to develop a midibus to cater for routes to fill the gap between a minibus and a full sized bus. In this regard, they developed the Domino.
The Domino was very different from the conventional front-engined midibuses like the Leyland Swift or Mercedes Benz 608D / 709D. In fact, It could be described as a shortened Dominator without the upper deck. It was a rear-engined bus with 2.5m width. Most of the parts were derived from the Dennis Dominator double decker. The full size wheels, Perkins 6.354 V8 engine, Maxwell 4-speed automatic transmission and ZF power steering made the bus very unique. Only 34 buses were built. 20 Northern Counties bodied buses were built for Greater Manchester and the other 14 Optare bodied buses were built for South Yorkshire Transport.
These buses did not attract big orders because they had high breakdown rate with the engine / transmission configurations. This model was superseded by the highly successful Dart.
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Page created: 6 September 2009