While many Kaiser aficionados know that Kaiser dabbled in jeeps during World War II, before making a splash in the automotive field, perhaps fewer know that Kaiser at one point attempted to produce articulated inter-city buses.
Built in 1946 at Kaiser’s Permanente Metals Corporation plant near Los Altos, California, the three-axle, 60-foot bus featured true monocoque construction and used a 275hp supercharged six-cylinder Cummins diesel engine under the floor of the front section. The remainder of the under-floor space was used for the air-conditioning unit and for luggage storage, which helped lower the center of gravity – as did the use of aluminum for the lower portion of the body and magnesium for the upper portion.
In late July 1946, Henry J. Kaiser himself introduced the bus, painted in Santa Fe Trailways livery, and billed as “the bus of the future.” It could carry 63 passengers (at a time when a typical bus carried only 37 passengers), ran on Torsilastic suspension and featured swivel-chair seats, built-in lavatories and 40 inches of legroom (versus 35 in typical contemporary buses). Over the next few days, Henry J. mentioned possibly building the bus in Spokane, Washington; Bristol, Pennsylvania; and Portland, Oregon.
What derailed production of the bus isn’t exactly clear. We see no mention of the bus at all in Richard Langworth’s “The Last Onslaught on Detroit.” In “Highway Buses of the 20th Century,” William Luke and Linda Metler argue that the concept of a large articulated intercity bus never caught on here in the United States as it did in Europe. We’d add to that argument that Kaiser at the time was just starting up Kaiser-Frazer, a venture that most likely drew time, money and energy away from producing more than the one bus.
But the one bus that Kaiser built actually did enter regular service, shuttling passengers between Los Angeles and San Francisco for Santa Fe Trailways (later Continental Trailways). Interestingly, Santa Fe had to petition the California State Railroad Commission to operate the bus on state highways because it used a trailer, something the commission forbid at the time. The bus remained in service through 1951, eventually wearing wide whitewall tires when it switched to Continental livery.
