CBBA

If there was such a thing as Cool Bus Builders Anonymous, then each meet in Leicestershire would start with the words. “Hello, my name’s Andy Stretton and I can’t stop building seriously cool buses.”

- Alan Hayward

Andy is the boss at Transporter HQ, and we have featured a few of his creations along the way. Then there’s the many other feature vans and buses that showcase his extensive range of products.

This particular bus is one we’ve wanted to feature for quite a while, but Andy made us wait. “I’ve just got to finish this, then I want to add that…” he told us. Is it any surprise that when it was finally ready, his next comment was, “I’ve got a bit carried away on this one and spent much more time and money on it than I intended”? To be honest he says that about all the buses he builds for himself, and I for one hope he doesn’t change any time soon.

So, what exactly have we got then? Well, Andy purchased this Doka as an unfinished project. It was part of the way along the route of becoming the double-cab version of what Toby Stowe created on page thirty-six of this issue, ie a van front end with a pick-up at the rear, fabricated from the lower half of a panel van. His plan was to finish the project, run it for a while, then sell it on. However, when he and his team started to strip it down, they discovered a partial horror story. The base vehicle itself was in good order and with a few minor tweaks, it passed its MOT with no problems. The problems lay with the modifications that the previous owner had perpetrated upon a poor innocent Doka. Let’s just say they were not up to Transporter HQ’s exacting standards and draw a veil across the rest of the details.