Casaro bodied Leyland Royal Tiger Worldmaster 1956

This photograph appeared in an issue of 'Commercial Motor' magazine following the 1956 Earl’s Court Commercial Motor Show. This striking coach was a Leyland Royal Tiger Worldmaster with bodywork built by Autocostruzioni Casaro of Turin, Italy styled by Ghia, the renowned Italian automobile design house also based in Turin. In a ‘Commercial Motor’ report in an issue published in the run up to the exhibition, it stated that the coach was 36ft 4ins long and 8ft 2½ins wide – it was to be about 5 years later before these sort of dimensions were legalised in Britain.

Anyone with an interest in model and toy buses will recognise that this striking vehicle was created in miniature in Lesney’s ‘Matchbox Series’ range. However, the model was shorter than it should have been compared with the width being 75mm long and 21mm wide which would equate to approx. 8.93 metre (29ft 4 in) long and 2.5 metres wide (8ft 2½ins) for a real vehicle. My model bus and coach fleet included 39 of the type.

The coach must have looked quite futuristic for the mid-1950s when other exhibits at the show included an Alexander bodied Albion Nimbus, a Beadle integral bus, a Burlingham bodied bus and a Plaxton Consort bodied coach on Maudslay Reliance chassis, a Yeates Europa bodied Commer coach plus traditional half cab double deckers including a Northern Counties bodied Guy Arab, a Metro-Cammell bodied Leyland PD3 and a Park Royal bodied AEC Regent V. There were Sunbeam trolleybuses in the form of a Willowbrook bodied double decker and an East Lancs bodied single decker. None of those for British service exceeding the then permissible length of 30ft. One other bus to mention was 281 ATC, the prototype of the revolutionary Leyland Atlantean, which made its debut at the same exhibition.