On Wednesday we commissioned a new radio and signalling system on the bus, replacing the old and unmaintainable system which has served us well for many years.

The new system is a slimmer version of the old system with a few new features. Firstly, winch and airband radios have been moved and are now hanging down from the roof of the bus, along with the PA system and the main power switch. It is worth noting that the handset for the winch radio is on the desk and the handset for the airband radio has been mounted on the roof, to avoid any confusion.

The light controls now consist of 3 separate buttons instead of the rotary control. These are a yellow button labelled 'take up slack', a green button labelled 'all out' and a red button labelled 'stop'. The take up slack and all out buttons must be held down for the signal to remain on, with the stop button being a latching button that you rotate to turn off. The idea behind this is to stop people from setting the lights to 'take up slack' or 'all out' and then getting distracted and leaving the lights on whilst not looking at the signaller.

Please note that the two emergency stop buttons on the side of the bus and the external buzzer are not yet connected (we ran out of time and daylight). These will be reconnected as soon as possible.

A short guide on how the new lights operate will be available on the bus soon. If you find any issues with the new system then please let Max Lazenby or Matt Page know.