Crown Coach
Crown Supercoach
The Crown Supercoach is a bus that was manufactured and marketed by Crown Coach Corporation from 1948 to 1991. While most examples were sold as yellow school buses, the Supercoach formed the basis for motorcoaches and other specialty vehicles using the same body and chassis. While technically available outside of the West Coast, nearly all Crown school buses were sold in Washington state, Oregon and California. From 1948 to 1984, the Supercoach was constructed at the Crown Coach facilities in Los Angeles, California. From 1984 to the 1991 closure of the company, the Supercoach was constructed in Chino, California.
Text from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0).
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Design history
=== 1932–1948 === In 1932, Crown Motor Carriage Company built its first complete school bus, in a shift from building bus bodies on cowled truck chassis. Externally modeled after Twin Coach body designs, the school bus body used a front-engine layout, with the Waukesha gasoline engine positioned next to the driver. The body was of all-metal construction with an integrated chassis and safety glass; for braking, in addition to the standard hydraulic service brakes, the Crown bus was equipped with a redundant hand-operated system alongside the standard parking/emergency brake. From 1932 to 1935, Crown Body and Coach Corporation produced additional forward-control school buses. As the original 1932 design proved too expensive to produce on a large scale, Crown shifted to a design based on a Reo commercial truck chassis. Named the Metropolitan, while still a front-engine bus, the new design significantly decreased forward visibility. In 1935, Crown revisited the 1932 design, introducing a new version as the first Crown Super Coach. With a seating capacity of up to 76 students, it was one of the largest school buses ever produced at the time. As with its 1932 predecessor, the 1935 Crown Super Coach featured an all-steel body with an integrated chassis, safety glass, and a front-engine body. In a big change, the redundant braking system was redesigned, with the Supercoach featuring full air brakes. In 1936, Crown produced the Super Coach as an intercity motorcoach, featuring onboard sleeper compartments. To maximize interior room, the powertrain layout was changed from front-engine to an underfloor mid-engine configuration. In several variants, the Crown Super Coach would retain an underfloor layout through its 1991 discontinuation. In 1937, Crown would build the first mid-eng
Supercoach II (1989–1991)
During 1989, Crown Coach introduced the Crown Supercoach Series II (internally designated N-body). Developed for Crown to participate in a multi-year California Energy Commission study of the feasibility of alternative fuel school buses, the Series II introduced the first major visible changes to the Supercoach since its 1949 introduction. Alongside buses created for the CEC design study, the model line entered production alongside the standard Crown Supercoach (internally designated C-body). California Energy Commission program. Produced for the first phase of the CEC study, 153 Crown Series II buses were acquired, including 103 "advanced diesel" and 50 methanol-fuel buses. As a secondary objective of the study, the buses researched the practicality of advanced safety features for school districts replacing buses manufactured before 1977, including fire suppression systems, an increase in emergency exits, taller seats (made of additional flame-retardant material), anti-lock brakes (ABS), and automatic parking brakes. Lasting until 2002, the CEC program lasted through four stages of research into alternative fuels and safety and technology advances; methanol was ultimately abandoned as an alternative fuel (in favor of further development of compressed natural gas and diesel buses), with virtually all of the methanol-fuel Supercoach II units converted to operate on diesel fuel. As Crown Coach ceased to exist after March 1991, the company only participated in the initial phase of the CEC program. Design overview. During the late 1980s, the only methanol-fuel engine that complied with California emissions standards was the Detroit Diesel 6V92. To accommodate the wider V6 engine in the rear of the Supercoach, substantial revisions were required for the chassis and rear b
Sections adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0); text is shortened. Read the full article for the complete history and citations.
More photos
Sources
- Wikidata — https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q5189470CC0 1.0 · retrieved 2026-10-01
- Wikipedia — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crown_SupercoachCC BY-SA 4.0 · Text © Wikipedia contributors; revision 1377553662 · retrieved 2026-10-01
- Wikimedia Commons — https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Crown_School_bus_at_Meadowhall.jpgCC BY-SA 2.0 · Photo: Ian Roberts · retrieved 2026-10-01
- Car Model Index — https://models.autoculturesociety.com/Compiled record. Sources that do not permit reuse are not copied; this index is credited instead.