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The Gillig Corporation, formerly Gillig Bros., is an American manufacturer of heavy-duty low-floor transit buses based in Hayward, California. Prior to 1993, Gillig also made school buses. ==History== In 1890, Jacob Gillig opened a carriage and wagon shop in San Francisco, California. His son, Leo Gillig, joined him in 1896. The original shop was destroyed in the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, but reopened as the Leo Gillig Automobile Works to manufacture bodies for automobiles, hearses, trucks, and buses. In 1920, Leo's brother Chester Gillig joined the company and introduced and patented the "California Top" roof construction style, consisting of a hard-top roof and sliding windows. The company's name changed at this time to Gillig Bros. In the late 1920s, Gillig starting producing pleasure boats and heavy trucks and, in 1932, produced their first school bus. In 1937, Gillig introduced their first transit-style (flat front) school bus. In 1938 the company moved to Hayward, CA. In 1957, Gillig purchased the Pacific Bus division of Kenworth Truck Company. By that time, the company was devoted almost entirely to making school buses. In 1959, Gillig pioneered the diesel-powered rear-engined transit style school bus with the release of the C-series Transit Coach. Within five years, the C-Series accounted for three-quarters of all of Gillig sales. In 1967, Gillig produced the 855-D, which had a passenger capacity of 97, the highest-capacity school bus ever produced. In 1969, Herrick-Pacific Steel purchased the company and changed the name to the Gillig Corporation. During the time they built school buses, Gillig earned a reputation as one of the safest buses, due to the near-total absence of recalls. The only recall for a Gillig-built school bus was in 1979 for rear-end axle separation issues. In 1977, Gillig decided to manufacture transit buses. They teamed up with Neoplan to build a series of European-styled transit buses with the option of propane fueled engines. The partnership with Neoplan lasted until 1979.〔Stauss, Ed (1988), 66.〕 In 1980, Gillig introduced the Phantom,〔Stauss, Ed (1988), 67.〕 a heavy-duty transit bus based on their previous round-body school bus platform. A State of California tax-free subsidy helped early sales. Later sales were buoyed by low bids on contracts, and by specializing in serving smaller transit agencies. This strategy proved successful, as the Phantom became one of the longest-lasting transit models. Production of the Transit Coach School Bus ceased in 1982, but Gillig offered a school bus version of the Phantom in 1986,.〔Stauss, Ed (1988), 68.〕 Production stopped in 1993 when Gillig exited the school bus market. The Spirit, a late-1980s attempt at a medium-duty bus, experienced poor sales and was discontinued after a few years. In 1997, Gillig entered the low-floor bus market with the Advantage (originally called ''H2000LF'', and is currently called the "Low Floor"). Like the Phantom, the Low Floor was first purchased largely by rental car companies for use at airport facilities, but transit sales increased as the model matured. On August 1, 2008, Gillig became a Henry Crown company under CC Industries, Inc. CC Industries operated Gillig in the same location with the current management team.〔http://www.metro-magazine.com/News/Story/2008/08/Gillig-Corp-under-new-ownership.aspx〕 Gillig is the second largest transit bus manufacturer by volume, behind New Flyer. As of 2013, Gillig had an approximate 31% market share of the combined US and Canadian heavy-duty transit bus manufacturing industry, based on the number of equivalent unit deliveries. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Gillig Corporation」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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