Photo © Brendan Smith. Please do not re-post without permission.

West Yorkshire AWR401B was the first of a batch of six Bristol RELH6Gs with ECW DP47F bodywork delivered in 1964 (ERG1-6: AWR401-406B).
It was renumbered 1001 in the 1971 renumbering, and again renumbered 2501 in 1978. In 1977 1001 became the guinea pig for a "later life" refurbishment and was sent off to Willowbrook at Loughborough, who retrimmed the vehicle and fitted it with a redesigned front incorporating a Duple windscreen, revised grille and headlamps, and a remodelled front dome. The vehicle was also converted to semi-automatic transmission, and its two-piece glider doors were replaced by two-leaf folding doors. A Duple Dominant dashboard was also fitted.
On its return to Central Works at Harrogate, the 'Man from the Ministry' gave the new Duple screen the thumbs down due to serious blind spots towards the top of each front corner pillar. (These can be clearly seen in the photo kindly given to me by Central Works Body Shop colleague Frank Skelton). The original style ECW screens were reinstated before 1001 re-entered service in its new guise, and the other RELH6G coaches refurbished by Willowbrook (1024-1029, originally CRG11-16) retained their original ECW screens. The 'CRGs' also received two-piece folding doors in place of their original one-piece manually operated ones.
West Yorkshire decided to refurbish further RELH6G coaches in-house (1018-1023, originally CRG5-10) and these retained their original ECW fronts, including the familiar grille, and one-piece doors. All the refurbished RELH6Gs were finished in half red/half white NBC 'Local coach' livery.

Photo taken by the late Frank Skelton (Brendan Smith collection), Thursday 25 August 1977, Central Works Body Shop, Westmorland Street, Harrogate

©1977-2026 Brendan Smith All Rights Reserved.
You're welcome to print these pages for personal use only or to link to them as long as it's not for financial gain. Photos may not be re-posted anywhere (including facebook, flickr and fotopic sites) without permission. See the Site Map for further details.