Tag: Willowbrook

East Yorkshire – AEC Regent V – VKH 47 – 649


Photographer unknown – if you took this photo please go to the copyright page.

East Yorkshire Motor Services
1957
AEC Regent V
Willowbrook L31/28RD

Now we have two Regent Vs from a batch of 19 delivered to East Yorkshire in 1956/7 they were fleet numbered 634 – 652.
634 to 648 were 27ft in length had AEC 7.68 litre six cylinder engines a four speed synchromesh gearbox and a Willowbrook highbridge “Beverly Bar” style roof bodies seating 56 as per the bus on the right above. 
649 and 650 had the same engine and gearbox but had Willowbrook lowbridge bodies seating 59 as per the bus on the left above.
651 and 652 were 30ft in length with AEC 9.6 litre six cylinder engines a four speed synchromesh gearbox but with Roe highbridge Beverly Bar style roof bodies seating 66. Another difference that 651 and 652 had was that they both had the more well known concealed radiator associated with the Regent V to see a shot of one of them click here.
With regards the above shot the bus on the right must have a cold running engine, that is a rather large radiator blanking panel. Getting a photo that shows the shape of the “Beverly Bar” style roof is not easy as it was painted white and when shot in black and white the roof merged into the sky.
I wonder why East Yorkshire ordered nineteen of these Regent Vs and not twenty seems a strange number to order to me

A full list of Regent V codes can be seen here.

With regard to EYMS Regent V’s, there were two (or three) separate batches involved in the 19 vehicles referred to. The first batch was for 15 MD3RV;s 634 to 648, the highbridge ones, plus two lowbridge ones 649 and 650 (all were registered VKH 634-650) delivered November, 1956; plus two LD3RA’s 651 and 652 (registered WAT 651/2) delivered April, 1957. The numbering of these last two completed the gap between the first batch(es) and the first ex Everingham vehicle, which carried fleet number 653 (the whole series for Everingham vehicles was 653 to 664 plus 46!) These were acquired, of course, in November 1953.

Keith Easton

For many years the “Beverley Bar” VKHs were to be seen on the Leeds – Bridlington service (joint with WYRCC). I was a frequent traveller on them, having relatives then in Bridlington, and often went all the way smoking merrily with others in the lower saloon. EYMS were possibly the last operator in the Country to allow smoking anywhere in the vehicle ?? The Willowbrooks, fine in most ways, did though have possibly the worst sliding windows for incessant rattling. I wish we could still ride on them today when I travel in the present rattling thudding horrors that manufacturers are so proud of !!

Chris Youhill

Looks like the coach drop off point Bridlington coach station around the mid 60s

Mickey Summers

Sorry, Mickey – I think this is the main Hull bus park outside the railway station (in the background). This was the location where countless EYMS and KHCT buses would park off-peak, and was always a good place to take photos.

Paul Haywood

Yes, It is definitely the bus park now gone under ST Stephens shopping centre and Interchange. What a crime!

Keith Easton

I remember taking dozens of box camera shots on this site at Hull in the very early 1950s. There were rebodied Guys, TD4 and TD5s, some ECW rebodied, and some lowbridge all Leyland PD2s, as well as the usual BB Roe PD1s and PD2s, plus several single deck types inc the ECW PS1s, Burlingham coaches, and the usual “Federation” types. Fascinating fleet it was too. I particularly remember the oval rear windows of the pre war single deck stock (a bit of an out-dated feature) and the original 3 window upper fronts of the pre war Titans.
We used the Bridlington to Hull service many times, via Barmston, Beeford, Ulrome and Skipsea, and it always seemed to be on a Roe PD1, which I remember as quite lively.
An interesting fleet….perhaps it was the livery which held it apart from other BET fleets.
Does anyone remember the slogan on the sides of several Brush PS1s…. “This is not a nationalised bus” ?

John Whitaker

09/08/13 – 07:54

My great grandfather designed and built the first Beverley Bar bus, his name was William Bundy. He lived in Sproatley till his death at 99 in a house he built himself.

Bernice Brumby

09/08/13 – 09:30

Yes John, I do remember the slogan and there was another version on the cove panels of single deckers – it boldly and unashamedly proclaimed
“UN-NATIONALISED, UNIMPAIRED.”

Chris Youhill

10/08/13 – 05:52

Wasn’t that the point of the white band around the roof? . . . to make the roof blend into the sky and look like a normal low-bridge roof? (In which case why not paint the whole lot white, rather than just a band around the roof . . . suggestions on a post-card).

Philip Rushworth

11/08/13 – 06:50

I’m surprised that no-one else has picked up on this. The title to this page gives the registration of EYMS 649 as VKH 47, Keith Easton gives it as VKH 649, while the photo clearly shows it as VKH 49. In fact, all of 634-50 were VKH 34, etc. While I’m on this subject of EYMS Regent Vs, could anyone tell me why EYMS suddenly bought two lowbridge double-deckers? Did they have a true lowbridge route, or were the two Regent Vs someone else’s cancelled order?
Also, how did Willowbrook come to build double-deckers to the ‘Beverley Bar’ outline? I thought the idea had emanated from a collaboration between EYMS and Roe, and had assumed that Roe had gone on to construct all the examples. (I don’t regard the Bridgemasters and Renowns as true ‘Beverley Bar’, they’re more like ‘pretend’).

David Call

11/08/13 – 09:29

Before the Second World War Brush built twenty-six Beverley Bar bodies and ECW twenty-one. Brush built more during the war (the PSV history and some published sources disagree as to whether all Brush bodies on the first Arabs were Bar buses) and ECW rebodied some Titans after the war whilst Roe rebodied the Arabs.
The Willowbrook bodies were a shock and are not regarded by many as handsome a design as the Roe bodies on various Titans (the full fronted ones excepted)
The bus park was useful to photographers, including myself, but for anyone wanting decent photos showing EYMS (or KHCT) at work in Hull it was a menace since many visitors rarely ventured outside this and the coach station.
The best “Bar” bus portraits ( they’re too good to be called photographs) were taken by G F H Atkins in Scarborough on his holidays, mostly at Northway.

Malcolm J Wells

11/08/13 – 09:29

David, I’m pretty sure but without looking deeply that East Yorkshire did need lowbridge buses somewhere in the outer west of Hull – possibly Elloughton ??

Chris Youhill

15/08/13 – 07:03

It would seem that East Yorkshire’s Elloughton garage was the main home of the company’s lowbridge buses.
The March 1962 and June 1965 editions of the Ian Allan “British Bus Fleets – Yorkshire Company Operators” both show East Yorkshire as operating the following lowbridge double deckers:
584-589 (MKH 402-407) Leyland PD2/12/Leyland L53R 632-633 (SRH 632-633) Leyland PD2/12/Roe L56R 649-650 (VKH 49-50) AEC Regent V/Willowbrook L59R
(The 1965 edition shows the split of upper deck and lower deck seating capacities with 632-633 being L28/28R and 649-650 being L31/28RD. I had never personally noticed any lowbridge deckers with a capacity of more than 53 before).
I am not sure though that the 1962 book is totally correct as in some R H G Simpson photographs I have there were also (at least) 505/506 (JRH 978/979) which look like Leyland lowbridge bodies but the book lists these two as Roe HBB54R (the ‘HBB code used to identify Beverley Bar buses with highbridge layout seating).
In an EYMS allocation list dated 1 March 1962 584/585/586/588/633/649/650 were allocated to Elloughton and 587/589/632 were allocated to Hornsea.
The allocation list dated 1 October 1962 shows 584/585/586/588/589/649/650 allocated to Elloughton, 632/633 allocated to Hornsea and 587 allocated to Withersea.
The list dated 1 November 1963 shows 584/585/586/587/589/649/650 allocated to Elloughton and 588/632/633 to Hull (Anlaby Road).
The list dated 1 January 1964 shows 584/585/586/589/649/650 allocated to Elloughton and 587/588/632/633 to Hull (Anlaby Road).
Lists dated 1 April and 1 May 19 both show 585/586/589/649/650 allocated to Elloughton and 584/587/588/632/633 to Hull (Anlaby Road).
In the same allocation lists the Willowbrook Beverley Bar bodied AEC Regent V buses 634-648 (VKH 34-48), which I always really liked and frequently saw in Scarborough. These were mainly allocated to Driffield Garage – I suspect for service 12 between Hull and Scarborough. The exceptions being in March 1962 635/636/644 were allocated to Bridlington; in October 1962 635/636 were allocated to Bridlington; in November 1963 and January 1964 were 634/635/636 allocated to Hull (Anlaby Road); in April and May 1965 634/635/636/637/638 were allocated to Hull (Anlaby Road) and 648 allocated to Bridlington.

David Slater

15/08/13 – 11:58

Interesting information David. Given that the nearest railway line and station to Elloughton today is Brough, a line which doesn’t have any low bridges, I wonder if the offending structures were on the old Hull and Barnsley line around the North Cave/South Cave area?

Chris Barker

17/08/13 – 11:54

I knew I had seen something in print somewhere about where the low bridges were on the EYMS routes and I can quote the following from page 6 of the Venture Publications Prestige Series book on EYMS which reads: “The standard lowbridge types were in the fleet because of only two low bridges, one at Hornsea Mere station and the other near Selby”.
As an aside, the Prestige book also helped towards clarifying the point of the correctness of the 1962 Ian Allan British Bus Fleets book. The BBF book has grouped together in one block 50 Roe bodied Leyland Titan PD1A buses built between 1947-1950 and shows them all as “HBB54R” – the code used to indicate a highbridge bus with Beverley Bar roof profile. These 50 buses are listed as: 447-453 (JAT 415-421); 471-498 (JAT439-466) and 505-519 (JRH 978-992).
However, as I mentioned before, I had photographs of 505 (JRH 978) and 506 (JRH 979) which I could clearly see were both lowbridge buses. The Prestige book shows a picture of 505 and confirms it was Roe bodied and not, as I had assumed, Leyland bodied – although the styling was very similar. So maybe these, the first two of the JRH batch were the only lowbridge bodies on that order and the list overlooked that fact. There is also a picture of 509 (JRH 982) which is a highbridge model.

David Slater

17/08/13 – 16:29

One has to be careful about sources
The OS/PSV history of 1980 shows the following
420-425 PD1 with Roe H52R bodies (later H56R)
426-427 PDI with Roe L51R bodies
433-453 PD1 with Roe H52R bodies (later H56R)
471-498 PD1A with Roe H54R bodies
505-507 PD1A with Roe L51R bodies
508-519 PD1A with Roe H54R bodies
The EYMS enthusiasts page says PD1, not PD1A
Which version is correct? I have no idea. The early Ian Allan books could be very inaccurate as shown in the first Yorkshire Municipal book’s entries for Hull’s 190-9/204-39 which contained no references to those rebodied with pre-war Massey and Weymann bodies from Regents and Daimlers, despite the fact that these had taken place 7-9 years previously.
The low bridge “near Selby” was, I think, at North Cave with the ex-Hull and Barnsley Railway Bridge although there may have been a problem at Willerby.

Malcolm J Wells

18/08/13 – 06:29

Malcolm, I had no idea that so many of the magnificent PD1s had been upseated from 52 to 56. Presumably a double seat was inserted each side in the upper saloons ??

Chris Youhill

18/08/13 – 12:00

As far as I am aware – yes. H30/26R instead of H26/26R, but I was a lad at the time and more interested in trolleybuses in Hull.

Malcolm J Wells

04/11/13 – 07:12

As a youngster I often travelled from Anlaby Common to Hessle to visit my Nana. The buses were always on service 3 Goole or service 4 Selby and if they were double-deckers they would be what we called “flat tops”- ie lowbridge. If for a change we walked through to Boothferry road to get a service 5 going to South Cave it was usually a “flat topper” too. For many years (1962 to 1969) I travelled to Beverley Grammar School from the Red Lion at Anlaby. For most of the time this was on the PD1A “JATs” and they went through Willerby without a problem so that bridge just short of Willerby Square mustn’t have been too low. Later we had the MKH full fronted PDs and latterly we had Bridgemasters or Renowns.
It is always good to see photographs of “the muck” behind Ferensway Coach Station – where I spent many happy hours noting numbers, collecting tickets and when the crew allowed setting the blinds for the next duty.

David Cornwall

04/11/13 – 16:50

Whilst the bus park alongside the coach station was very good for seeing lots of EYMS and KHCT buses many enthusiasts went no further so that photos of buses at work are in short supply. Photographs of EYMS elsewhere in the city in the 1950s and 1960s are rare – most pics show Scarborough, Bridlington and Beverley with hardly any in the suburbs for EYMS and very few KHCT ones outside the city centre.
Trolleybus enthusiasts tended to ride to and take pics at the outer termini as well as the city centre.
Until the KHCT head office was built in 1962/3 KHCT buses could also be found on what was bombed damaged land alongside the front of the garage in Lombard Street.

Malcolm Wells

Vehicle reminder shot for this posting

06/12/13 – 17:51

In common with several others who have posted EYMS comments, I too was – quote, unquote, a Grammar School git, who commuted between Willerby and Bev between 1963 and 1969. I must express particular gratitude to David Cornwall above, as he once lent me his 1964 copies of “Buses Illustrated” – I had only started buying it in 1965. I am delighted to see David remains interested in buses: my own enjoyment has never waned. Not being any good at maths, physics, Latin, games, woodwork – in fact not being very good at almost anything they tried to teach us at school – my nostalgia for those days is limited, but I would love to stop the clock and travel once again on the EYMS fleet of the mid-1960s. Our school run required about six buses each day, and almost anything from the fleet might turn up, even coaches on occasion. I was able to underline just about everything in the East Yorkshire section of my Ian Allen British Bus Fleets: Yorkshire Company Operators. My least favourite at the time were the JAT PD1s – Skidby Hill was always a challenge for them, but the AEC AV590-engined Bridgemasters and Renowns took it by storm, the Renowns being memorably melodious. I had a particular affection for the VKH Regents: ugly as sin, but what sounds they emitted, sweet AV470 melodies from the front, but a very rude raspberry of an exhaust.

Mark Evans

Devon General – AEC Regent V – 506 RUO – 506


Photographer unknown – if you took this photo please go to the copyright page.

Devon General Omnibus & Touring Co Ltd 
1964
AEC Regent V 2D3RA
Willowbrook H39/30F

This very good looking Willowbrook bodied AEC Regent V of Devon General is I think about to start on its long distance run to Plymouth. It had not been in service very long when this shot was taken in the summer of 1964. It is on route 128 which was Torquay to Plymouth, the via blind reads Ivybridge and Totnes but on looking at a map it should be via Totnes and Ivybridge, still it will be right for the return trip. This route was one of the joint service long distance routes operated with Southern & Western National. Devon General also had an agreement with the largest city in their area Exeter, so Devon General buses did quite a few inner city routes and City of Exeter buses would be seen on some of the out of city routes.

Bus tickets issued by this operator can be viewed here.

A full list of Regent V codes can be seen here.

It is possible that the intermediate display is printed so as to show the places only once, thereby being “wrong way round” on every other journey.  This was a fairly common practice where operators quite reasonably sought to avoid wastage of the expensive material.

Chris Youhill

It is a very smart body, perhaps slightly marred by the heavy look of the sliding windows.
Amazing how rear wheel ‘spats’ always improve the look of buses. Was this a common feature of Devon General?

Chris Hebbron

24/03/11 – 17:25

Most Devon General AECs had rear wheel trims (dustbins) fitted which improved appearance and made it much easier to keep the wheels clean.

Royston Morgan

15/05/13 – 15:29

Does anyone have any information on a very old green bus (could date from as early as the 1920s) which was sited in Wakeham’s Field in Shaldon, Devon in 1951. I came with my parents and sisters to Devon that year and we lived for nine weeks on the camp site whilst waiting for a house. We lived in an old bus for the final few weeks. It had been partly adapted as living accommodation. It had a former Admiral’s (or Captain’s) bathroom area installed – a quite grand mahogany wash basin which lowered down. I have recently seen one of these contraptions on the Antiques Roadshow. I think we still had to pour water from a container into the basin but it drained away after use into the area which would once have been the driver’s place. The bus itself had long seats on the right side as you went in – rows of them I mean, rather than the normal two x 2 each side. Each seat would have taken 4- 5 people. I think some of the windows may have been painted over – probably because there was no way of having curtains. I have never seen a bus of that design anywhere other than the Midlands in the late 40s.

Mary Grant

Hebble – AEC Regent III – CJX 69 – 268


Photographer unknown – if you took this photo please go to the copyright page.

Hebble Motor Services
1952
AEC Regent III
Willowbrook L55R

This is one of the last batch of Regent IIIs Hebble took delivery of, to say it was new in 1952 it looks as if it was built well before that. I think it is the drivers sloping small window that makes it look older. Although from what I can gather the Willowbrook bodywork had excellent interior finish.

15/08/11 – 13:20

This batch or Regents were type 9612A (A=crash gears) which was a change from the previous Roe bodied Regents which were type 9612E (E=epicyclic pre-selector). I remember them on the Joint Bradford-Huddersfield route 64

Kev

Trent – AEC Regal I – RC 9668/74 – 303/768


Copyright Bob Gell

Trent Motor Traction 303 – 1947 – AEC Regal I – Willowbrook FDP39F

Trent Motor Traction 768 – 1947 – AEC Regal I – Willowbrook B35F

A company not yet represented on this site is Trent Motor Traction, so this photo is to rectify that omission. In the early postwar years, Trent took delivery of a large number of AEC Regals with Willowbrook bus bodies. In 1958, some 20 of the Regals were modernised by Willowbrook, who fitted a full front, extended the chassis and lengthened the body to 30 feet, increasing the capacity from 35 to 39.
The rebuilt vehicles were treated as dual purpose, which meant they saw use on local services (the only time I rode on one was on the Derby ‘town service’ 27 from Scarborough Rise to the bus station), and also express services, often to the East Coast on summer Saturdays.
I’m not sure how much of a success they were, as they were withdrawn in 1962/3, only 2/3 years after the last of the unrebuilt examples.
My photograph shows rebuilt 303 (RC 9668) and unrebuilt 768 (RC 9674), both from the 1947 batch, at Derby Bus Station in 1960.

Photograph and Copy contributed by Bob Gell

16/12/12 – 11:03

Extending the chassis and fitting a new body? Sounds rather like the Tilling fleets with the Bristol L to LL conversion. Who’s idea was it?

Pete Davies

16/12/12 – 12:20

Were not some of these Regals lengthened by Trent themselves but remained half cabs?

Eric Bawden

16/12/12 – 14:47

I found this site by accident (What a fascinating place the internet can be) and have been delighted with the photographs and comments. I was with Trent from 1965 to 1967 prior to emigrating to Western Australia. I worked at the Hucknall depot in Nottinghamshire where we drove mainly Leyland PD2’s and 3’s plus Atlanteans and Daimler Fleetlines. I never gave a thought, sadly, to taking photographs but I have found a few examples of vehicles similar to those that I drove. If anyone has examples of Trent buses I would love to see them.

Malcolm Holmes

17/12/12 – 08:14

When I was a nipper we took holidays at Skegness and we stayed at digs near the coach park! I seem to recall one of the full front vehicle was used as some kind of booking office. Have I got this right? My father who had the same initials RC often commented the number plate would be just right for his own car this being before the craze was the general norm.

Philip Carlton

18/12/12 – 08:00

To answer a couple of points, the rebuilt vehicles didn’t have new bodies. As Bob rightly states, the original bodies simply had the rearmost bay extended to achieve 30ft length and provide four extra seats. In halfcab form they had been used on long distance express services but attracted complaints from passengers because the original bus seats were very low backed. The rebuilt vehicles were given dual purpose seats although these were still rather spartan. The rebuilds gave between four and five years service, the last being sixteen years old when withdrawn, I suppose that was quite creditable for Trent who usually worked to a twelve year maximum fleet life.
I’ve never known if the AEC radiator was retained behind the full fronts but the rebuilt vehicles had a reputation for getting extremely hot in the cabs and were known as ‘sweat boxes’ None of them were extended and retained half cabs. Quite a few rebuilds saw further service after leaving Trent. The mobile booking office at Skegness was a much earlier vehicle, a pre-war SOS.

Chris Barker

19/12/12 – 07:22

Chris – Thanks for the additional information.
The pre war SOS mobile booking office (RC 2721) was saved for preservation, and is currently being restored by LVVS at Lincoln.

Bob Gell

13/06/13 – 11:34

As a fitter and a manager working at Trent for 30 years 1962 to 1992 I can confirm that the lengthened AEC Regals were indeed “sweatboxes” working on the engine in the cab in thick overalls on a hot day had to be believed! they did not retain the original AEC radiator but a flat metal affair, where they came from I am not sure. The conversions were all carried out at Willowbrook but for me they did not look right. As a matter of interest my boss at Trent for 25 years Malcolm Hitchen MBE is currently writing about his 50 years with Trent engineering hopefully to be published to coincide with Trent 100 years in October 2013

Alan Hiley

Vehicle reminder shot for this posting

24/08/13 – 15:27

RC 2721

There is mention on this Trent page of a mobile booking office used at Skegness. This was RC 2721 a 1935 BMMO DON converted to the booking office in May 1953, acquired by the Lincolnshire Vintage Vehicle Society in April 1965. Still with them in 2013 and being put back to its original condition.

Alan Hiley

03/09/13 – 06:00

RC 2721_2

Alan Hiley in his contribution of 24/08/2013 makes mention of Trent Motor Traction Co., 1935 BMMO DON – RC 2721 being with the Lincolnshire Vintage Vehicle Society, in preservation.
I thought you would like to see it in their ownership.

Stephen Howarth

Express Motors – AEC Regal I 0662 – RC 9680

Express Motors - AEC Regal I 0662 - RC 9680

Express Motors
1947
AEC Regal I 0662
Willowbrook rebody 1958 FDP39F

RC 9680 was new to Trent in 1947 with a Willowbrook B35F body being lengthened and fitted with a new Willowbrook body in 1958. It was withdrawn by Trent in 1963 and is shown here four years later laying over in the shadow of Caernarvon Castle on a wet day in September 1967.

Photograph and Copy contributed by Ian Wild

21/07/20 – 06:41

A small correction to Ian’s caption; these vehicles were not given new Willowbrook bodies, the original bodies were lengthened at the rear to allow an extra double seat on each side and slightly at the front to fully enclose the cab and conceal the radiator. The other modification was a folding door, as seen, replacing the previous porch type entrance with a door at the top of the steps.
There were twenty of these conversions, the first one was given all new flush glazed windows mounted in rubber gasket, the remainder kept their original windows to reduce the conversion cost. They were all given new seats which allowed them to be re-classified as dual purpose but the new seats, although an improvement, were still rather spartan for 2-3 hour seaside services.

Chris Barker

22/07/20 – 06:58

It was a very successful conversion, IMHO, helped by the completely horizontal waistline instead of the dropping rear. I wouldn’t have guessed the bodywork wasn’t original. And here it is, still around, 20 years after being built!

Chris Hebbron

25/07/20 – 07:15

I agree with Chris Barkers comment about the horizontal waste line, helping to give the vehicle a more modern appearance. However when I see these vehicles I always feel that the frontal appearance could have been improved if – either the aluminium trim followed the bottom contour of the front windows, (and not a horizontal line) or the windows had a horizontal base instead of the angled finish. I’m sure their were good reasons for not altering the line of the windows (not least because they concealed the bulkhead and radiator and were part of the original half cab design). Nice conversion in any event.

John Rentell

09/08/20 – 05:53

Looks like a Creams (of Llandudno) Bedford VAL alongside. Could be BCC 1C ( https://flic.kr/p/7Qrw3K ), or BCC 6C.

David Williamson