North Western's first garage in Oldham was on Slater Street, just off Manchester Street and very close to where the first Sainsbury's supermarket was in Oldham. 177 was one of a batch of Tilling-Stevens Petrol-Electric double-deckers which introduced double-deck buses to Saddleworth. The charectersitics of a petrol-electric bus made it easy for a novice to drive but pretty useless for a hilly area such as Saddleworth and it is difficult to appreciate nowadays how slow these buses were. By a miracle one of this type survives in the Manchester Museum of Transport, the only significant difference from the condition shown here being the fitment of pneumatic tyres. This particular bus worked until 1930 and then had an interesting subsequent career as it was converted to a six-wheel dropside lorry by Chivers, the jam people, who seemed to have a predeliction for Tilling-Stevens vehicles.