The Bristol 401 saloon and Bristol 402 cabriolet are British luxury grand tourers, produced between 1948 and 1953 by Bristol Cars, an offshoot of the Bristol Aeroplane Company[1] They were developed from the Bristol 400, which continued in production alongside the 401 and 402 until 1950.
The 401 and 402 use an improved version of the BMW 328 hemispherical-head engine and its unusual arrangement of two separate pushrods to operate the exhaust valves, necessitated by the hemispherical combustion chambers and opposite facing valves, as used in the 400. However, the styling was an advance on that first Bristol model. It was inspired by a Milanese designer, Carrozzeria Touring, and its most notable feature is that the door handles are not exposed. The doors are opened by pressing a button in the door. The body is more spacious than the 400, and is a full five-seater.
At the front the 401 and 402 are also distinctive, with their headlights positioned quite a distance toward the centre-line of the body, either side of the narrow grille, which resembles BMW grille a little less than does the 400's. They are also deeply curved at the front: this, along with the then-unique door handle arrangement, is believed to give the 401 a drag coefficient of less than Cd 0.36 – competitive even by today's standards and remarkable for the time.