Rescuing an extensively damaged Series 1 E-type

Our customer bought a Series 1 4.2 E-type coupe which had been off the road since the 1970s.

Our customer bought a Series 1 4.2 E-type coupe which had been off the road since the 1970s. The car had some obvious extensive rust outs and on initial viewing the car looked like it required new floors, door skins, sills and some repair work to the rear quarter wheel arches.

Once the car was stripped and, in our workshops, a detailed inspection took place, and it was clear that the car had had a rear end shunt in its past. The whole rear end assembly showed distortion to the boot floor ribs as did the rear number plate panel. 

The shell was media blasted and the full extent of these old repairs was then evident. The entire rear end of the car was crudely repaired by having damaged panels roughly beaten, welded and lot of lead loading applied. In all over 11 kilograms of lead was applied to the rear and shaped to form a final (and quite convincing!) shape. In addition, many of the bonnet panels needed repairs or to be replaced.

At this stage it was clear that a very extensive fabrication programme was needed, requiring both rear quarters, the rear end assembly, inner and outer sills, floors, bulkhead side panels, door skins, bonnet underpan and left and right-hand front wing assemblies to be replaced. Extensive work like this requires great skill to maintain the perfect shut-gaps that the E-Type body requires. No matter which replacement panels are used they do not fit without extensive reworking and of course each shell can have surprising variance from standard dimensions.

Once the fabrication was complete and the correct lead loading applied the shell went to our prep and paint team who resealed, prepped, and painted the car in its original solid Warwick Grey colour. Finally, the shell was mounted to a purpose made body jig to allow our customer to carry out the fit up in comfort.

The Result

This lovely series 1 coupe is now perfectly repaired and painted and ready for its extensive mechanical and interior rebuild. We can’t wait to see the original red interior colour scheme installed.