Looking for info on the W&P Sebring GT Hardtop

[lastsaint]

Hi Everyone.

I'm still new here and looking for a bit of advice.
There have always been Jags in my family including a '65 series 1 E-Type Roadster.
I still have a hardtop for it and I think it might be the only undamaged complete one left in the world - the Williams & Pritchard Sebring GT hardtop.

http://www.coachbuild.com/forum/downloa ... e=view

Has anyone got any info on this hardtop? We had it on the car and it looked stunning - far more beautiful than the factory hardtop (imho)

Thanks, Alex

Wayback machine has a snapshot of the Register website;

https://web.archive.org/web/20080911184 ... -type.htm

Here is the info from that now defunct Williams & Pritchard Register website - about someone else's hardtop:

This is the exceptionally rare Sebring GT fastback hardtop for the E-Type Jaguar, which at £172 + VAT was the most expensive item on the Sebring GT price list. However, in an article in Cars and Car Conversions magazine in 1969, Len Pritchard initimated that some Jaguar dealerships had taken this accessory up and were selling it as a factory branded product. It came complete with a side lifting fuel filler cover and large rear boot panel, and with its buttresses the rear window bears just a slight resemblance to the later XJS.
The only surviving example known to the Register is this one, which belongs to the Collins family and was acquired some time ago in the family paint shop. It is damaged, missing part of the lower left support sill, and is missing its fuel filler cover, so will require quite a bit of skilled restoration work (and a suitable E-Type to wear it) but is still a very rare and possibly unique surviving piece of W&P and Jaguar history, as the moulds were destroyed in the nineteen eighties.

[PeterCrespin]

Ah yes, Williams & Pritchard - the hard top for people who can't find an Ashley. A great way to make a 'Spitfire' look like a Tiger Moth'

David found more photos for a previous thread. There was a photo of one in silver or some other light metallic so if yours isn't light coloured there are probably at least two extant.

Meanwhile, the Ashley:

has a huge fastback rear screen (heated glass of course)

has a Webasto folding roof in the hard top,, for open-top motoring if required

has a large boot lid and huge parcel shelf

has a Kamm tail, a la 250GT

has plenty of chrome details and a built-in petrol flap.



Yes, I still have mine. Trouble is, I've only had Series 2 OTSs and it is made for an S1. It would be a pity to hack it about at the back to fit onto an S2. Like the W+P it would work best in body colour, but black on dark blue gives a fair idea.

[lastsaint]

I'd missed this reply!
i did look up the Ashley....erm...yuck, its like Americans in the 70's wanted to make the XK-E more American.

[Heuer]

More info: http://forum.etypeuk.com/viewtopic.php?p=42776#p42776