That French one would have been a LHD car probably imported from the USA!
What is not speculation is there are no Jaguar factory records supporting the commissioning, drawing, materials purchase, building, work hours allocation, piece work payment or outright purchase of the square sided radiator in a company where everything was tightly controlled by Mr Arthur Whittaker. Those records do however exist for the Marston and the later service replacement. There were only three major car radiator manufacturers in 1960's Britain - 'Marston Excelsior Ltd', whose history has already been detailed here, 'Serck' and 'Coventry Radiator and Presswork Ltd'.
Serck Radiators of Warwick Road, Greet, Tyseley, Birmingham.
1907 Peter Oscar Serck formed Motor Radiator Manufacturing Co
1919 Formed Serck Radiators Ltd, as a public company with ?200,000 capital of which he personally held more than half the shares, and was the Managing Director.
1922 about 180 people were employed at Serck, the radiators being made by hand, a tinsmith only having six cases and the tubes per week. 1924 The Company continued to concentrate on motor vehicle radiators, introducing some new designs to supplement the honeycomb block e.g. the film-block and fin-tube block.
1937 Aircraft radiators and oil coolers, condensers and tubes
1957 Serck Services were formed and in that year Serck Limited became the parent company of the Serck Group, with Serck Radiators becoming part of the group. Seeleys Road Works was completed in the same year.
1963 Motor Show exhibitor. Radiators.
1964 The very profitable H. O. Serck business was bought by the Serck Group when Herman Oscar retired.
1968 The last car radiator was produced, ending over 60 years involvement in the industry that made the Serck name famous. To reflect its activities more accurately, the Company?s name was changed from Serck Radiators to Serck Heat Transfer.
Coventry Radiator and Presswork Ltd of Canley, Coventry, and Leamington Spa.
Many British cars and most of the UK?s commercial vehicles, tractors and stationary engines, would be equipped with Coventry Radiators which was enjoying an international reputation. In fact by the 1960s the company was the largest manufacturer of car radiators in the country, and British cars fitted with Coventry Radiators and Presswork parts were to be found in every country in the world; amongst them would be Austin, Daimler, Armstrong Siddeley, Rootes, Standard and Triumph. Those who live in the Midlands are well aware that car makers are mainly component assemblers, buying in most of the thousands of parts they need to put together to make the vehicles they sell.
1893 Business founded by F. T. Jackson
1915 Converted into a private company Coventry Radiator Co Ltd
1926 Name changed to Coventry Radiator and Presswork Co Ltd
1949 Holding company incorporated
1952 Public company incorporated as Coventry Radiator and Presswork Holdings Co Ltd
1955 Acquired by Associated Engineering Group
1960 Manufacturer of Dravo oil-fired space heater
1963 Motor Show exhibitor. Radiators
1972 The Covrad subsidiary of Associated Engineering developed the first low-cost aluminium radiator for car
It does surprise me Sir William chose a company that was not Coventry based for Jaguar radiators (Marston were in Leeds) and I do wonder whether the 4.2 radiators came from Covrad (work in progress) as their speciality was the pressing of side tanks and other fittings into complex shapes as seen:
Both the Serck and Covrad items are clearly marked with the makers name, date code and drawing or serial number. In fact almost every component on the E-Type is marked with a makers name stamp and usually dated (instruments, wiper motor, fan motor, battery etc etc) so I would expect no different from the brass square tank's.
So Eric if you think these square tank brass radiators were factory fitted you need to find out who made them for Jaguar rather than agonising about how many are to be found.
Simon - any makers name or number on the scalloped rad from Richard's car?