Meticulously rebuilt and reimagined in California, this 62 year old Jaguar E-Type FHC is better than brand new. Restored with painstaking precision - the E-Type’s recommissioner was a surgeon - this is one Jag that’s going to live up to the promise of those show-stopping looks. There’s not a single part that’s not been examined, replaced or refurbished. What’s more this definitive 1960s British sports car is now up for sale.
You’ll know the back story already. How the E-Type is in effect the road-going sibling of the Le Mans-winning D-Type with its signature aerodynamic fin. How, even before the first car rolled off the production line, super-confident Jaguar bosses advertised their new baby as having a top speed of 150 mph. Luckily it did. And how the Geneva show example was driven overnight from Coventry to Switzerland, arriving just in time to be unveiled at the 1961 Geneva Motor Show.

Those early E-Types have nothing on the hand-wrought build and finish of the car you see here. Located for his surgeon client by former Jaguar engineer Dave Ferguson, who now runs high-end Californian restorers Images Autobody, the E-Type was an abandoned project. Already in carefully labelled and indexed pieces, the 1962 E-Type was ready to be newly hand-reassembled, to a standard unheard of on the original Jaguar production line in Coventry.

1962 Jaguar E-Type FHC: The finer details
Most obvious visual difference is the Le Mans-style all-aluminium bonnet, chosen to save weight and featuring integrated driving and fog lights. Revered Jaguar in-line six cylinder XK engine is sculpturally revealed when the front bodywork - forward hinged of course - is lifted. Engine has been stripped and rebuilt, fitted with Delong sports camshaft and performance cylinder head. Gearbox has been rebuilt and there’s a fully upgraded cooling system featuring new water pump and more efficient radiator. Overall idea was to add contemporary drivability without sacrificing originality.

The E-Type’s body was fully stripped down and bead blasted prior to powder coating and painted with what the restorers call the "correct but later 1965-67 colour, Opalescent Silver Grey (green tint)”. Images Autobody are renowned for their obsessive approach to paintwork and these images show just how obsessive. And for the record we’re loving the colourway. Interior too: fully retrimmed in leather with subtle but significant upgrades to instrumentation.

If you want to see this one-of-a-kind pristine E-Type, it’s available to view. Just take a trip to Miami - it’s lovely this time of year, we understand - and locate the North America showroom of Munich-based collectible cars specialists Schaltkulisse. Don’t be distracted - oh look there’s a 1955 Ferrari 250 Europa GT - and focus on the gleaming grey of the E-Type in front of you. Then take out the £200,000 that you’ve brought with you and hand it over. There. Now this remarkable piece of perfection - a key part of British sports car history - is all yours. We’ll even drive the E-Type home for you if you ask nicely.

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