"Glassless Roof" Jensen Coupé

[NigelK]

The rarest of the rare?

https://www.carandclassic.co.uk/car/C1227161" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Krusty]

looks like its a "left overs" car utilising the last parts lying about.

that said i think it works and i guess it would have shaved a fair chunk off the build costs at the factory

those bumpers are growing on me too

[Chris_R]

Richard Calver may be along and provide more information about this but according to his books only one Coupe was made with a solid roof and saloon style side windows and that was an RHD prototype which only had single bumpers. There is a picture of it at the liquidation auction.

Krusty - I think the double bumpers were part of the answer to the US 5mph impact regulations.

[Richard Calver]

Aside from the prototype, there was also this one, done specially for van Hool - 2723/1986. It was not known to me until it turned up earlier this year. Double bumpers are correct on a LHD USA style Coupé.

[Jens]

Thank you Richard. Again what learned.

[shaun]

Richard,
I presume van Hool is the Belgian well known coach and bus builder?

[Richard Calver]

Indeed, van Hool is Belgian by origin but they had a plant in Ireland at that time and now they are international. I first heard at the factory back in the 1980s about the van Hool Coupé. The recollection was that the glass roof leaked (as they all did) so the car came back to be converted to an all metal roof. My assumption from this was that the car must have been located in England/Ireland and thus be a RHD. The chassis file on this late example has no useful information (not even the drive configuration) so that's where it rested until the car came to notice a few months ago. My other assumption was that a glass roof Coupé which was turned into a metal roof version must have had the opera windows at the side, like one of the prototypes, but no, as you can see, it was built with a saloon roof, or at least it was converted that way. You could speculate about why this was the preferred route, given the long period in which the conversion was underway, but there it is. The conversion job was raised in December 1975, the tag plate on the car is July 1976 and the car was invoiced in November 1976 to van Hool. As the car stands today, the interior has been retrimmed and the paint colour changed as compared with the factory record, but there may well be inconsistencies in the scant records. Without records of the car's life in Europe to complete the picture, you wouldn't know why that was.