Sometimes, a car gets so badly damaged or neglected that it seems hopeless to restore it to its former glory. But at Classic Motor Cars (CMC) of Bridgnorth, England, undertaking such a restoration isn't impossible. In fact, CMC was able to fully restore a Lightweight Low-Drag 1963 Jaguar E-type Coupé, which crashed in 1964 taking its driver's life. Let's take a closer look at this restored classic car.

Rare Lightweight Racing Coupé

Linder Nocker 1963 Jaguar E-type Lightweight Low-Drag original
Via Extravaganzi

The Lightweight Jaguar E-type was considered rare even when it was still fresh from production as only 12 units of its racing kind were built. Only one of these all-aluminum racing E-types was factory modified for German Jaguar importer Peter Lindner to Malcolm Sayer’s Low Drag body design. This means that this coupe is truly one of a kind.

Lindner and Peter Nöcker actually managed to race this rare Lightweight Low-Drag Jaguar E-type Coupé at the 1964 Le Mans. A few weeks after the famed endurance race, the Lindner-Nöcker Lightweight E-type got involved in a tragic crash at the Montlhery circuit in France, taking Lindner's life and three others. The mangled car was then impounded, and nobody thought that it was possible to restore it because of its bad shape.

Restored With 90% Original Parts

Linder Nocker 1963 Jaguar E-type Lightweight Low-Drag crash
Via Classic Motor Cars

Then came Peter Neumark, owner of CMC. With assistance from Lindner's family, CMC worked hard and skillfully to restore this Lightweight Low-Drag Jaguar E-type using more than 90% of its original parts. Starting off from mangled metal parts -- including the body panels – they gathered old photographs and cine footage of the car. CMC also received assistance from Peter Wilson, who was in Jaguar's Competition Department in 1964.

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Then, the panels were flattened, repaired, and reformed into their original shape. CMC then riveted and spot welded together the structure using original construction methods. After four years and more than 7,000 man-hours of restoration work, the Lightweight Low-Drag 1963 Jaguar E-type Coupé was resurrected and shown to the public in 2011.

2011 Restoration

Linder Nocker 1963 Jaguar E-type Lightweight Low-Drag restored
Via Classic Motor Cars

The restoration of this ultra-rare Jaguar E-type was so challenging and unprecedented that it was picked as the winner of the Restoration of the Year Award at the International Historic Motoring Awards 2011.

Source: Classic Motor Cars, Dailymail

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