Art, The interior was re-trimmed in the 1990’s. Among the documentation that came with the car is a sample color swatch from the firm that did it. Unfortunately, it doesn’t indicate the name of the color. The swatch indicates “Mr Frank Hansen, custom auto upholstery * Foreign * Antique” in Bedford, Massachusetts. The prior owner indicated they were a well respected firm locally. It’s a pretty color with the BRG, but I’m not sure what exactly it is. I’ve applied for a JDHT certificate but have not received it yet. We’ll see what It was born with shortly.
It looks very much like the recent photos of the Jabekke car.
Admittedly the Jabbeke car was a 120. I’d still like to know what the interior color was called. My 140 OTS is ready to come out of the metal shop and go into the paint shop.
Roger, My 140 OTS has a build date of Nov. 20, 1956 and looks like it was about 75 cars prior to John’s. It also has alloy doors.
Bob
Ah - I’m informed the OTS had alloy doors. I was assuming OTS and DHC used the same materials, it seems not.
Roger (K), the discussion about aluminium skinned doors versus steel skinned doors versus all-steel doors was only applicable to FHC and DHC.
All XK140 OTS doors were all aluminium from first in Oct 1954 to last in Jan 1957.
Roger
Roger and Art,
I just received an email copy of the JDHT Certificate of my car and it did answer a couple questions.
- The Date of Manufacture was 13 December, 1956 (good guess Roger!).
- Date of Dispatch was 7 January,1957
- The interior color is indicated as “Tan”, which looks lighter on Google than what is in the car.
- The JDHT chassis, engine, body, and gearbox numbers all match the car.
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John,
13 Dec DoM - I was close, one day out.
7 Jan 1957 DoD - a Monday! Looks like the Shipping Note was prepared on the 3 Jan (Thursday), but actual dispatch held over to Monday, given still plenty of time to load, and catch the Wednesday 9 Jan sailing date.
Don’t know the date of this XK140 loading at the Liverpool Docks bound for USA, but maybe that’s your BRG OTS in the foreground.
RE your interior colour showing as being TAN on your Heritage Certificate.
There were 103 only XK140 OTS (LHD and RHD) painted BRG originally of which 37 had TAN interior, 43 had SUEDE GREEN interior and 23 had BISCUIT interior. These were the ‘standard’ available Paint/Trim combinations, anything else would have been ‘special order’ non-standard combination. You don’t advise what your original Hood (Soft-top) colour was (I already know your Bonnet was painted BRG), but of the 37 BRG/Tan cars, 9 had a Black hood colour, 1 had French Grey, 17 had Gunmetal and 1 only had Sand colour.
That’s the original factory facts.
In your earlier photo the colour of your trim/seats was questioned. I thought clearly it was meant to be TAN being one of the only three factory options, but you had already advised that the complete interior had been retrimmed, thus as with paint colours, the colour match is only as good as the diligence of whoever purchased the leather, and indeed the shade of leather colours then available. Its impossible to ‘match’ colours, whether leather or paint, on an electronic monitor, just get a general idea. So whether your new TAN leather is a good match for the 1956 original, impossible to say without seeing physically, and comparing it alongside my 1956 factory colour leather samples.
I have factory March 1950, Feb 1956 and Feb 1957 Leather sample books, and all include TAN (and only identified as being TAN) and to my eyes all three sample colours look the same shade of TAN. Later leather sample books I have from 1958, 1959, 1960, 1961 all have samples that look exactly the same shade of Tan colour, but are now identified by their Connolly Leather and Colour shade code VM3280 - the VM denotes being of Vaumol leather quality, the 3280 being the colour shade. I do note that from 1959 onwards, there was now also introduced another leather Colour LIGHT TAN as often seen in XK150s, and it is VM3104, so same quality Vaumol leather, but a lighter and to my eyes a richer/more orange shade of tan.
Regardless of what was original, with restorations we are very much in the hands of what the suppliers choose to stock and sell you, and matching leather colours isn’t yet as topical as is matching paint colours, albeit I am aware of instances where pedantic restorers have gone direct to Connolly to make up new hides with an exact leather quality and colour shade match as the Connolly archives records allow - its one thing knowing a 1956 XK140 had VM3280 Connolly leather, its another thing knowing what that means, and then getting an accurate match made and supplied.
Similar situation of course with Hood material and hood material colours. I do have original factory XK hood material sample books, but I am unaware of any supplier world wide who exactly matches the 1950s material, let alone makes any reasonably accurate effort at any colour other than Black. Things may be better now, as to be fair, I haven’t checked availability for many years. I was/am hoping to get some accurate Gunmetal hood material for my 1955 XK140MC restoration, that most probably will be accurately matched BRG paint, with as good as is available SUEDE GREEN interior.
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Wow Roger, that’s a wealth of information. Thank you so much! My original hood (soft top) color according to the JDHT was (and still is) Black. So I gather mine was one of 9 BRG/Tan/Black XK140 OTS. I wonder how many of those were LHD MC or SE’s? I must say I think BRG is one of my favorite colors for an XK and I feel very fortunate to have come across such a nice example.
Best regards,
John
Thank Anders Clausager, then Chief Archivist of the factory JDHT, for his book JAGUAR XK140/150 IN DETAIL for the breakdown of colours and colour combination statistics. He did a comprehensive analysis of the factory records for all XK140s built, but unfortunately does not break down colour statistics to LHD/RHD nor ‘Standard’, ‘Special Equipment’ and ‘Special Equipment with C-type engine’ as named by the factory (or in USA local terminology XK140, XK140M and XK140MC). A few of us had been separately trying to make some sense out of the colour mix and indeed colour combination mix, but nothing can approach of course this JDHT 100% data reconciliation.
I can advise from my own data, that of the 107 OTS that were BRG, 90 were LHD and 17 were RHD and that off those 17 RHD cars at least two of them were BRG/tan/black XK140MC - S800040 and S800068.
My LHD OTS colour statistics are pretty patchy at best, and although I do identify several BRG cars of the 90 made, I don’t show any of these as having Tan interior, most simply as ? (unknown)
So all I can say is really yours is one of a maximum of 7 Left-Hand-Drive OTS, with BRG/Tan/Black combination.
Maybe some one else can comment
Indeed S800068 sold new to Northern Ireland is now 100% restored and features in JAGUAR XK140/150 IN DETAIL, claiming with its correct Tan coloured interior that actually looks more like a beige colour (or biscuit maybe) and not anything at all like Tan.
S800040 is an Australian new car, now fully restored and on debut at the 2004 National Concours (held in Canberra) it was 1st place overall Champion. I was actual Chief Judge at the 2004 Nationals, but inexplicably don’t have any good interior photos, but the attached poster shows at least a glimpse of its restored Tan interior.
Two other RHD cars I record as having BRG with Tan interior, but with Gunmetal hoods.
But the other 13 RHD BRG cars I don’t record interior and or hood colours.
Roger
Thanks for that advice/pics on your H6 carbies - a very specialist interest of mine - but I may start a new thread, this one is now dominated by paint and colour combinations
Thanks Roger, The interior of that Canberra car color does look very similar to mine. I contacted the prior owner of my car, he said the firm that did the interior (Hansen) matched it as best as they could to the original. It would have been nice if they had cut off a swatch of the original to keep with the new sample for posterity.
If for no other reason, reading your posts keeps me here!!!