I am sorry, I am on vacation, so less frequent access to e-mail…
I was actually asked to write an article once about Triplex from the Healey crowd which also helped, but never got to finish it.
Here is section of it, which describes the logo:
Logo Design
It’s difficult to say when Triplex introduced the logo. Motorsports Magazine article dated 1932 states: “sheets are branded with the famous three X’s, the trade mark of the firm”. Logos must have been then introduced before 1932.
The first logo sample I have found dated from 1934 is from an MG:
Here, we take a look at the '50ies logo, which consisted of few distinctive elements:
• US standard designation,
• TRIPLEX brand and XXX logo,
• Date of manufacture,
• Safety glass type,
• Other standard designations,
• BSI Kite logo.
As each of these elements evolved throughout the years, let us take a look at each of them in detail.
American Standard designation which (according to ANSI) should be placed above the logo. This designation was introduced at the beginning of Q2 1948. The letters ASWS or AS were placed above the logo:
ASWS, stands (probably) for “American (National) Standard – Windshield” later changed to AS1
AS – used on side glass at the time when ASWS was used on the windshield
Sometime between Q2 ’52 and Q4 ’52 a change in these designations occurred. (the precise date to be verified). From this time on until today letters AS1 or AS2 were placed above the logo (later anywhere within the logo):
AS1 - glass with at least 70% transmission and can be used anywhere on a vehicle.
AS2 - is used for side glass.
AS1/AS2 Markings are used up to date.
TRIPLEX brand and trademark- the XXX logo. The logo was inscribed in a circle made of 4 arches for laminated glass. Toughened glass logo was without the circle.
The TRIPLEX brand was inscribed on the top of the circle. The Triplex font was the same as all the other letters until the end of 1962. From Q1 ’63 a somewhat thicker and larger font was used, however this is not applicable for the XKs
Glass type was specified at the bottom of the logo: TOUGHENED, PLATE or SUNDYM. Word PLATE was changed to LAMINATED in 1963. SUNDYM was used for dimmed glass.
Year and glass type designation was the next part of the screen marking (until the end of 1964). Year was given in 2 digits, the letters before and after the year dating have the following meaning:
L – Laminated
T – Toughened, heat treated
P – Plate Glass
S – Sheet Glass
V – for vehicle use??, used until ‘64
F – Float Glass, used since ’63 when float glass begun to be available
WF – Front windscreen quality – used since 65
M3 or M6 – Manufacturer codes, describing different models of glass – used since ‘65
French Homologation Designation, used since ’54. It consists of “AGRÉÉ” and the standard designation: TP.GS.6
-
AGRÉÉ meaning certified, authorized, (dots are accents)
TP.GS. meaning “Transport Publique, Gestion de Securite” – the homologation body) and 6 is the homologation number.
In ’66 the French homologation designation changed from the two line format to single line and now read: AG TPGS6.
German approval was introduced in ’67. It was a sine wave followed by letter D and a number. D90 was used on ‘60s Triplex glass.
The so called Kite - registered certification mark of the British Standards Institution:
The ‘Kite’ mark is an arrangement of the letters B, S and I.
Some of the Triple X logos included a dot in the middle. I was unable to trace it’s meaning. An example of such dot, from 1950 XK120 660115 (logo date: '49 Q3):
(Roger, once again, many thanks for the photo!)
They appear throughout the years, like on this MG TD from '53 (logo dating '52, Q4):
Logo Dating
Over the years TRIPLEX has changed the dating format many times. Luckily, we are interested only in a period from ’53 to ’67.
Logo dating consists of year designation and quarter designation:
Year Designation
PLATE glass, from 1950 up to 1964: The year is given in a two digit format, as described above. (Glass prior to 1950 used same dating as TOUGHENED glass.)
TOUGHENED glass throughout the entire period and LAMINATED glass since 1965: Year was coded by a dot under one of the letters in the 9 letter words LAMINATED or TOUGHENED. Dot under the first letter meant ‘51 (or ’61) and so on. No dot meant year ’50 (or ’70).
Quarter designation
The quarter designation is provided by the dots over letters in TRIPLEX. It changed during production of the XK Jaguar:
T =January/February/March
R = April/May/June
I =July/August/September
P= October/November/December
From ‘54 (to ’69) dots over the following letters mean the following manufacture month:
T =January/February/March
R = April/May/June
E =July/August/September
X= October/November/December
It’s fair to say that glass predated the production date of the car by about 3 months – it seems that the logistics and JIT (Just-In-Time) manufacturing was to be yet discovered byTRIPLEX…
The height of the logo also varied depending on the version and year used:
- 24.5mm – Q1 ’50 – Q4 ‘53
- 28.5mm – Q1 ’54 – Q2 ‘55
- 26.5mm – Q3 ’55 – Q4 ‘62
Here is the logo calligraphy:
And samples from:
Q1 1950 (Thanks to Godfrey):
First AS ANSI designation I managed to locate, thanks to Peter in Australia (MG TD car):
First French standard designation on a XK120DHC 21 April 1954 (Logo date: '54 Q1),
(thanks to Roger):
Not quite related to XK, but a MK IX Chassis 791670BW, July '59
(thanks to Steve Kennedy)
And one of XK150 from 13.12.1960
(thanks to Robert Davey)
And first e-type I have:
A61 Q2 E-type S1 875343
