Spa Classic Tour and Track Parade | September 2019

SPOTLIGHT on Le Mans Coupes Hopefully this will be a regular feature for a few issues of your magazine. Starting with Le Mans Coupes in this issue, we aim to feature leading manufacturers/suppliers of GT40 replicas. To select ‘who comes first’ I employed advanced technology (shortest matchstick) to choose which company appears in which issue. Here Oliver Hulme tells the Le Mans Coupes story: “ Le Mans Coupes was conceived in 1998 and came to fruition in 2003 with the arrival of the first Shelby Daytona Cobra. Initially focused exclusively on the Daytona Cobra, the factory, Hi Tech Automotive PTY, Port Elizabeth, South Africa where all Superformance cars are built, swiftly announced their project to build continuation series GT40’s under licence to Safir Spares Ltd, the rights holder to the GT40 name.

Nigel, founder and owner of Le Mans Coupes, believed there was potential for the GT40 and became the sole agent for the UK and Ireland. His foresight paid off with over 45 cars having been imported and built through him and his team to date. The range of GT40s has expanded over the years.

You can design a car to your exact spec depending on required use and ownership objectives. All our cars are built from the original drawing including the monocoque chassis. It is dimensionally and aesthetically 100% true to the originals with over 85% of the chassis being interchangeable with the original. Options for 100% accurate chassis now exist although they are typically reserved for FIA HTP cars. Based near Gatwick, Le Mans Coupes is now going through a period of growth after Nigel appointed son Oliver to head up the sales and marketing functions. Investment is happening in the business to develop both our public image and customer service offering. The website now reflects the quality of our products and with a showroom in development for the tail end of 2019, the future is looking bright.

How we help our customers:
We are the official and exclusive UK agents for Superformance. We work with clients to spec their dream cars. All cars are factory built to very high standards. They are imported as complete ‘turnkey minus’ cars; i.e. less engine, transaxle, battery, tires and fluids. As a business we specialise in building these cars to current UK road legislation, passing the IVA test and registering the car for clients and delivering them as turn key cars. However, clients are very welcome to undertake the build from turn key minus themselves and we offer various levels of consultancy to aid in this undertaking and can be as active as required to get the car finished.

We also consult clients as to the right car for them. A predominantly track focused car will have a different spec to a road car. Options include but are not limited to:

MK1 or MK2 body, 289 – 427 Ford
V8 (typically a Ford Motorsport unit or Roush power plant), Quaife RFQ 5 speed transaxle, Bilstein or Ohlin shock absorbers, Gurney Tab, Canard Fins, Gurney Bubble, Leather or Alcantara seats, Right hand or Left hand drive, Sill mounted or centre gear change, historic liveries or custom colour scheme, BRM or Halibrand Wheels, Door Locks With our cars having achieved great success on the racing scene, the factory now offer toolroom copy cars or 1075 as well as pre ’66 FIA HTP cars allowing owners to compete in historic racing events around the globe.
Contact us to see how we can help you achieve your GT40 dream.”
Oliver can be contacted at:

Mobile: +44 (0) 7947 301 012
Tel: +44 (0) 1342 712 774
Email: oliver@lemanscoupes.com Web: www.lemanscoupes.com
Le Mans Coupes
Stubbits, Down Park, Turners Hill Road, Crawley Down, West Sussex,
RH10 4HQ