Today we will look at the Amelia Island Auction that will take place next week (3 March 2022) by the auction house Bonhams on the Fernandina Beach Golf Club in Amelia Island (in Florida, just in the north of Jacksonville). There will be many iconic cars for sale including a 1955 Porsche 550 Spyder, a yellow 1960 Mercedes-Benz 300SL Roadster and a beautiful 1954 Jaguar XK120 SE Coupe. If I have time, I'll try to write a post before the sale on the most beautiful cars of this sale.

But if you read my posts about car, you know that I prefer to focus on the rarer or lesser known car manufacturers for the general public. I consider myself to be in this category because I learn about them every day. As it's the case with this beautiful 1952 Allard J2X Two Seater Sports :

I only knew this car manufacturer Allard Motor Company by name. I find it perfect to dive into its history with this J2X, two-seater car, whose starting price is estimated at $US 400,000

History of Allard J2X

First, we'll back over the history of the English car manufacturer Allard. It was founded in 1945 Sydney Allard, English rally and hillclimb driver born in 1910. It produces cars with American V8 engines on light chassis, a bit like Sunbeam Tiger and AC Cobra will do in the 60's. Unfortunately, the adventure didn't last long, a little more than 10 years, because in 1958 the company declared bankruptcy having produced about 1,900 cars. Allard was a competitor and a racer like Enzo Ferrari producing street car in order to finance his passion for competition.

In 1946, Sidney Allard developped the J1, a two-seater competition car producing 140 hp with a top speed 137 kmh. As the success was here, Allard decided in 1949 to produce new roadster, J2, with an American engine from Mercury or Ford. The car was very successful in competition (third place during the 1950 Le Mans with Sydney Allard behind the wheel). In 1951, he improved the model with the J2X (extended). The changes were minor especially a larger cockpit for American drivers.

This exemple (chassis 3059) was produced in 1959 in Texas. The first buyer was a gift from a daily driver to his wife, but she hate the car 😀. The second owner participated in a few races with this car equipped with a Chrysler Hemi engine then Cadillac 331. Than Bill Bauder acquired the car and installed a powerful Ford 406 Nascar engine producing 550 hp 😲. The car was restored in 2014 both the cosmetic side and the engine.

Specification

This Allard J2X is now equipped with 406ci OHV Ford V8 engine mated to 4 speed manual transmission producing 400 hp at 4,000 rpm.

Durint its twelve months restoration, the car was finished in olive green over a beautiful mahogany leather interior. Beautiful car but not adapted for the Canadian winter, especially with all the snow that fell today. So I'll not bid on this model to the delight of my bank account 😀