Jaguar E-Type Lightweight, 1963
6-Zylinder Reihen-Frontmotor
3781 ccm, 345 PS @  6800
Robic Nr 59

Ex-vehicle of the Frankfurt racing driver Peter Lindner. Fastest E Type of its era, built to beat the Ferrari GTO.

A resident of Wiesbaden, Germany, Peter Lindner was an affluent man and run a successful business as Jaguar and Aston Martin importer and dealer. He was not afraid of racing his precious cars, and as a skilled driver he obtained a series of good results - particularly in company of his friend Peter Nöcker from Düsseldorf. The car most famously linked to Peter Lindner was this Jaguar - arguably one of the most beautiful racing machines ever built - the fifth of the twelve special E-Type Lightweights built by the factory in the Winter of 1962-1963. These cars were very different from the road going E-Type model that had been launched in the Geneva Motor Show in March of 1961, having an aluminum body shell and engine block, and were distinct from each other as well. Lindner’s car - a sweeping low-drag coupe, chassis number S850662 and registration plate 4868 WK - and partnered it with Nöcker in the 1963 1000 km of Nürburgring: the car would surprise the whole field by gloriously leading the opening lap, but soon the Ferraris flew by and it retired after only eight laps with oil pressure problems; success would come soon, though, as it won at Avus in Berlin.

The main assault of Peter Lindner Racing in 1964 would be the 24 Hours of Le Mans, and the car was especially prepared for the occasion: aiming to increase top speed in the long straights of the Sarthe circuit, the machine received a low-drag roof specially designed by Jaguar lead aerodynamicist Malcolm Sayer and, with two eyes on the reliability required to succeed in such a long event, the aluminum engine block gave way for a steel replacement. Once again Lindner shared the car with Peter Nöcker, and if the first modification helped the car to turn very fast laps during the race, the second was not able to help it to cross the finish line: in fact, it was due to a very engine seizure caused by a head gasket failure that the Jaguar retired in the sixteenth hour of the event.

In October Lindner went back to France for the 1000 km de Paris at Montlhéry, and once again the car showed much promise. Sadly, tragedy would struck during the windy and rainy race when, on the eighty-fourth lap, the Jaguar crashed against the Abarth-Simca driven by Italian Franco Patria in a horrible accident, killing both drivers and three marshals at the scene. One of these marshals was Jean Pairard, formerly one of the partners that owned small French sportscar manufacturer V.P. and a racer himself. The French police impounded the remains of Lindner’s and Patria’s cars for years, and later these changed hands several times until Guy Black, owner of the British restoration and replica construction company Lynx, acquired what was left of Lindner’s silver Jaguar. The vehicle was carefully reconstructed around a new monocoque.

From http://www.motorsportmemorial.org/update.php?db=ct&y=2005&m=2