Bouillot-Helsel

Bouillot Helsel Inc. operated from Harbour House, South Esplanade, Saint Peter Port, Guernsey, with promotional or registered connections also reported in Monaco. Its entire documented full-size automobile venture unfolded in 1983. At that year's London Motorfair the company unveiled an opulently modernized Jaguar E-Type Series 1 roadster and offered equivalents at approximately £50,000–£55,000, several times the value of an ordinary used E-Type and more than some period racing-car replicas. Promotion emphasized exceptional hand finish, cream-and-burgundy paint, unusually fine calfskin or leather, a burr-walnut dashboard, matching Italian-made luggage repeatedly stamped with the Bouillot-Helsel device, bespoke wheel hardware and gold-plated keys. Mechanically the car received a synchronized five-speed Jaguar gearbox, uprated suspension and brakes. Its construction history is disputed. Contemporary coverage repeated the claim that the car was built from new Oldham & Crowther monocoque and body components; the surviving vehicle's Jaguar identity, chassis 860402 and later auction research describe a 1964 right-hand-drive fixed-head coupé converted to a left-hand-drive open two-seater. The catalog preserves both claims and treats the physical chassis history as evidence that this was a restomod/conversion, not a wholly independent replica chassis. The original 3,781 cc Jaguar six was reported at 265 hp. Contemporary response combined admiration for workmanship with ridicule of the price and grandiose marketing, and no buyer-supported series followed. Knowledgeable Jaguar historians believe the Motorfair car is the sole completed full-size example. It later appeared in collections and auctions, selling for US$93,500 in 2014. Sources also credit the company with reduced-scale replicas of Le Mans racers, including the 1982 Rothmans Porsche 956, but no dimensions, propulsion, road legality or production evidence survives; they are therefore recorded as miniatures rather than invented automobile models. The complete qualifying range is one E-Type Roadster in 1983, and the company and marque cease in the same year.

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