Year of manufacture 1967 Recorded mileage 1371km Asking price €198,500 Vendor Thiesen, Hamburg, Germany; 0049 040 450 3430; thiesen-automobile.com WHEN IT WAS NEW Price n/a Max power 345bhp Max torque n/a 0-60mph n/a Top speed n/a Mpg n/a
It is likely that your first thought when you turned to this page was, ‘What on earth is that?!’ – which is exactly what crossed my mind upon seeing it. At first glance it looks like a late-night product of using Photoshop after a drink or two but, believe it or not, this is a real, fully functioning, road-legal vehicle.
It won’t come as a surprise to learn that this creation, for sale with Thiesen in Hamburg, is a one-of-two prototype. It combines elements of a low-slung ’30s roadster with the boxy brilliance of a desert-ready Land-Rover. It started life as a 1967 Series II Landie before German marque enthusiasts Thomas Bell and Holger Kalvelage got hold of it around a decade ago. The two seats have been moved back to just ahead of the rear axle to give a classic long-bonnet look like no other. Under that 2m-long bonnet lies a 4.6-litre Range Rover V8 that Coventry-based JE Engineering has bored out to 5 litres, apparently giving 345bhp, while its handmade aluminium body was formed at Lorenz und Knorr-Held in Erlangen, just north of Nuremberg in Germany.
This machine might have the look of a rough-and-ready, go-anywhere workhorse, but upon closer inspection it appears to be thoughtfully and expertly crafted. Yes, you can remove the hardtop and fold down the windscreen to go full desert-spec. But from the nappa-leather-covered bucket seats with harness belts, the leather-topped dashboard with white-faced Smiths dials, the Becker Mexico radio and U-shaped roll hoops, to the wood-lined floor and load area, the stainless-steel side pipe
