This is a rare 1967 Astra X-300 GT that was recently uncovered in a garage in Woodstock, Georgia. The car is largely complete, with the body, chassis, suspension, and some of the interior in place, and it comes with a title.
The Astra X-300 GT is an American sports car from the 1960s that was offered in both factory-built and kit car form. It’s not known exactly how many were made in total, but no two are quite the same.
Fast Facts – The Astra X-300 GT
- The Astra X-300 GT was created by Jim Kellison, an Air Force veteran with a background in engineering. Kellison founded Kellison Engineering and Design in the late 1950s, bringing his expertise in aerodynamics and a passion for sports cars into the burgeoning American kit car industry.
- Combining a potent engine with its lightweight build, the Astra X-300 GT excelled in both road and racing environments. It was celebrated as an affordable yet powerful alternative to more costly European sports cars, balancing performance with accessibility, and often besting its European rivals on track.
- The Astra X-300 GT was emblematic of ’50s and ’60s American fiberglass car culture, centered around custom-built sports cars that were often assembled in people’s home garages. No two examples of the Astra X-300 GT were built to the exact same specification, and it’s not known how many were made in total.
- The car you see here is a 1967 Astra X-300 GT that was discovered in a garage in Georgia, still with its second owner. It’s powered by a 289 V8 which is running, but it’s going to need a full restoration and it’s now being offered for sale.
The Great Jim Kellison
Born James Frank Kellison in Seattle, Jim Kellison would move to California as a young man and become part of the rapidly growing hot rod scene as a teenager. It would be in the world of hot rods that he cut his teeth learning about automotive engineering, bodywork, and engine tuning.
This is Jim Kellison with one of his creations. Many Kellison J series cars went racing and achieved excellent results in the early 1960s.
In his late teens Jim joined the United States Air Force, he long be enamored with aircraft and aircraft design, having been a keen builder of model planes when he was younger. This fascination with aircraft would later have a significant influence on his automobile designs.
After leaving the USAF Jim opened his own body and fender repair shop, at the age of just 22. He would spend the next few years working in the field, both in his own shops and working for other people, building a broad base of experience in the process.
It was around this time in the early 1950s that fiberglass was becoming a popular material for constructing car bodies. It was lightweight, relatively inexpensive, and easy to form into complex shapes with the use of moulds – vastly easier to turn into car bodies than aluminum or steel.
Jim began work on his first J-series car design in 1957, he created a steel tube and wire frame, then used plaster of Paris to create a smooth surface to create the fiberglass mould. Within two years Kellison cars began appearing in American automotive magazines including MotorTrend.
Beginning with the Kellison J-4 the company would produce a number of models, each designed to fit onto different chassis. These models included the J-4, J-5, J-2, J-3, and the J-6 Panther. Later designs would include the Astra X-300 GT, and the company produced some replicas based on the Ford GT40 and the Shelby Cobra due to popular demand.
The Astra X-300 GT
Kellison Cars had been founded back in the 1950s and become one of the best-known kit car manufacturers in the United States. By the mid-1960s many of the original J-series car designs were being made by a company called Allied Fiberglass under the Astra model name.
This garage find Astra X-300 GT has now been rolled out into the sunlight, amazingly they managed to get the engine running.
At its core the Astra X-300 GT was an updated and improved variant of the original Kellison J-4. The height of the roofline had been increased by two inches to give more headroom, there were some subtle changes to the body, and a newly reshaped grille.
The X-300 GT body could be fitted to the proprietary Astra chassis, which was based on the Kellison chassis which had been developed back in the 1950s. Those who wanted to use their own chassis could also fit the body to a 1955 – 1957 Chevrolet chassis, or to a Corvette chassis, with many choosing that latter option as the engine, transmission, suspension, and brakes could all be left in place which made the build far easier.
It’s not known how many examples of the X-300 GT were made, some were bought as kits and never completed while others were modified extensively, and some were mistakenly called Kellisons even though they were technically Astras.
In recent years there has been a surge in interest around these 1950s and 1960s-era low-volume American sports cars. They used to be largely unknown but now even major automotive events like the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance have featured them in their own classes on the main lawn alongside Ferraris and Duesenbergs.
The 1967 Kellison Astra X-300 GT Shown Here
The car you see here was uncovered in a garage in Woodstock, Georgia still in the possession of its second owner. This vehicle was complete and both running and driving before it was tucked away in the garage for safekeeping.
These are some blueprints of the Astra X-300 GT, the car is based on the J-series Kellisons of the 1950s, vehicles with design that was at least 10 years ahead of their time.
It has since been bought by a new owner who planned to restore it, but now realizes he doesn’t have the time and wants to sell it, in the hopes that someone else will get it back on the road. The car is largely complete with a running 289 V8 under the hood and it’s rolling on its own chassis.
He’s now accepting offers for the car around the valuation of $25,000 – $30,000 USD and you can find the listing on Facebook Marketplace here if you’d like to read more about it or register to bid. I have included a screenshot of the listing below for posterity, should the original listing be deleted.
This is the original Facebook Marketplace listing for the Astra X-300 GT. Image courtesy of Facebook.
Images courtesy of Facebook Marketplace
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