This is a 1976 Piper P2, it’s a little-known, low-volume British sports car that competed in-period with the likes of Lotus, TVR, Caterham, Ginetta, Marcos, and others.
The P2 was developed as an improvement on the earlier Piper GT and GTT models, the styling is completely unique and it was considered well ahead of its time when it debuted in the 1970s. It’s not known exactly how many were made but we only rarely see them come up for sale.
Fast Facts: The Piper P2
- The Piper P2 is a rare, lightweight British sports car developed as a more refined successor to the earlier GT and GTT models. It has unusual styling, a tubular steel chassis, and a lightweight fiberglass body. Surviving examples appear for sale only occasionally, because overall Piper production stayed low during the company’s relatively short lifespan.
- Piper Cars began in the mid-1960s as an offshoot of Piper Tuning in Kent. The team built racing and road cars with fiberglass shells and simple tubular steel spaceframes, as well as widely available Ford mechanical parts. The line evolved from the Sports Racer to the GT and GTT before the P2 became the company’s most advanced model.
- This P2 has been owned by the same keeper since 1979 and received a body-off restoration in 1997 that included a strengthened, zinc-galvanised subframe and a fresh Stage 2 Ford Crossflow engine. A 2023 respray returned the body to its original tone. The refreshed cabin shows light wear and the car presents cleanly.
- Power comes from a 1.7 liter Ford Crossflow fitted with twin Weber 40 DCOEs, linked to a 4-speed Ford 2000E gearbox and a Capri rear axle with a 3.77:1 ratio. Maintenance has been ongoing with new cooling and electrical components fitted recently. Minor oil weeps are noted but the car is said to run well.
History Speedrun: Piper Cars
Piper Cars was founded in the mid-1960s as a small, garagiste-type company out of Campbell’s Garage in Kent, England. The company was similar to the likes of TVR, Marcos, Ginetta, Lotus, and countless other low-volume automakers in England that built sports cars with fiberglass bodies and tubular steel chassis – with engines, suspension, brakes, and many other parts sourced from common production cars from the time.
Thanks to the unusual design of the Piper GTT, the side windows don’t wind down, instead the sunroof is popped open when the occupants need fresh air.
The first car made by the company was the Piper Sports Racer introduced in 1966. It was an elegantly designed open-topped sports car with a lightweight fiberglass body, a tubular steel spaceframe chassis, and a choice of engines to suit various racing classes.
The team at Piper quickly realized they could do a roaring trade if they developed a hardtop coupe that could be set up as either a road-legal car or a race car. The result was the Piper GT, it was styled by Tony Hilder, the same man who had designed the Piper Sports Racer, and it was introduced at the 1967 Racing Car Show.
The interest around the Piper GT was immense, pre-orders flooded in and the company looked set to be a significant new competitor in the British hand-built car industry.
As was probably predictable, the company faced some quality control issues as they ramped up production. This resulted in the Piper GT being modified to address these concerns, and turned into the Piper GTT.
Company owner Brian Sherwood tragically died in late 1969, shortly after the company passed into the hands of Piper employees Bill Atkinson and Tony Waller who did Brian proud – keeping the company going and developing new models.
Their most significant new model development was the Piper P2. It was a marked improvement over earlier Piper cars and was based loosely on the earlier GTT. The Piper P2 had a slew of major improvements to the chassis, body, and interior – making it the most refined car Piper had built up until that point in history.
Sadly, after the mid-1970s demand for cars of this type had begun to wane, in part due to less-costly sports cars from major manufacturers becoming available. It’s estimated that 80 to 100+ Piper cars were built across all model lines, and today they offer a wonderful alternative to other fiberglass-bodied British sports cars of the time.
The 1976 Piper P2 Shown Here
The 1976 Piper P2 shown here was built in 1976 and has had the same owner since December 1979, an unusually long ownership for a British sports car of this type – and perhaps an indication of just how much the owner loved it.
The car underwent a full body-off restoration in 1997, during which the subframe was strengthened and zinc-galvanised, the interior was refreshed, and a new Stage 2 Ford Crossflow engine was installed. A respray in 2023 brought the fiberglass shell to a finish described as the closest possible match to its original color.
The odometer shows just under 7,000 miles, though it was recalibrated during the 1997 rebuild, and the seller notes garage maintenance and servicing as required across more than four decades.
Overall condition appears to be one of this car’s strongest selling points – the refreshed interior shows light wear consistent with occasional use, while the paintwork looks tidy for a car of this vintage thanks to the respray – a roll cage is also fitted for safety.
The car is powered by a 1.7 liter Ford Crossflow inline-four topped with twin 40 Weber DCOE carburetors, power is sent back through a 4-speed manual Ford 2000E gearbox and a 3.0 liter Capri rear axle with a 3.77:1 ratio.
The current engine was supplied new in 1997 by Anglian Engines and (fittingly) runs a Stage 2 Piper cam, an all-steel rocker assembly and a Kenlowe fan. Recent work includes the fitment of a new alternator, radiator, and pipework, and while minor oil weeps are noted at the gearbox and axle, the seller reports that it runs strong.
It’s now being offered for sale on Car & Classic out of Surrey in the United Kingdom and you can visit the listing here if you’d like to read more about it or place a bid.
Images courtesy of Car & Classic
Articles that Ben Branch has written have been covered on CNN, Popular Mechanics, Smithsonian Magazine, Road & Track Magazine, the official Pinterest blog, the official eBay Motors blog, BuzzFeed, Autoweek Magazine, Wired Magazine, Autoblog, Gear Patrol, Jalopnik, The Verge, and many more.
Silodrome was founded by Ben back in 2010, in the years since the site has grown to become a world leader in the alternative and vintage motoring sector, with well over a million monthly readers from around the world and many hundreds of thousands of followers on social media.
