By Dean Larson

It’s hard to say too much about Jim Kellison and Kellison Engineering. Kellison’s aerodynamic designs were a beautiful marriage of his engineering education and aviation experience, including flying fighter jets in the Korean War. It’s estimated that Kellison’s business built 1,000 bodies of Kellison’s design and something like 1,000 other bodies.

The J2 was one of Kellison’s early designs from the late 1950s. Literature for the J2 body states that it was designed for larger cars with a 102-inch wheelbase, but a 1960 Kellison catalogue lists a smaller 88-inch wheelbase. Kellison normally separated models based on donor sizes, so this appears to be an odd early convention. This Kellison J2 offered for sale on eBay is one of the latter specification and comes with a Triumph TR3 chassis donor. 

This J2 body is a particularly rare example featuring the “double bubble” roof. Said to be influenced by Zagato, small numbers of Kellison’s early designs were equipped with the enhanced roofline, and this seems to be one of eight made with three believed to exist today. The seller believes the body was built around 1953, which would indeed make it one of Kellison’s earliest builds. After being cut apart for a Ferrari chassis project that failed in the 1970s, the body was reassembled by a fiberglass expert. The original rear windshield is included with the sale.

The donor TR3 for the project clearly needs some work, but the seller has addressed some large details. The engine has been hot tanked and magnafluxed, received crankshaft work, and comes with an upgraded transmission and camshaft. The TR3 is also said to have a clean title. 

While there’s definitely some assembly required for this J2 double bubble, the final result would be one of the rarest Kellisons and would be revered in the classic fiberglass community. One of the other remaining double bubble J2s is an attractive racing example that also uses a Triumph power plant and is a testament to how this example could look when finished. See it here on eBay.