By now, we all know TVR as the fledgling automaker that made charming sports cars featuring lightweight construction and a variety of engine choices ranging from mild to wild. The car that started it all was the Grantura, which was as delicate as they came and equipped with a variety of components that represented peak parts bin raiding at the time. Still, TVR managed to build a compelling first offer for a real-deal production sports car that would go on to race at LeMans and Sebring. Find this rare early model listed here on eBay in Texas with one bid to $1,500 and no reserve.

The Granatura was the brainchild of Trevor Wilkinson, who was the founder of TVR. Wilkinson has plenty of experience with chassis construction but building a car from scratch was new territory. With one employee and a vision of a glass reinforced plastic car body above a tubular steel chassis that they had built on a previous venture, Wilkinson embarked on bringing his vision to life. As was customary with small-scale manufacturers at the time, Wilkinson pillaged key mechanical components from Ford, Volkswagen, Austin Healey and others. The running gear in the earliest Granturas typically came from Ford in the form of a non-crossflow 109E engine. The seller is including a non-matching Ford crossflow engine and block in the sale.

The photos show a car that has evidently been in pieces for a while. There’s no information given about how this TVR came to be this way, but it’s obvious it was taken down for a restoration that never happened. The body panels all show some evidence of prior repair work and given this is a Texas car, you would hope corrosion would be at a minimum. However, the seller mentions that the chassis is included but “….has rust and is missing tubes.” While the body appears to be sagging in the top photo, it actually seems to  correctly resemble the stance that Grantura has when assembled and on the ground. Other items included of note include a brand new windshield, which has to be near impossible to find.

The dashboard is a surprise to see, as it looks reasonably complete and not destroyed by the sun. In addition, given how popular the Grantura was with racing teams and sole proprietors when new, you would think a car in disassembled condition like this would show evidence of being abused and quickly pieced back together multiple times. However, I would argue that with bits like the new windshield and the dash apparently not hacked up for aftermarket gauges that this is simply a case of a restoration project that ran out of time. Do you think it’s possible to put the Grantura back together with the limited assortment of included parts?