Triplex glass and date coding.

I have been helping a fellow J owner with various parts for his J type restoration. During our e-mail exchanges I mentioned the quick way to date a vehicle was to check the glass. he had never heard of this and so I explained how it works.

Remember you are only dating the glass of the vehicle and it is best to check as many of the pieces of glass as you can.

First you need to have an idea what age the vehicle might be, well to the nearest 10 years at least.

You now need to look for two dots, one dot will be above the letters T,R,E, or X

 (in TRIPLEX) and gives the quarter of the year the glass was manufactured.

T=Jan,Feb,March

R=April,May,June

E=July,Aug,Sept,

X=Oct,Nov,Dec.

The second dot to look out for is below one of the letters in the word TOUGHENED.

T=1, O=2 etc (if no dot the year is zero).

Therefore a July 1955 J type should have glass with a dot above the letter "E" in TRIPLEX and a dot below the letter "H" in TOUGHENED.

This is only a rough guide but might be of interest to you all.