Our facility is equipped with a complete machine-shop, which allows us to restore vintage parts or fabricate quality replacement parts when the originals are unobtainable. We also can customize parts or modify whole vehicles to suit an individual client’s practical needs or satisfy his whimsical desires. Cooper Technica, Inc. also locates rare and unusual cars for clients.
1385 N. NORTH BRANCH, CHICAGO, ILLINOIS 60622
TEL (312) 440-0711 • FAX (312) 440-0723
Restoring Museum-Quality Vehicles
To maximize a vehicle’s value, restoration starts with the mechanical side. Cosmetics are important, but they are secondary, we believe, to function. This implies an approach—to save original parts when possible, to seek out original factory parts of the same vintage if needed, to thoughtfully replace or fabricate new parts when necessary and above all, to make our work invisible. Occasionally this goal requires us to modify the original designs to work with more modern materials or components. This, we believe, should be done discreetly. As the mechanical work reaches completion, we focus on the restoration of the car’s body and interior. In keeping with our approach, great care is taken to honor the original design.
Restoring and Customizing Rare and Interesting Vehicles
When the strict originality is not a financial issue, owners of vintage cars and trucks may opt for restorations which can include subtle modifications made for driveability (like modern alternators , brakes or seat belts) all the way to designing and building custom parts and accessories. For example, several clients asked us to re-design the dashboards of their vintage cars, re-locating , converting or supplementing the instruments and switches.
Partial Restoration
Cooper Technica, Inc. builds engines and mechanical components, or performs partial mechanical restorations on vintage cars and Land Rovers. We strive to work within our client’s budgets and goals.
Custom Fabrication
Cooper Technica, Inc. has the ability to make custom fabrications or modifications to vehicles. Since each project differs, here are some examples of the special projects we have done:
• Expedition preparation of vintage Land Rovers
• Retrofit a 1967 Corvette Roadster with a modern 700hp engine
• Street Rod conversion of a1967 Alpine-Renault
• Vintage Race Preparation of a 1960 Porsche 356B Coupe
• Custom paint scheme and matching driver’s suit for vintage racer
• Toy: Custom-bodied Go-Kart for seventieth birthday of vintage racer
• Toy: Wall-mounted fantasy dashboard for future race drivers (4 year-olds), complete with siren, lights, radio, working gauges and three steering wheels
Here are a few projects in search of the right client:
• For a Hispano-Suiza, fabricating the missing components originally ordered by a Maharajah for elephant hunting
• Conversion of Aston Martins for future 007’s
• Restoration of a rare Tickford body Land Rover Series I
David Cooper, president of Cooper Technica, Inc., fell into the business of restoration fifteen years ago when a Bugatti owner and fellow driver on the vintage race circuit noticed that he was fabricating parts for his car. The owner then asked Cooper if he could fabricate parts for a Bugatti Type 35B. One job led to another and the next thing Cooper knew, he was in the business of restoring vintage automobiles and Land Rovers.
For eleven years prior to starting Cooper Technica, Inc., David Cooper was vice-president of a company that manufactured and sold custom industrial sewing equipment in the U.S. and abroad. In his spare time he turns to other interests including jazz, black and white photography, cycling and the history of pre-WWII Europe. Cooper holds a bachelor’s degree in Political Philosophy and Literature, which informs and complicates his habitual reading of the Sunday NY Times.
Statement
It is not nostalgia or a mistrust of new technology that leads me back to vintage cars, machinery and design. Rather, it allows me to look through a window into a time when everything was still possible, when cars were new and unusual, and it was still not clear what purpose they would serve. It is easy to imagine the excitement and satisfaction, but hard to remember the difficulties and nuisances, of owning and driving a luxury car in the twenties or thirties. But at that time cars were not universal appliances; instead they were, at best, the finest work inspired mechanical designers could devise when they turned their attention to the automobile.
At Cooper Technica, Inc., our task is to help maintain the rapidly disappearing art of making fine mechanical things. We work to preserve hand-made cars and other machinery made by engineers who were artists first—not bound by the demands of quantity, price, or sometimes, even practicality. Their personalities are visible in their work. We try in our way to help this work survive.
1931
Alfa Romeo 6C1750 Gran Sport "Testa Fissa"
Featured on NBC "Today Show" April 17, 1997
Outstanding Race Car at the Chicago Concours
D’Elegance, 1994
1967 Alpine Renault A110 1300S
Featured in Sports Car International, January 1994
Featured in Supercar Classics, Spring 1994 (Japan Edition)
Display at Meadowbrook Concours D’Elegance
1927 Bugatti Type 35B Grand Prix Race Car
Featured on NBC "Today Show" April 17, 1997
Winner, Montefiori Concours D’Elegance, 1991
Winner, Chicago Concours D’Elegance, 1995
Cover Feature of Christie’s Exceptional Motorcars, 1997
New York Times, Arts & Leisure Section, April 27, 1997
1968 Citroen DS21 Henri Chapron Convertible
Displayed at Meadowbrook Concours D’Elegance
1962 Elva Mark VI Sports Racer
Best in Show, Elva 35th Anniversary, October, 1990
1961
Land Rover Series IIa 109 Station Wagon
(Expedition
Preparation)
People’s
Choice British Car Festival, 1999
People’s Choice British Car Festival, 2002
1967
Land Rover Series IIa Military Ex Nato
People’s
Choice British Car Festival, 1995
Display at British Invasion, Stowe, VT 1995
1971 Land Rover Series IIa
(custom body work and interior)
People’s Choice British Car Festival, 1996
1973 Land Rover Series
III 109 Three Door Diesel
People’s Choice British
Car Festival, 2001
1952 MG-TD with original body made in Stuttgart
Cover Feature, Sacred Octagon magazine, February, 1993
Site Credits
site design: Ted Studios, Inc.
photography: Richard Marin Simon Clay and David Cooper