Abbey Panels Ltd.

Abbey Panels Ltd., originally known as Abbey Panels & Sheet Metal Co. Ltd., is a Warwickshire-based coachbuilding company founded on Abbey Road, Nuneaton in 1941, initially assembling Supermarine Spitfires for the war effort. The early partners were Edward Loades FRSA, Les Bean, Bill Woodhall and Ernie Wilkinson. As the business grew they expanded to Old Church Road, Coventry before having their main manufacturing plant on the well known Bayton Road Industrial Estate in Exhall. In 1967, Ted Loades listed the business on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) and it became known as Loades PLC, with Abbey Panels its main brand, alongside Albany Zinc (castings), Loades Dynamics (machining) and Descartes Design (car styling), and it then went on to be run by Ted's sons.

The company specialised in producing handmade prototype car bodies and did so for many notable car companies including: Jaguar Cars, Rover, MG, Lea Francis, Bristol Cars, Healey, Rolls Royce, BMW, Buick, and Lincoln amongst others, being responsible for the bodywork of cars such as the Le Mans winning Ford GT40, numerous Jaguars (XK120, C-type, D-type, E-type, XJ13, XJ220, XK180), the original Mark I Land Rover Station Wagon,Jim Clark's Lotus 38 and Stirling Moss's 1957 Pescara Grand Prix winning Vanwall. They also produced many specialist parts for the aerospace industry, including, for example, the Rolls-Royce Pegasus engine duct of the Harrier Jump Jet.

In 2002 Loades stopped much of its manufacturing and began a phased closure of the Abbey Panels plant in Coventry. Loades continued to run their aerospace engineering and machining company for some time, and refocused their efforts on redeveloping their industrial properties under their Loades Ecoparc brand.