Thomas Harrington decided to go into car manufacturing in 1961 because of a declining bus market, and also because it is quicker to build a car and therefore to generate income. Their fibreglass technique learned through moulding parts of coach bodies helped them to create the Harrington Alpine fastback. Following the success of the Alpine, Harrington tried the same recipe with the Triumph TR4 to create the Dove GTR4. Harrington's own connection to the Rootes family had facilitated the Alpine project, but a different channel had to be used for the Triumph project. In this case the Triumph dealers L. F. Dove & Company of Wimbledon provided the channel for orders and the project commenced. It was intended that the car should be called 'Dove GTR4 and prounounced 'Dovay' as though Italian, but the English pronunciation persisted. However, after about 50 cars were completed pressure from Rootes forced the end of this project on what was essentially a rival product. Shortly after the Harrington Alpine ended its run and the Harrington name was lost to car production.