Jaguar To Build Another 9 XKSS

Period racers built with GM engines are fine, like the Cadillac Allards, but I do decry the builders of today (on both sides of the Atlantic) whose instinctive reaction is to “put a Chevy in it…and call it good”. Shows a real lack of imagination and a serious appreciation of history.

It’s not like Ford V-8s are hard to find, terribly exotic, or too costly for Cobra replicas.

I hear what you’re saying, but one could simply say, well, it’s just a look alike.
I guess it would depend on how accurate one was trying to be.
Can’t say I’d want a Chev motor in an ally bodied, authentic repro chassised Cobra, but a plastic kit car? What does it matter? It only has to make the right noises. 🙂

Don’t get me started.
It’s bad enough looking at the ads in Classic and Sports Car for the many UK Cobra look alikes with Chevrolet engines (seeming a majority..Or at least those offered by wheeler dealers).
Like having a cold Coke at a pub, instead of a proper pint, putting a GM engine in anything purporting to be a Cobra or Jaguar isn’t illegal, but it should be…at Any rate, if one respects tradition, it’s an affront to all that is holy. 🙂

Well, is the Blue Oval better? Back in the early-mid ’70s I stuffed a small block Ford 302 with Windsor heads into a S1 E Type coupe, a popular mod at the time. That was back when a 427 side oiler, big block motor was worth more than a used XK-E, and Arntz, out in California, was starting to sell 427 Cobra kits, followed by ERA in New Britain, CT. ERA was just starting to get into the Cobra clone game after buying an Arntz kit which, BTW, ended up sitting in a corner of their shop gathering dust.

A Boss 302 engine was what I’d planned to shoehorn into the Jag, but it was way too wide to fit between the rails ….. Come to think of it, I sold the Boss 302 engine for more than what I’d paid for the ’66 Coupe! The guy who bought the Boss 302 was planning on putting it into his Sunbeam Tiger, but I don’t know whether he ever managed to do it. Back in the mid-’70s E-Type Jags were dirt cheap. The DOHC Jag 3.8s and 4.2s cost more to have rebuilt than what the cars were worth!

How times have changed …..

Period racers built with GM engines are fine, like the Cadillac Allards, but I do decry the builders of today (on both sides of the Atlantic) whose instinctive reaction is to “put a Chevy in it…and call it good”. Shows a real lack of imagination and a serious appreciation of history.

It’s not like Ford V-8s are hard to find, terribly exotic, or too costly for Cobra replicas.

Don’t get me started.
putting a GM engine in anything purporting to be a … Jaguar isn’t illegal, but it should be…

[devils advocate] Lister Knobbly anyone? 😛

Don’t get me started.
It’s bad enough looking at the ads in Classic and Sports Car for the many UK Cobra look alikes with Chevrolet engines (seeming a majority..Or at least those offered by wheeler dealers).
Like having a cold Coke at a pub, instead of a proper pint, putting a GM engine in anything purporting to be a Cobra or Jaguar isn’t illegal, but it should be…at Any rate, if one respects tradition, it’s an affront to all that is holy. 🙂

Ah, so how about a D-Type with fat, lo-profile tires and an aluminum Chevy LS6 shoehorned under the hood? 🙂

….with the recent change in US regulations allowing limited runs of factory built, turnkey kit cars, who knows?

It wasn’t all that long ago that Shelby “found” a bunch of old 427 Cobra chassis lying around for his run of “continuation” Cobras. They were quickly gobbled up by those with the bucks.

As I understand the new US law, the engine had to meet pollution standards…which only GM has done for a “crate motor”…and the certification process may be too expensive for smaller production runs.

And the Shelby ruse didn’t fool many people, IIRC, they got into some trouble with that one.

Jaguar did it with the continuation run of Lightweight E Types ….. track only in most civilized countries, but at over a million bucks a piece, how many are going to be driven flat out on the track?

Same, same for the continuation D-Types. Track only, but with the recent change in US regulations allowing limited runs of factory built, turnkey kit cars, who knows?

It wasn’t all that long ago that Shelby “found” a bunch of old 427 Cobra chassis lying around for his run of “continuation” Cobras. They were quickly gobbled up by those with the bucks.

So they’re brand new cars, that don’t conform to any modern safety or emissions standards?
Anyone who isn’t a motor manufacturer care to try doing the same thing? I doubt you’d get away with it.
Perhaps these are supposed to be for race track use only?

When I was at college and looking for my first car I had a bit of money laid away. I got offered a S1 E-type Coupe that had been in a slight accident (crumpled nose and tail – but repairable) but passed it up for an XJ6 that was on the road. I wish I had bought the E-type!

Whichever E type you bought a few years ago, it would be a good investment. Not so many years ago I was buying Spitfire projects (the aeroplane not the car) for less that a ropey S1 E type is currently being advertised for. Amazing.

I could have afforded a 2+2 S2 E before we had kids, but no, I bought an XJ6, which I still have, and which has appreciated by….. Nothing….

Bruce 😉

PS – I also have a side by side Vampire, and I don’t think they are so bad..

The Series 3 E-Type 2+2 are painful to look at…far too bulbous, the car equivalent of a side by side Vampire.
The V-12 didn’t do the handling any favors, the exposed headlamps and larger air intake along with the stretched cabin turned a lithe design into a round mess.

Another great example of keeping designs around too long.

Having said that, inexplicably they’re increasing in value along with the rest of the range.
An acquaintance bought one, a nice car with no major faults, several years ago for nothing and now it’s becoming a shrewd investment.

Hi All,
Talking of Jaguar e-types I love this shot two of the best of British designs IMHO…………:eagerness:
More info on this very car at this web site:- http://www.jaguarheritage.com/t/othercars_022

1970 E-type S3 2+2 with Jaguar aircraft.
Geoff.

Jags

The car I really lusted after was the E-Type coupe, but it cost $500 more than the roadster, more than I could afford on the pay of a 2LT, so a roadster was what I ended up with in ’67, one of the last covered-headlight roadsters – factory new with 12 miles on the odometer when I picked it up in Coventry. The budget was so tight I had to settle for painted wire wheels instead of the chrome wheels, but it came with much improved radial tires.
The frustrating part was driving back to base in Germany with the rpm limitations imposed by the break-in
period of the 4.2 engine which limited top speed to around 60 mph – on roads with no speed limits.
After the break-in period, I’d cruise at around 125 mph. Above 130, the front end got awfully light … nothing on the road was faster, the
only competition came from the occasional Porsche 911S or Ferrari. I did own a coupe years later, one I bought for $1000 with a slipping clutch.

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A green Jag in front of a plane? Here’s my daily driver in front of XR713 a few weeks ago. Last of Malcolm Sayer’s designs 🙂

Ref appropriateness of the thread. Malcolm Sayer was the major aerodynamasist and stylist/designer at Jaguar, he learnt his trade at Bristol Aeroplanes.

[QUOTE=Sabrejet;2302765 Graham Warner, Spencer Flack and many others raced cars and operated historic aircraft. [/QUOTE]

I once saw Stephen Grey at Duxford riding a bike. How about a thread on the Raleigh Wayfarer?

Why is this thread in ‘Historic Aviation’?

Car (auto) and aircraft technology often run in parallel paths: in the case of the D-Type/XKSS it was probably the first race car to employ aluminium monocoque construction (though I know there was the Issigonis Special prior to that), so it has a great deal in common with aircraft of the 40s/50s.

Recent carbon fibre construction methods again began in the race car world with CanAm in the ’60’s and on that occasion it took aerospace a while to catch up. Use of titanium again was echoed in race cars (CanAm again), and there are many ‘wings and wheels’ type events which deliberately cater for the phenomena of car enthusiasts also being interested in aviation.

Graham Warner, Spencer Flack and many others raced cars and operated historic aircraft.

Aside from that, many historic aircraft engines survive and run, only because they are fitted in race cars: I’m thinking of the unique Sunbeam Maori, various WW1-era aero-engined specials etc. There is even a FIAT-based monster which races with an Isotta-Fraschini airship engine.

So (for me, as one with interests in both camps), perfectly appropriate here.

:eagerness:

I see they had to put the Jaguar on a mat, guess it was puking more oil than the radial behind it………..

There is a market for quality replicas, some D types go for 200-300,000…to say nothing of the exact Pur Sang Bugattis and Alfas.
And the recent 2004-6 Ford GTs are bucking the typical supercar trend and are bringing double their original price.

The lesson seems to be even guys who can afford a very expensive car lust after rare originals that even they can’t afford.

BTW, I saw a real XK-SS cross an auction block in Arizona in 2003, it was bid to just under $1 million…but didn’t sell, the owner wanted more.