2005 Jaguar X-type 2.5 on 2040-cars

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2019 Jaguar XE SV Project 8 First Drive Review | Cat track fever

It doesn't take long for the cognoscenti to spot me. At stoplights, street corners, and parking lots, the 2019 Jaguar XE SV Project 8's swollen bodywork and park bench-sized tail attract the fanboys like iron to a magnet. My Velocity Blue tester is one of the few Project 8 cars in the States, and I can't remember the last modern Jaguar with so much head-turning charisma. If you're not up to speed, the Project 8 is Jaguar's surprise salvo into sedan madness. And Jag didn't half-ass it, either: it's Jag's biggest engine – a 592-horsepower, supercharged 5.0-liter V8 – stuffed into their smallest steed, the compact XE. Think Aston Martin V12 Vantage, AC Cobra 427, et al. Aiding downforce is a wing that delivers 269 pounds of downforce at 186 mph, so much that Jaguar had to reinforce the trunklid to prevent it from denting at high speeds. There's a flat underbody for reduced lift, and lightweight carbon fiber and aluminum body panels replacing all but the front door skins and roof. The purposeful theme is carried into the cabin, with snug racing buckets up front and seating limited to four. The boy racer cues bely some serious equipment. It's 68 lbs lighter than the next-lightest SE, the 380-hp S AWD supercharged V6. There's also a whole lot of tightening throughout, from the spring rates to the firmer engine mounts. In fact, the stiffening feels like it's been cranked to 11 – even in Comfort mode, the ride is taut and sometimes jarring, never quite feeling at ease enough. If you dig feeling every last ripple in the tarmac, it's wonderful, but anyone seeking a wallowy, coddling ride will find the Project 8 too much. The Project 8's razor sharp feedback begs you to drive on public roads like you're lapping Nardo or the Nurburbring – two of the circuits where the car was developed. But despite its legit origins, dicing such an overtly extroverted car through traffic can also be an enormous social liability. Go-fast sticker graphics? Check. Ginormous wing? Yep. Banana yellow brake calipers? Duh. This is weaponized transport for the street, enough to make the meekest driver look like he or she has something to prove. The Project 8's Alcantara-trimmed interior compliments the aggressive exterior, as do the snug-fitting seats, which use magnesium frames for weight savings (non-U.S. markets go a step further, with carbon fiber seats with four point harnesses). Squeeze the accelerator, and the XE responds with a shove and a snort even from low RPMs.

Jaguar Land Rover rescues British off-road tuner Bowler

Jaguar Land Rover's Special Vehicles Operation (SVO) rescued British off-road tuner Bowler from an uncertain fate. The firm has worked with Land Rover in the past, but it has always been independent. While JLR isn't in an ideal position to make acquisitions, and its recent financial troubles are well documented, Bowler was on the brink of shutting down. The small, 34-year old company had entered administration, and the 26 people it employed risked losing their jobs. Monetary details haven't been released, meaning we don't know how much Bowler was worth, but the firm pointed out it's now fully owned by SVO. It joins SV, Vehicle Personalization, and Classic as the division's fourth pillar. It's too early to tell precisely where Bowler will fit in the JLR latticework, because the initial focus will be on stabilizing the company. It will remain based in Belper, England, and every member of its full-time staff has been offered a position as a JLR employee. Bowler made a name for itself by turning the original Defender into a rally car, and Land Rover said the expertise it acquired during decades of racing is highly sought after, so that's a hint we'll see more hardcore models developed jointly by the two companies sooner or later. The new Defender would lend itself well to the Bowler treatment. The Bowler name could replace the SVX nameplate used on the stillborn, V8-powered Discovery, for example. The tuner's focus on off-pavement performance means we're unlikely to see a Bowler-badged Jaguar, but anything is possible as global demand for SUVs (especially quick ones) continues to rise. What's certain is that, once Bowler is stable, it will grow bigger.

Junkyard Gem: 2001 Jaguar XJ8

After Ford bought Jaguar in 1989, the bosses in Dearborn finally got their hands on a storied luxury brand that would be taken more seriously than Lincoln outside of North America. A fresh infusion of dollars worked wonders to improve the quality of Jaguar's engineering and assembly, and development of a modern DOHC V8 engine immediately took a high priority. That engine made its debut in the 1997 Jaguar XK8, then went into the engine compartment of the very first production Jaguar sedan to get factory V8 power: the XJ8. Today's Junkyard Gem is one of that first generation of XJ8, found crashed in a Colorado self-service boneyard. The 1998-2003 XJ8 lived on the final iteration of the mid-1980s-vintage XJ40 platform, the X308. While this means that the X308 had chassis ancestry stretching back to the British Leyland era, Ford's money ensured that it would be built better than its predecessors had been during the cash-strapped bad old days. Exterior styling wasn't much changed from that of the XJ300. Inside, the old XJ40 dash finally went away for good, replaced by a design more appropriate for the new century. Jaguar couldn't compete with BMW and Mercedes-Benz on leading-edge chassis engineering, but its heritage was hard to top. The engine is a 4.0-liter DOHC V8 with variable valve timing, rated at 290 horsepower and 290 pound-feet. Ford should get credit for funding Jaguar's own engine instead of simply stuffing some member of its Modular V8 family in here. If you wanted a manual transmission in your XJ8, the answer was a firm no. In fact, Ford ended up using the 3.9-liter version of this engine in the Ford Thunderbird and Lincoln LS. The MSRP for the base 2001 XJ8 was $56,355, or about $98,725 in 2024 dollars. The 2001 BMW 740i listed at $62,900 ($110,190 after inflation) and the 2001 Mercedes-Benz S 430 cost $70,800 ($124,030 now). Perhaps the $51,745 BMW 540i and the $56,050 Mercedes-Benz E 430 ($90,649 and $98,190 in today's money, respectively) were more realistic sales rivals for the XJ8, though. This car's interior is a bit grimy but appears to have been in nice enough condition when it arrived here. What happened? This happened. On a near-quarter-century-old European luxury sedan, body damage like this usually results in the insurance company declaring the car totaled. Remember when Dennis Tito paid $20 million to become the world's first space tourist? Jaguar could have saved him some money. You'll never, ever lose it in the parking lot.