Jaguar Xj8 In Good Condition 164,900 Miles No Maintenence Missed on 2040-cars

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The Jaguar E-Type Lightweight is back on the prowl after a few decades away

Sometimes procrastination has its benefits. Jaguar originally planned to build a run of 18 E-Type Lightweights for racing in the '60s. However, it was only ever to complete 12 of them. It has taken all of the intervening decades to finally get back to the project and build the final run of new Lightweights. While Jag announced the plan recently, the first continuation model was unveiled during the Pebble Beach weekend.
Coming from Jaguar Land Rover's Special Operations unit, these cars are identical to the way they left the factory in the '60s. Jag is even using the same grade of aluminum for the bodies, and the cars are fully compliant for FIA historic racing. Power comes from an aluminum, 3.8-liter inline-six with about 300 horsepower and 280 pound-feet of torque routed through a four-speed manual gearbox. Who could guess that in 2014 someone could buy a brand new vehicle from a major manufacturer that comes with Weber carbs? Though, Lucas mechanical fuel injection is an option.
While they look old, these new E-types are also a wonder of modern technology. To get things just right, the company laser scanned an original car to create the new bodies. Check out the gallery from the unveiling to see this old cat on the prowl again.

Junkyard Gem: 1994 Jaguar XJ12

While Americans were able to buy new Jaguar two-doors with V12 engines under their bonnets from 1971 all the way through 1996, availability of new Jaguar 12-cylinder sedans was much spottier here. The Series 1 and Series 2 XJ12s were sold here from the 1973 through 1979 model years, and then there was a grim Jaguar V12 four-door drought here all the way until the 1994 model year. Here's one of those very rare felines, found in a Northern California boneyard in April. Jaguar had developed the XJ40 successor to the Series 3 XJ over an agonizingly protracted period that spanned the British Leyland era of the early 1970s through the first production cars being shown to the world in 1986. The XJ40 first appeared in the United States as a 1988 model. The following year, the Ford Motor Company bought Jaguar. The engineers in Coventry struggled to design a viable V12-engined XJ40 for years, giving it the XJ81 designation. At long last, the XJ81 was revealed to the motoring world in 1993… just prior to the replacement of the XJ40 by the XJ300 for the 1995 model year. All of the XJ81s sold in the United States—just over 1,500 of them in all—were 1994 models. This junkyard provided a bonanza of rare European iron when I stopped by on that chilly spring morning. Located within a few rows of this one-year-only XJ81 were a Volkswagen Phaeton and a Rolls-Royce Silver Shadow. The yard also had a running Peugeot 504 for sale in their "builders" section, and I'll admit I was very tempted by it. The April 1994 production date indicates that this is one of the very last members of the XJ40/XJ81 family to be built (though Jaguar continued to use platforms derived from the XJ40 until the X350a arrived as 2003 models). This 6.0-liter engine was an excruciatingly tight fit in this engine compartment (there are semi-credible tales that the XJ40's engine compartment was made so narrow as a sneaky office-politics means of preventing British Leyland from installing Rover V8s in Jaguars), and working on it must be a mechanic's nightmare. Output was 301 horsepower and 336 pound-feet. Meanwhile, Mercedes-Benz's V12 was rated at 389 horsepower and 420 pound-feet, while BMW's V12 had 296 horsepower and 332 pound-feet. The MSRP for this car was $73,200 for the dual-airbag version (and we can see that both airbags were deployed in this car's career-ending crash). That amounts to $151,889 in 2023 dollars.

Jaguar Land Rover names new manufacturing chief for EV transformation

LONDON — Britain's biggest carmaker Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) is replacing its director for manufacturing as it prepares its plants for an electrified future, the firm said on Thursday. JLR operates three factories in its home market but is building its first electric car, the I-PACE, in Austria. The Indian-owned automaker's Chief Executive Ralf Speth told Reuters earlier this year he is waiting for more information on trading conditions after Brexit before he decides whether to make electric cars in Britain. On Thursday, he said Executive Director for Manufacturing Wolfgang Stadler is retiring from the business, to be replaced by Director of Quality and Automotive Safety Grant McPherson starting July 1. "He will oversee the ongoing investment into our UK and global manufacturing, transforming our plants to enable Jaguar Land Rover's exciting electrified future," Speth said. Reporting by Costas PitasRelated Video: This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings. 2019 Jaguar I-Pace deep dive with designer Wayne Burgess