Innehållsförteckning för Jun/Jul 2024 från Classic Jaguar

Well, I’ve done it. I’ve marked the 45th anniversary of the Series III with a purchase. Alongside which, I own X300s in their 30th anniversary year. I just have to hope I make it until Christmas without buying some sort of Mk2. But the buying guide in this issue makes that a difficult temptation to resist. So before I get caught up, let’s look at what else we have in this exclusive triple anniversary issue. Not only is there a Mk2 buying guide and a new Series III project car, but we take a look at a rare Series III manual – rare still, a Daimler Sovereign. We look at an unrestored Mk2 reimported from the States, and we re-evaluate the whole X300 range three decades on. New contributor Gareth…

HISTORY JAGUAR XJ SERIES III The Series III XJ is Jaguar’s longest-lived saloon model, and with thirteen years’ largely unchanged production, only the pre-facelift XJ-S coupe can beat its production run at all. In that time it’s been driven by everyone from spivs and pub landlords to royalty. Almost as powerful a symbol of the British establishment as the Rover P5B and the Daimler DS420, in the years that have passed since it has become the archetypal old Jag for a generation. Not bad for a car that wasn’t really meant to happen. Jaguar had initially intended for the project that became the XJ40 to replace the Series II XJ of 1973 directly, possibly even as early as 1979. That car had been an update of the original 1968 XJ…

PROJECT CAR 1985 DAIMLER 4.2 If you also read our sister title Jaguar World, you’ll know I’m looking to replace my errant Range Rover L322 with an X350 as a modern everyday car. Something economical for long distance cruising between features. So naturally, what I’ve done is buy a Series III instead. In fairness to myself, I’ve been looking for a Series III since 2022. And having driven the JDHT’s last of the line Sovereign recently, I found I couldn’t resist the temptation that was getting ever stronger. So when I saw this car advertised for sale in Kettering, I had to go and have a look at it. After all, C397 LOX is an old friend of sorts. Regular readers will remember that in the August/September 2023 issue, I…

The profile of the Jaguar Mk2 has been raised above and beyond similar Jaguar models of the Sixties thanks to bank robbers and television programmes such as Inspector Morse. Consequently, abandoned projects and tatty imports rarely sell for less than around £7,000£10,000, and restored or original examples in top condition can easily cost £50,000-£70,000 or more. Even a Mk2 in average condition can demand £20,000. And there are often clear price differences between a 2.4 and 3.8, with the latter offering better performance statistics. The similar-shaped models that replaced the Mk2, such as the 240, 340 and the S-type, are also less expensive. Is the Mk2 the wiser investment thanks to its popularity? Produced between 1959 and 1967, the Mk2 replaced the ‘Mk1’ that first appeared in 1955. These models…

Jaguar’s historic Castle Bromwich site looks to have reached the end of the line as a car production facility. The Birmingham site, originally used to build Spitfires and Lancaster bombers during the war, was taken over by Jaguar Cars in 1980 and began building complete cars in 1998, but will now transition to producing of body panels for a whole new line of vehicles after it stops assembling the XE, XF and F-TYPE in June. A new era for the firm will begin in 2025 when a new electric saloon is set to be unveiled as the first of three planned new models, all using the new JEA platform. In the meantime, the retirement of the XE and XF saloons and the F-TYPE sports car means the brand will only…

MODEL PROFILE DAIMLER SOVEREIGN SERIES III 4.2 MANUAL Since 1930, Daimler had been doing its level best to rid the driver of the necessity of changing their own gears. Indeed, from 1930 to the mid-Fifties it had sought to do away with the tiresome job of swapping cogs with the use of the Wilson pre-selector gearbox and a fluid flywheel. You would select your gear from a dash quadrant, rapidly depress and re-engage a pedal in place of a clutch, and the fluid flywheel would transmit drive in much the same manner as it does with today’s autos. No clutch, no lurching, it did almost everything for you in a far smoother manner than a conventional manual. No double declutching was needed, no perfect timing, no rev matching – even…

CLASSIC DRIVE JAGUAR MK2 3.8 “Some cars are destined to be in your garage,” Marcus Jones tells me. “Len is one of those.” The ‘Len’ he’s talking about is a 1960 Mk2 3.8 with a remarkable history that has resulted in a remarkable condition. Yet Marcus wouldn’t have known anything about it if it wasn’t for another recently exhumed Mk2 he found for sale in St Louis. “In September 2020 and after posting pictures on a Jaguar Facebook group of the car being loaded for transport to the docks, I was contacted by a gentleman called Mike,” explains Marcus. “Mike explained that his father had a car like the one I had posted pictures of and he needed to sell it. Pictures were not immediately available since it was at…

STORYLINE 1955-1956 Quite a few people in Browns Lane, Frank England included, called the Jaguar chairman and managing director ‘Sir,’ probably because Bill or William seemed far too familiar. Most shop floor workers when faced with the boss asking them a direct question or having him peer over their shoulder, curious at what they were doing, or more likely how they were doing it (isn’t there a better way?) would call him Mr Lyons, a ‘sir’ added on the end depending on the worker’s attitude. From ambitious youngsters with families to feed, rent to pay and an eye for furthering themselves, who did; to militant shop stewards who put up a pretence of hostile reluctance, they did have union conveners and officials to impress after all, who very definitely didn’t.…

TECHNICAL HANDBRAKE MAINTENANCE The handbrake mechanism on Jaguars such as the XK150, Mk2 and E-type, which have disc brakes all round, uses a mechanical caliper to grip and lock each rear disc, with a straightforward cable mechanism to operate them via the handbrake lever inside the vehicle. On the Mk2, the handbrake cable mechanism consists of three cables and one compensator. There’s a single cable routed from behind the gearbox area, alongside the propshaft and to the rear differential where a compensator is mounted. Two more cables are routed from this compensator, which lead off to each rear handbrake caliper. The way the handbrake caliper works is relatively simple, whereby a pull of the handbrake clamps the handbrake pads around the brake disc. When released, a return spring forces them…

TRIED & TESTED JAGUAR XJS V12 By the end of its production life the XJS didn’t exactly look up to the minute any more. It was an anachronism, a car bought by eccentrics out of choice rather than by those looking to flash the cash. If you think of it as a cut price Bristol, you’re in the right sort of ball park. Even more anachronistic in the 1990s was the V12 – six litres and 15mpg of wonder, but barely any quicker than the cheaper and more parsimonious 4.0. By the end of production the XJS V12 – retailing at £50,500 - had become a special order only vehicle, and barely a handful of buyers would have believed it to be worth the £11,550 premium over the six cylinder…

TWIN TEST DAIMLER V8-250 v ROVER P5B COUPE AIthough the Daimler and Rover brands may both be defunct today, both were significant forces in the early days of the car industry, with Daimler producing its first car in 1897 and Rover moving from two wheels to four shortly afterwards in 1904. Both were also headquartered in Coventry, which quickly became the epicentre of the rapidly expanding British car industry, something which encouraged a certain William Lyons to move his company to the city in 1928 and which would eventually have significant repercussions for the Daimler company in particular. In fact, it was the acquisition of Daimler by Jaguar in 1960 which resulted in the existence of the Daimler V8 you see here, the model leveraging the traditionally stately Daimler marque…

Age does few of us any favours. Unless you’re Sean Connery or Honor Blackman, then there’s a good chance you were in your prime in your youth rather than now. In car years, three decades is a long time, but that’s how long the X300 has been with us now – yet it’s definitely a Sean Connery kind of car. It doesn’t look as new as it once did, but it is still extremely handsome. It has aged fantastically, like a proper Jaguar should. The X300 was the first car to be styled entirely under the stewardship of the late Geoff Lawson, who was only the second head of design to work for Jaguar, the first being Sir William Lyons himself. “Designing a car is like making a film,” he…

What is it we love about the Jaguar Mk2? At 65 years old we love it more than ever. To several generations it has a history, it’s been Dad’s car, a police car, a getaway car, a television star, a hot rod donor car, a banger racer and a show car. It reminds us of the old days, before political correctness because a buzzword and when all manner of societal ills could be excused as a little mischief. Unashamedly raffish and new money, and yet with a thin veneer of respectability, the spiv’s favourite occupies a rare automotive position in the nation’s collective rosetinted retrospective alongside the Land Rover, the Mini and the London cab. People have memories of the Mk2 and its family from all walks of life, and…

EVENTS GALORE The month of May really sees the calendar of events take off for the Jaguar Drivers’ Club with something happening somewhere more or less every weekend from now until November when we wrap things up at the NEC with the Classic Motor Show. On Saturday 18 May there will be an ‘R’ in the month when the Club supports one of the biggest turnouts of Jaguars in the country for Supercharged Saturday – any Jaguar or Daimler with a ‘blower’ is invited to line up by model in front of the British Motor Museum at Gaydon. All other Jaguars and Daimlers are welcome to come along and join in but the spotlight will be on those supercharged heroes with an R badge. Unusually for a Breakfast Club meeting,…

JAGUAR ON TOUR NORTH YORKSHIRE MOORS The North York Moors is one of my favourite places within the British Isles. As a Lancastrian, that is tough to admit and, having relocated to the eastern side of the Pennines, I had better hope that none of the local villagers read this admittance and have me banished. Moors roads are undulating and often carefully guarded by flocks of determined sheep. Picturesque villages are surrounded by cattlegrids, heather and ancient railway bridges, and are loosely connected by a complex web of sweeping a-roads, barely classified tracks and green lanes. Given the choice of vehicle for this particular excursion, we will avoid the latter. The Series III XJ is the perfect car for exploring such territory: the cabin cossets and warms on a crisp…