Building the Leg End. The Old Jag thread.

[SiC]

Oh no I meant V12 car engines in general.
Only ones I can think of Yank is pre-war stuff.

Otherwise the most they mass produced was V10 engines. Tbf those they made are/were pretty decent units.

[slowanimals]

We have an S.3 XJ12 here,but what with one thing and another (chiefly the cost) it hasn't turned a wheel this year. As lovely as it is,I'd honestly prefer it if it was a 4.2. God only knows what the series 1 or 2 must be like, although I admit they're much nicer detailed to my eyes,the dash and bumpers on the series 3 rather spoil the look.

[The Reverend Bluejeans]

Are any v12 easy to own?

I guess possibly the yank ones when run in the USA.

The E38 750i isn’t bad as they are quite simple. SOHC, no Vanos shit, proper timing chain etc. The one after that was a nightmare.

[The Reverend Bluejeans]

We have an S.3 XJ12 here,but what with one thing and another (chiefly the cost) it hasn't turned a wheel this year. As lovely as it is,I'd honestly prefer it if it was a 4.2. God only knows what the series 1 or 2 must be like, although I admit they're much nicer detailed to my eyes,the dash and bumpers on the series 3 rather spoil the look.

The 3.6 AJ6 is a good swap into a Series 1-3 XJ. It’s a very good engine, reliable and good on fuel plus it’s pretty powerful. There are still enough rotted out XJS scrappers complete with either a 5 speed manual or a 4 speed ZF automatic.

[slowanimals]

Love the idea but any series XJ I could afford now wouldn't be worth bothering with. They're one of a few cars which almost make me wish I was a little older because I could have enjoyed them for a few hundred.

[The Reverend Bluejeans]

I did just that. I can recall a row of shagged Series 1 cars at a local breakers in 1981 and I could have bought a running 1971 K registration 4.2 for £100 in 1984. They were everywhere and worthless. I bought an XJS in 1989 and restored it. The cheapest XJ was a Squadron blue 3.4 auto on an 1978 S plate in 1990 for £40. The last one was a very early Series 3 on a T plate, another 3.4 in Tudor white with red leather in 1998 for £250. Of course it was rubbish, they all were.

[slowanimals]

I'm just a little too young to have taken advantage of that,but they certainly seemed to age very quickly in my recollection. By the time I started to notice cars as a child in the eighties most series 2s were downtrodden pub car park bangers and series 1s mostly gone altogether. You'd see the occasional one here and there,an elderly recluse in the village I grew up in had a K plate Daimler with a diesel of some sort in it. Looked smart enough (Squadron blue) but you could hear the bastard about five minutes before it hove into view. I can remember being in a scrapyard in Colchester in 1996 trying to "rescue" a silver FD Victor 2000 and seeing a black X plate XJ6 atop the stack. Looked almost mint until you looked up underneath it,I was honestly almost impressed how rotten it was at fifteen years old. I suppose it's the usual story with perceived prestige cars,once the first couple of owners have taken varying degrees of care of it then it's usually shoestrung along until something expensive means it's scrapyard or oval time. Plus a lot of them really weren't all that good when they were new,of course.

[The Reverend Bluejeans]

Fifteen? That did well.

Most were fucked at ten and visibly troubled at six or seven. I still maintain that they were the most rot prone of all BL cars. A mate bought a 1974 Series 2 4.2 in Greensand in 1980 and it was cheap because it needed sills. The old carb XK's didn't last long if you drove them hard.

They are both a lovely car and a heap of shit at the same time.

[slowanimals]

Hadn't thought about it for years until now,but the first XJ I ever got to drive I probably should have bought in retrospect. Summer of 1999 and a chap the other side of Coventry to me was doing some driveway classic dealing, he'd got a major hard-on for my A99 and offered me all sorts of swaps with some cash. I hadn't had it long so he didn't stand a chance. Anyway he came round one afternoon with an early 3.4 series 2 in Sandglow (or its Jaguar equivalent), unbelievably clean in the wheel arches and sills for something 23 years old at the time and let me take it for a spin. I was nineteen, it was a lovely sunny afternoon and my test route involved a rip along Coundon Wedge and past the Jaguar factory. It was an absolute revelation,I'd read about how they just flowed down the road but it was nice to find that it was true, especially given I'd stepped into it straight out of a Westminster. I think five hundred would probably have bought it but I couldn't abide the colour. If I'd known it was going to be the last one I'd see which was both good and cheap I doubt I'd have wasted so much time, effort and money on big Farinas and Crestas in my twenties.

[Warren t claim]

I may be wrong, but my last V12 was a red XJ12 with chrome arches on either an A or C plate bought in early January 1997. Paid £1600 for it and terminal rot coupled with a lack of availability of bent MOTs saw me scrap it about six months later. At the time I was also offered a Daimler Double Six in metallic blue and in better condition for two grand but I thought I was boxing clever saving the £400.

Jags were both cheap and plentiful back in those days, mainly down to them being the default luxury saloon car choice in the 70s and early 80s. The alternative was the much more expensive S Class or the E32 7 Series. I also once owned a bargain basement E32 733i on a T plate. Bought from the banger auction I drove for at the time. At some point it had been owned by a race horse owner and still had various bloodstock stickers on it as well as being fitted with a pre cellular radiophone that obviously didn't work anymore.

Was it a better car than a 1978 XJ6? Not really. It handled worse, was no less rusty, no faster and suffered as many non functioning toys. The seats were nicer though and the steering wasn't as overassisted.

I never had the pleasure of owning a Series 1 XJ6, only the Series 2 and 3. Both had seats so firm they felt like they were stuffed with horse hair but I did prefer the cloth trim of the 3.4 over the leather.