Tag Archives: E-Type

Classic Jaguar Pride – Silverstone Classic

THere was a large pride of Jagaurs at this years Silverstone classic which included,

Jaguar XK120, Christopher Scholey, Stirling Moss Trophy , Silverstone Classic

Christopher Scholey’s 1954 XK120 which he shared with Rob Newall to record a 23rd place in the Stirling Moss Trophy.

Jaguar XK140 FHC, Silverstone Classic

Enjoying a lap of the track in the Jaguar Parade was this 1956 XK140.

Jaguar E-Type, Ian Simmonds, Chopard International Trophy, Silverstone Classic

Mark Hales and Ian Simmonds drove the #36 E-Type to a 28th place finish in the Chopard International Trophy.

Jaguar XJC, Chris Scragg, Jet Super Touring Car  Trophy, Silverstone Classic

Known in some circles as the fastest vinyl roof in the world the Jaguar XJC 12 made an unlikely competition car next to the manufacturers other V12 Coupé the XJS, but first time round British Leyland wanted to put the XJC 12 on the track and found it had severely underestimated the capabilities of BMW’s CSL batmobiles against which it was to be judged. Above Chris Scragg pedals his mighty 1976 example round to an 18th place finish in the Jet Super Touring Car Trophy.

Jaguar XJR14, Gareth Evans, Silverstone Classic

Built to the 1991 Formula One powered Group C regulations the Ford HB V8 powered Jaguar XJR14 was an instant success winning the 1991 World Sports Cars Manufacturers Championship with three outright wins and Teo Fabi the World Sports Cars Drivers Championship. Gareth Evans is seen lighting up the front brakes above on his way to 7th place in the Group C Endurance Race.

Jaguar XJ220, Justin Law, Silverstone Classic

Finally a lucky passenger is seen below accompanying Justin Law in his Martini striped 1993 Jaguar XJ220 during the ’90s GT Legends demonstration.

Thanks for joining me on this “Classic Jaguar Pride” edition of Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres. I hope you’ll join me again tomorrow when I’ll be looking at another pride of Jaguars at the Jaguar Club of North Americas 50th Anniversary Meeting in San Diego. Don’t forget to come back now !

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Hot In Miami – Jaguar XJR5 #006

If one foreigner deserves a knighthood for trying to keep the British Motor industry alive while it was in self destruct mode twixt the early 1960’s and late 1980’s my nomination without question would go to Bob Tullis who prepared and raced a succession of British sports cars from Triumph and Jaguar to numerous victories over the 30 years in question.

Perhaps most remarkably of all having been a successful driver for 20 years, which included driving a few non British vehicles like the Dodge Dart, AMC Javelin,Bruce Jennings Porsche 911 and a one off drive in a works Oldsmobile Cutlass, Bob and Group 44 Inc business partner Brian Feurstenau managed to persuade Mike Dale of Jaguar Cars Inc, New Jersey, to fund an IMSA GT Prototype project which would see Jaguar return to Le Mans nearly 30 years after their last official appearance at the circuit in 1955.

Tullis who’s diverse endurance experience included driving the Triumph Spitfire Coupé and Howmett gas turbine car at Le Mans employed Lee Dykstra to design the new Jaguar XJR5 IMSA GTP challenger.

Jaguar XJR5, Miles, Silverstone Classic

The XJR5 was to be powered by a variant of the 2 valve per cylinder 5.34 litre / 326 cui Jaguar V12 which Bob had successfully campaigned in his Trans Am Quaker State Group 44 Inc Jaguar E-Type and later XJS models since the mid 1970’s.

In August 1982 Bob and long time co driver Canadian Bill Adam drove the XJR5 to a debut 3rd place finish behind two of the outgoing Porsche 935’s at Road America to score a debut class victory.

Bob and Bill scored the teams first overall victory at Road Atlanta in April 1983, two more followed at Lime Rock and Mosport, Doc Bundy then shared the final XJR5 victory in 1983 at Pocono with Bob.

Jaguar XJR5, Miles, Silverstone Classic

Today’s featured chassis #006 first appeared at the 1984 Daytona 24 Hours where Bill Adam, Pat Bedard and Brian Redman qualified 6th and were classified a disappointing 24th, the sister car driven by Doc Bundy, David Hobbs and Bob Tullius qualified and finished 3rd.

Next time out at Miami with Brian and Doc at the wheel chassis #006 qualified 4th but more importantly crossed the line first when the chequered flag fell. Despite the team increasing the capacity of it’s V12 motors to a full 6 litres / 366 cui a couple of months later this would prove be their only overall victory in 1984.

After Porsche’s top driver Derek Bell had been suitably impressed with the XJR5 after testing it in 1983 Jaguar gave the green light to Bob and Group 44 to take the cars, one of which would be #006 driven by Tony Adamowicz, John Watson and Claude Ballot-Léna to Le Mans in 1984.

Jaguar XJR5, Miles, Silverstone Classic

Tony, John and Claude qualified 19th and retired after an accident on lap 212 while the sister car driven by Brian, Doc and Bob qualified 14th and made it to lap 291 before the gearbox gave up.

Chassis #006 returned to the States and finished the season with a 2nd place finish in the Daytona 3 Hours with Brian and Hurley Haywood at the wheel.

For 1985, by which time Lee Dykstra reckoned he had redesigned 99% of the XJR5, #006 was prepared for the Le Mans 24 hours.

Jaguar XJR5, Miles, Silverstone Classic

Jim Adams joined Brian and Hurley in chassis #006 where the car was qualified 17th and retired after only 151 laps with a constant velocity joint failure.

The sister car driven by Bob, Chip Robinson and Claude qualified 16th and finished 13th overall and first in the GTP class.

The cars final two races were back in the States where Chip Robinson joined Hurley to score a best 2nd place finish at Pocono in September 1985 on it’s final in period race appearance.

At Daytona in December 1985 the XJR5 model appeared for the last time, before it was replaced by the all new XJR7 in 1986, Brian and Hurley sent the model into retirement with a fine second place less than 8.5 seconds behind the winning Hobert Racing Porsche 962 driven by Al’s Holbert and Unser.

Today #006 is owned by Don Miles who can be seen driving the car at Silverstone Classic events in these photographs.

Thanks for joining me on this “Hot In Miami” edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres” I hope you will join me again for Ferrari Friday tomorrow. Don’t forget to come back now !

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Weight Saving Pussycat – Jaguar E-Type Lightweight #S850659

Between 1963 and 1964 Jaguar built 12 Lightweight E-Type Jaguars with six cylinder engine blocks, monocoques and bodies all made from aluminium which saved 250 lbs / 114 kgs over the standard E-Type.

Today’s featured Ligthweight E-Type, chassis #S850659, is the seventh of the 12 to be built and was delivered to Briggs Cummingham in time for him to enter it into the Sebring 12 hours for Bruce McLaren and Walt Hansgen to drive.

Jaguar, XK-E, Lightweight, Blackhawk Museum

Bruce and Walt finished the race in 8th place one place and one lap down on the class winning Kjell Qvalle lightweight E-Type #S850660 driven by Ed Leslie and Frank Morrill.

The cars next appearance was at Le Mans in 1963, where Walt Augie Pabst replaced Bruce McLaren to share driving the #14 with Walt. By this time Briggs has acquired two more lightweight E-Types to make up an impressive 3 car team.

Jaguar, XK-E, Lightweight, Blackhawk Museum

After just 8 laps Walt retired the #14 with a broken four speed gearbox, the sister #16 manged just 40 laps before Paul Richards and Roy Salvadori retired with fire damage after an accident. Team Patron Briggs and Bob Grossman also had to pit after loosing it’s bonnet in an accident, but rejoined the race to finish 9th overall and second in class to the AC Cobra driven by Peter Bolton and Ninan Sanderson.

After Le Mans #S850659 was fitted with a 5 speed ZF gearbox by the factory and driven to a third place finish by Walt Hangsen in the 1963 Bridgehampton 500 kms.

The car seen in these photographs, by Geoffrey Horton at the Blackhawk Museum, last year was tested by Simon Taylor in 1996 when he described it as a “pussycat” to drive, a racing car one “could go shopping in”.

Thanks for joining me on this “Weight Saving Pussycat” edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres” I hope you will join me again for “Ferrari Friday” tomorrow. Don’t forget to come back now !

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Prototype, Racer, Decoy – Jaguar #E2A

After Jaguars bitter sweet success at Le Mans in 1955, when the works D-Type driven by Mike Hawthorn and Ivor Bueb won the ill feted race following Mercedes Benz mid race withdrawal, Sir William Lyons concluded, as did the board of Mercedes Benz, that Jaguar’s resources would be better spent turning it’s racing success into commercial production success.

The Jaguar racing department became the Jaguar prototype department as all Jaguar works racing programmes were left to customer teams like Ecurie Eccose who promptly won Le Mans in 1956 and 1957 with their D-Types and Briggs Cunningham, who realised he did not have the resources to build and compete with an American sports car with the best Europe had to offer, but still had the resources to buy top line European cars to race.

Jaguar E2A, Ziegler, Goodwood Revival

The Jaguar prototype team’s first job was to build a production version of the D-Type using monocoque construction and replacing the D-type’s live rear axle with independent rear suspension.

This prototype, known as #E(Type)1A(Aluminium), was a 130 mph 2/3rds scale drivable vehicle built in 1957 which after much testing was broken up and scrapped somewhere between 1959 and 1960 without ever having been shown to the press or public.

Jaguar E2A, Ziegler, Goodwood Revival

Today’s featured car #E2A was a full scale second prototype with a monocoque and aluminium body styled by Malcolm Sayer. The car was fitted with a 3 litre / 183 cui fuel injected aluminium straight 6 motor in order to meet the Le Mans prototype regulations. E2A was entrusted to Briggs Cunninghams team and painted in his teams white with two blue stripes colours.

Before going to Le Mans in 1960 E2A was tested at the oval MIRA test facility and the suspension was set up for this purpose when it arrived at Le Mans unknown to Dan Gurney and Walt Hangsen who were employed to drive it.

Jaguar E2A, Ziegler, Goodwood Revival

Dan and Walt found the car extremely twitchy and it was late before the race that the suspension settings were changed to something more suitable to a public road used as a race track rather than a steeply banked oval at MIRA.

#E2A completed the opening lap of the 1960 Le Mans 24 hours in third place, but after just 3 laps the car was in the pits with a broken injector pipe. This was replaced but a train of damage had been set in motion which resulted in E2A retiring after six hours with a failed head gasket and burned piston.

Jaguar E2A, Dron, Goodwood Revival

Back at the Jaguar factory the 3 litre #E2A engine was swapped for a 3.8 litre / 231 cui unit and the car was shipped to the USA Walt Hangsen drove it to a win in the 2nd Annual Inter-club Championship Bridgehampton and class win in the 500 mile Road America race.

Reigning double world champion “Black” Jack Brabham drove #E2A 10th place finish in the 200 mile Grand Prix Riverside, a twisty track to which E2A was as poorly suited as Laguna Seca where Bruce McLaren drove #E2A in two heats of the First Pacific Grand Prix to 12th and 17th place finishes.

Jaguar E2A, Dron, Goodwood Revival

Thereafter #E2A was returned to Jaguar for further testing which included an early anti lock braking system called ‘Wheel Slide Protector’ as used by the Ferguson P99.

#E2A was eventually put into storage, only to be pulled out and painted green in 1965 so that it could be used as a decoy while testing of the top secret XJ13 was carried out at MIRA.

In 1967 Jaguar customer car competition manager Roger Woodley managed to save E2A from the usual destruction for scrap prototype fate by mediating a deal for his father in law Guy Griffiths Camden Car Collection in the Cotswolds to take it with Jaguars insistence that #E2A should never be used in competition.

Jaguar kindly repainted #E2A in Briggs Cunninghams original racing colours and some time after handing it over manged to supply Guy with a 3 litre fuel injected motor.

In 2008 Roger’s wife sold the car for just short of US$5 million at Bonham’s, owner Stefan Ziegler has since had the car prepared to ‘weapons grade racer’ standard much to the chagrin of some old curmudgeons, myself included.

Stefan is seen at the wheel of the car at Goodwood in the photo’s dated 2012, while Tony Dron is seen driving the car in the older images.

Thanks for joining me on this “Prototype, Racer, Decoy” edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres” I hope you will join me again for Ferrari Friday tomorrow. Don’t forget to come back now !

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Jaguar V12 E-Type Series 3 #IS 2857

In the summer of 1980 I passed my college entrance exams, at my third attempt and before finally fleeing the family nest in Wembley to attend Trent Polytechnic, I got a summer job at a local Honda dealership to tide me over.

Jaguar E-Type, Siverstone Classic

One of the dealership owners many cars, and even more motorcycles, was a black Jaguar E – Type Convertible like the one in these photographs one of the last fifty made, all available only in black, a fact that is noted on a brass plate mounted on the glove box cover.

Jaguar E-Type, Siverstone Classic

In 1971 the Series 3 E-Types ushured Jaguars second ever completely new motor into production, an all aluminium 5.3 litre / 326 cui V12 with 2 valves per cylinder design that had it’s origins in a design intended for racing dating back to 1954. This motor would eventually be developed into a 7 litre / 427 quad cam that would be used to win at Le Mans twice, 1988 and 1990.

Jaguar E-Type, Siverstone Classic

All Series 3 E-types were built around the longer 2+2 chassis pan, most with the V12 engine but a few Series 3 models were built with the older 4.2 litre / 256 cui 6 cylinder motor.

Jaguar E-Type, Siverstone Classic

The brass plaque on the right of this photo gives the chassis number as IS 2857 which according to the only list of XKE chassis numbers I have seen suggests this car was originally supplied in Right Hand Drive form.

Jaguar E-Type, Siverstone Classic

This particularly splendid example, seen here at the recent Silverstone Classic, has been restored and ‘sympathetically’ upgraded winning the Speis Hecker World Masterpiece competition for outstanding coachwork re-finishing.

Jaguar E-Type, Siverstone Classic

My own 30 year old memories of the V12 E – Type were that it was certainly a buzz taking the car to the petrol pump down the road, it turned heads, the engine was silky smooth, the steering was light but it inspired little or no confidence, even on a roundabout at perfectly legal speeds, in it’s handling capabilities, it seemed to lean in the corners rather that hug the road as even my pedestrian FIAT 128 did, and parking a car with such a long nose was an absolute nightmare on a crowded parking lot.

Overall I was disappointed with how the car drove a bit like meeting a rock star whom one has held in high esteem only to find that he / she has all the usual human traits some of which are not so pleasant or different from our selves, or driving an air cooled Porsche for the first time to find that interior has the same smell of fumes as an air cooled VW Beetle, more boulevard cruiser than the track racer which I was expecting.

Thanks for joining me on this E-type edition of ‘Gettin’ a lil’ psycho on tyres’ I hope you will join me again tomorrow. Don’t forget to come back now !

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Original Lightweight – Jaguar Lightweight E – Type 9/12

In 1962 Jaguar built a Low Drag Coupé E-type, with a steel inner tub but aluminium outer pannels, that was more in the spirit of the D-Type from which the E-Type styling and design had evolved. The car was not any more competitive than it’s all steel namesake despite it’s higher performance and the prototype was sold.

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From 1963 – 1964 12 Lightweight E- Types were built that evolved from the Low Drag Coupé, again making extensive use of aluminium body panels and other components.

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The standard 265 hp iron block straight six engines were upgraded to 300hp aluminium block XK6 specs fitted with fuel injection.

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The cars failed to emulate the international success of earlier ‘C’ and ‘D’ types at Le Mans or Sebring but they were moderately successful in club racing.

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Of the 12 Lightweights built and two additional bodies it is thought ‘at least one’ was a Coupé some of the open top cars were converted to Low Drag Coupes with even more powerful 340 hp motors.

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The vehicle featured in these photographs was the 9th of the 12 originals and carries the chassis number 850666.

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The car was purchased and raced by Peter Sutcliffe from 1963 to 1965.

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This was the most successful Lightweight E-type in the 1964 season scoring victories at Mallory Park, Zolder and Montlhery out side Paris, France.

Hope you have enjoyed another Lightweight edition of ‘Gettin’ a lil’ psycho on tyres’, and that you’ll join me again, for Ferrari Friday, tomorrow. Don’t forget to come back now !

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Heavyweight – Jaguar E- Type 3.8 Coupe

Call me a hopeless romantic but there is something I find irresistible about the notion of walking into a showroom purchasing the fastest vehicle they have in stock, adding a couple towing eyes, a fire extinguisher roll cage and 5 point harness and ignition cut out switch and heading down to the nearest race track.

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This kind of racing used to be called stock car racing in the US and Production racing in the UK.

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Today’s stunning 1961 E-type 3.8 litre Coupe has been kept in more or less original trim since new.

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It still has an all steel shell and opening panels.

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Until recently the current owner; ex power boat racer, Michael O’Shea has been racing a 1958 XK150S, he has a decades experience racing Jaguars and a couple of years racing a Cooper – Maserati.

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Michael first started racing karts at 12 but did not start racing cars for another 34 years.

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Racing has been in Michael’s blood all his life his Dad was the mastermind behind the O’Shea Racing Organisation which ran a car for a then unknown, future world champion, Jack Brabham.

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Michael will be racing his car in the new HSCC Jaguar E-Type Challenge a series created to cater just for E-types on their 50th Anniversary.

My thanks to Jaguar World and Classic & Performance Car for additional information.

Hope you enjoyed todays Heavyweight edition of ‘Gettin’ a lil’ psycho on tyres’ and that you will join me again tomorrow for Ferrari Friday. Don’t forget to come back now !

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