Am i reading your post right? Are you saying the earliest XJ40’s had the european sealed headlamp assemblies? In which country? In the United States, the 1988-1989’s XJ40’s base trim or Vanden Plas all had the quad round front lights. Even the 1990 Base XJ40 has those same lights where the Sovereign and VDP got the european units. From 1991 and on, all the models came with the european units.
In Canada, the very earliest cars, (at least the parts car I owned) had rectangular, single reflector Valeo brand headlights. This was the headlight style commonly known as “fishtank”. I have no idea what trim level car that car was, possibly a Sovereign?
I would think all N.American models would have been similarly equipped. I don’t know how long the Valeo style continued, I think it was maybe a short-lived feature as I’ve only run across one car with them and that VIN was down in the 5’s.
By the time the 1990 model was introduced, the Valeo European fishtank style had been dropped in favour of a unique-to-North-America Hella branded twin-reflector rectangular headlight. This style remained in production right up to the end of the range and was fitted to cars of the upper trim levels.
Just to be clear, no North American XJ40 was fitted with European single reflectors after the Valeos were dropped.
New Zealand also had the twin round headlights on the base spec cars and the bricks on the soverign, The twins gave much better lighting, My ‘92 had the brick headlights and I change them for the twins and the impression I had once I had changed them out was that the car looked vertically slimmer.
Thank you Larry. I am contemplating doing some changes to this rectangular lights.
This car came down from the USA back in 1988 . Was driven by the Vice President of Jag at the time and it would appears to me that they took out the original 4 lamps and installed the 2 lamp system. So I am contemplating reversing the strategy. Furthermore, it appears this was a VDP and they relabel it as Sovereign.
Thank you Robin! Thinking about converting as well, as it now appears that the bricks are not readily available.
If it is a VDP it would have fluted trim on the hood and tailgate chrome. Unless it has these features it is probably a Sovereign. These very early cars had many features which were dropped/modified in later years.
Can you take a picture of your headlights and grille and post it here?
Physically they are a drop in unit but the wiring will need to be modified, unless as you say, it was originally a twin light system.
From memory I just spiced a new two pin socket into the high beam feed, the inners are only high beam.
We NEVER got these “Fishtank” lights that you speak of here in the United States. We indeed did get the Hella rectangular units in 1990 but not on the base model, just the mid price Sovereign and VDP. By 1991, all models got the Hella lamps.
Yes I know - I said that!
I think you’ll find though that the earliest cars could have had them, like I said, VINS in the early 500000’s. I don’t see why the Canadian cars would be much different from the US models at the time. Apart from DRM’s there isn’t much difference in the other years.
Looking inside, the US Vanden Plas has the fold down picnic trays and the rear sun shades.
Yes! My sovereign has the shades and pull down trays behind the front seats.
The best I know about this model year XJ6 “Series 4” / XJ40, the pull down trays and sunshades were only on the Vanden Plas model. My guess is it is a Vanden Plas.
I have a '93 XJ6, but the New York State Department of Motor Vehicles and Carfax identify it / the VIN as a Sovreign, despite Jaguar not offering this model designation in the US that year.
The very early VIN '88 Sovereign I scrapped a couple of years ago had those fitments too.
Car would also have to have the fluted grille to be a VDP. No flutes = not a VDP
Heh. What’s in a name? Cars in the US often seem to get different nomenclature than ROW. A Ford Falcon in Australia is a completely different animal than a Ford Falcon in the US. Heck, the US couldn’t even get a Jaguar E-Type, they had to rename it the “XKE” for this market.
True - and in Jaguar’s case for a very good reason.
The cars with the ‘fluted grille’ called “VDP” in North America are in fact “Daimlers” - but Jaguar were not allowed to use that name in NA for copyright reasons but could do so in the UK (and the RoW as far as I know).
And some had rear seat headrests and VDPs came with the ultra fuzzy floor mats for all positions but the drivers seat floor. Probably all long lost by now. And then in later years of the XJ40, just to confuse things, there was the Majestic, a sort of ultra Vanden Plas, Vanden Plas. It had its own special wheels as I recall.
The correct name for the rear sunshades is peasant blockers.
1 Like
Hey I still have the 3 fuzzy wuzzy over rugs in my VDP …lambswool apparently …