David,
Lots of great detail there - thank you for all the work it must have taken to document it. You speak as if there is only one type of reproduction spinners, but it that the case? For example, I’ve seen spinners with two “feathers” on the tail of the direction arrows, yet neither of the photos from Geo of an original and repro have this feature.
‘Fletching’ - yeah, I think I’ve seen that too.
David, Thanks for the clear and detailed information. I am wondering if there is any differences with the series 2 spinners. Below are some pics of what I have, in the first pic, the spinners on the right are what came on my late series 2 coupe which I purchased in the 70s so I believe to be original and the spinners on the left are a set I purchased some years ago. You can see that the JAGUAR logo appears the same on all of them.
This shows the inside of the spinners, you can see that there are no identifying marks or stamnpings on the originals but one of the newer ones has th AB cast into it with a number stamping. All of the newer ones have numbers stamped.
I wish I would have taken a picture of the reproduction spinner I sent back last week. I’m positive that it had the narrow (squished) G and J on it.
For the S1 there are three makes of repro spinner that I know of:
Orson Engineering - the most popular and supplied by SNGB amongst others. These are the ones with the defaced Jaguar logo
Original vs Orson repro:
MWS - used to make their own with ‘MWS’ logo stamped on rear. Discontinued and they now supply the Orson Engineering version
Limora - have feathers on the arrows, sometimes stamped ‘Made in England’ on rear
Finally there is a later Jaguar supplied version. It is the same weight, size and shape as the other Jaguar variant but it has the following cast markings: 8723, 1467, RH, SR as against 1467, RH, AB on the other. The thread side wall appears to be slimmer but the biggest difference is in the logo which is much finer and less bold than the AB produced item. The arrow head engraving also has more of a flourish. I assume the ‘SR’ stamp refers to the manufacturer although I have not yet found out who they were:
As I said earlier all original S1 spinners did not have the ‘Jaguar’ logo painted, they were chrome. Because the base of the logo letters could not be polished they retained the rough surface from the stamping and the Factory considered this gave enough definition and made the logo stand out (it was also cheaper, Mr Arthur Whittaker!). Concours entrants take note!
The S2 spinners are all made by Orson Engineering as far as I know and they are excellent copies. The weight, shape and engraving all pretty much match the originals. When I spoke to Orson Engineering at Stoneleigh I pointed out that they got the S2 spinner perfect so how come they screwed up so badly with the eared version. They made it clear they were not interested - “Nobody else has complained”, “Been like that for 20 years”, “Not going to change them now”, “Owners don’t care, they want cheap”.
So S2 spinners are fine to fit. If owners simply restored their S1 spinners and refused to buy the Orson crap they may decide to do something about it. In the UK the message has got through to owners who are eagerly hunting eBay for NOS examples or having their originals restored.
David
At some point Jaguar started painting the “Jaguar” lettering as I have an original Jaguar marketing brochure from 1968 that has a photo of a spinner that is clearly painted black. If anyone is interested I can scan that page of the brochure and post.
I believe the S2 spinners were painted and the later SR marked eared spinners were also painted. Just the AB ones that were not. Change coincided with British Leyland ownership of Jaguar.
Possibly Jaguar, but photographers often ‘touch up’ a car for ad photos (eliminate wipers, clean up the body line below the car, etc). Rather like the picture on a cereal box – the cereal has to be real but the ‘milk’ is Elmer’s Glue.
David- I checked the brochure and indeed the spinners are the federalized “safety” 3-nub spinners so that fits with your Series 2 statement, even though the brochure was for a Series 1 (informally Series 1.5) car.
Typical…and baaaad customer relations. Hate that.
That’s the problem when there is no competition Wiggs. Orson know they are now the only game in town so why invest in doing them properly. I keep on at Julian Barratt to stump up for Albion Brockhouse to resume production but his argument is the x2 cost means most owners will opt for the crap versions because they are just as shiny!.
A little OT but I found this information card in the brochure I have to be interesting- a compilation of all the claimed performance and equipment for 1968.
Greeting Jaguar Friends,
If I’ve missed it in this thread, please forgive me, but…
Can someone recommend an EXPERT high quality restoration shop in the US (or in Canada if it’s relatively painless) who can spruce up and re-chrome my original spinners? They are a little dinged, but by no means horrible. The chrome is pretty rough, though…
Andrew
Any good chrome shop should be able to do it, IMO. Chances are most, if not all, restoration shops farm that work out to the same guys you can contact directly.
IIRC, Peter Crespin lives in your general area. Maybe he will chime in with a recommendation.
My original XK120 spinners had a very, very thin chrome plate on them. Most had flaked off. I had them rechromed by a shop in Calgary, Alberta. I would assess the job as acceptable street quality, which is what I specified. Price was reasonable. The challenge to achieving a perfect rechroming job on spinners is preserving definition. The Jaguar logo is deep and will come out reasonably well but the rest of the script and undo arrow are shallow, so buffing will fade them somewhat.
The outfit is Alberta plating, contact is Anthony Metez. They’re online. You could send him pics of your spinners, tell him the quality of the job you want and he’ll give you a price.
Other than that they are identical 
