Interesting. Then again there seem to be many variables here - neither my crash roll carriers nor anything else in the cabin rusts… but the screws mainly in the climate control box. I don’t think that surface rust after many years is bad, but rather shows that cost sensitive improvements have been made to keep costs down and still provide better quality. A Jaguar thing and part of the success of the company.
The windscreen design is terrible, but I believe it improved slightly with the new paint process in '86 or thereabouts. The SIII is the result of a long improvement processes with a lot of confusion along the route - but when it looks good, it probably is.
The bad quality of the steel and improper rust prevention must have been a general issue, but I can throw in BMW recalling the early e36 at huge cost because they rusted too much. Same goes for the Mercedes and Daimler-Chryslers of long past-communism (no change to the supply for sure) times. No doubt many more. Either my XJ has always been dry or there is nothing bad about it, it being in a general state of neglect but from below everything is very nice still.
The screens are a story of their own but I can’t attend at everything at once. Judging from the rear screen that was out before the water collects, is eventually kept in and held by capillary effect. Eventually the paint lifts, aided by the increased stress from the glue and water starts rusting under the paint. In theory no water should enter the cabin because of the small c-section the glass rests on. I thought about brazing in drains with a tube at the lowest points but wish there was an alternative, easier solution: The bodies themselves didn’t change too much in terms of stability, glue or not…
Concerning the reliability, the Jag only now starts to catch up on error count with our more modern cars. I drove 360mi (both tanks) in the last four days and was not worried in the least. The small things, however, can kill you: First it’s the flasher relay, then it doesn’t want to start one time and before you know you’re in a cold garage dissecting your lighting switch to no avail. Once you give up you drive off complaining about cold feet and rough idle. I still think that they are good cars, especially when cared for.
Performance wise I don’t think the V12 is that great, I only was in one once (not counting the Broadspeed XJC) and the the 4.2 isn’t far slower, a bit lighter and has quicker steering. What about the SWB SI, manual, 0-60 wise? I’m preoccupied, that’s high on my dream car list.
The V12 of course is the most amazing experience given how abundantly smooth and powerful it feels.
I want to wrap up this thread with the news that I did find a clean unmolested SII XJ12. Brought it home on a trailer in May. I just retired from my job after 20 years so I finally have time to dive into it. She’s a '79 2-tone blue with some tasty mods by the previous owner: new aluminum radiator, UK style bumpers, side marker delete and 7" outboard headlights. I also got a rebuilt T5 manual trans for a future project. But that will have to take a back seat to fixing a near catastrophe I had last week with overheating from a burst top hose. I am now deep into Kirby’s Book to plan the first big project: replacing the apparently dead fan clutch with an electric fan. Won’t go into that here but I will say The Book is worth reading for any V-12 owner -any jag owner for that matter -because it is chock full of knowledge from many sources and points to many references that you won’t find in manuals.
I think this car has tons of potential. I did drive it a few times and I love the smooth ride (on worn out suspension!) and turbine-like power of the engine. It does move out like an old American V8 though. I am thinking some bits from AJ Engineering and the 5-speed will wake it up. But, those are a ways down the road. I want to address the basics first.
Really happy with this car. It’s pretty much what I wanted, a not-too-common classic car project with plenty of potential at a reasonable entry price. -and when I’m done it’ll be a ball to drive!
Driven gently you primarily notice just the extra smoothness of the V12. That’s a treat in and of itself.
But there’s just no escaping the fact that the V12 has a lot more horsepower. In my case, 90 more horsepower (going from the Jaguar spec sheets). But…the V12 is not a torque monster. You gotta give 'er the boot and bring 'er up to a boil, so to speak, to really feel the full effect.
I’d say the V12 is a full 3-4 seconds faster than the 4.2 on a 0-60 blast. That’s a very big difference. But, if you drive our Jag as though it’s made out of glass, you won’t notice much difference
Tony , First off, HAPPY RETIREMENT!. Health for a long time!
Second, your choice was a good one…
You have a full body car with the v12 , but because of the era parts will be cheap and the project will be fun.
If you got crazy with it, TRY the series 1 bumpers or shave them off completely, both a good look.
Enjoy your toy, its yours and do what you want…
All the best!
GTJOEY1314
The V12 (compared to the euro-spec 4.2) makes 0-60 in 6.5-7.5 seconds?
Yes I’m sure the added power and especially smoothness are great, but the acceleration might come close.
the US spec SIII is considerably slower than Euro cars, so I believe Doug’s comparison. In Europe it would mostly be 205 vs. 265 DIN hp (comparing a cat-12ender), whereas the US way would probably rather be 180 vs. 265 hp … Maybe you would be surprised to feel an early 299 hp pre-HE on a stick shifted coupé:slight_smile:
Sure. And I bet I would.
But my non-catalysed 4.2 does 10.5 seconds (if it ran, which it hopefully will by next week). Cat-to cat v12 shouldn’t be the most significant difference in terms of overall performance - at least that was my thinking all along…
I thought the 5.3 SIII only made it to the states in catalysed form if at all.
David
Yes, sure - but us Europeans tend to compare non-cat SIII XJ6 - because we didn’t get any other - with catalyzed XJ12s - because most SIII 12s on the road today are catalyzed (production from 1987-1992) .
And your six seems to be in pretty good shape enginewise - once it runs again:-), so the margin gets much closer than if comparing oranges with oranges …
It certainly was quick! Now it’s lacking four head studs but that’ll hopefully be ‘sorted’ until the weekend. I really miss driving around.
Not to forget the 2.88 diff in the US cars. Good point on the late V12es! Maybe that adds to it.
Leaves them heavier though. And the steering is geared lower, isn’t it?
I have one of those Canadian VDP V12s with only two cats and no air injection… no idea of compression ratio… but it hauls ass. Beats the pants off my old 83 XJ6. Now it’s nothing compared to a 2004 XJ8 with the fancy 8 speed automatic or whatever it had, but the XJ12 is much prettier. I did park it a couple years back because it was getting too many miles. My daily driver is a 96 6.0 XJ12 which was the best $900 I ever spent! Fantastic car. I love all the V12s.
I don’t think all Jaguar V-12’s are created equal, and there’s quite a transition from a 1972 series 1 to a late series 3. In my opinion the S1 cars are more sporting, and the S3 cars are a lot more refined.
Having followed this post along, I can report that my own early car, which has had some mild mods including 10:1 compression, and with the benefit of the long intake runners that carburettor cars have, has torque in abundance. Easily more than any other V-12 I’ve driven, But the real gains are in the 3.3 diff ratio, and the fact that it’s some 600 lbs lighter than Doug’s lovely series 3. That accounts for an awful lot.
Because the V-12’s are so smooth, and don’t have the instant throttle response of an XK engine, when the foot is buried in the carpet it needs a constant gaze at the speedo to realize how fast they really are. It’s very deceptive. And they just keep on pulling right to the top of the rev range.
If your looking for a hobby car they can’t be beat. Will keep you tied to the garage and poor in equal measure.
Good for you, I recently bought my first Jaguar, a somewhat rusty 85 XJ6. Yes, it has rust around the windshield and rear window, some bubbles over the back right wheel and I think there’s a good bit of bondo in the rockers. I did have a new floor pan put in the passenger side as it was quite bad. BUT I garage it and try to avoid driving in the rain as much as possible so these have not gotten much worse so far. A tappet guide stakedown kit and a little timing chain adjustment is the only work I’ve paid to have done to the engine. Rest has just been simple stuff - hoses, belts, MC, calipers.
I’ve driven it over 10,000 miles in 2 years and enjoy it tremendously, rust and all.
