Growing up I heard many dinner table horror stories about 1970’s/80’s Jaguars from my mom. She was an office manager and her bosses drove company Jags. They were in the shop every other week it seemed, and she spent a lot of time just wrangling their broken Jags. She grew up poor and was appalled at the amount of money the company wasted on those cars.
In a magazine called Sports Car Market which is based in Portland Oregon, they once did a review of the Jaguar XJS which prompted one of their contributors to write in with her story of a friend arriving at her house in Portland from Seattle and the friend wiggled out of the passenger side window with the headlights still on because neither door would open and the lights wouldn’t shut off. Neither power window worked and the trunk wouldn’t unlock. The owner had just bought the car brand new (I think this was in the later 80’s)
The Chevy V8 Swap is somewhat popular with the 70’s-80’s Jaguars particularly the ones that came from the factory with a GM automatic.
Two Dodge Shadows in sequence. I loved the cars – they were the most basic, straightforward machines available. And they were in the shop almost every single month. Total repair bills, in the end, would have bought another whole new one.
But for crappy construction, it would be hard to beat my 1975 Chevy Malibu. It was like it was assembled by drunken children, with little bugs everywhere.
The worst-built new car that I ever saw was the '71 Barracuda that my brother had the misfortune to own, after his wife decided to buy it–without consulting him. There were so many parts of that car whose fasteners were never tightened at the factory, that you could literally see parts dangling precariously when the car was delivered.
For example, the rear window defroster was a blower device, instead of the heated wires that we are used to nowadays. The blower and its ducting were attached to a fairly hefty piece of angle iron that was supposed to be bolted to the underside of the rear package shelf with 3 bolts.
However, there was only one bolt in evidence, and that one bolt was only tightened about half-way. Since I was the one who discovered that the loud banging noise coming from the trunk was because of the barely-attached rear defroster, that image is etched in my memory, along with the “fader” control for the audio system that was hanging from the bottom of the dashboard. So, in addition to being really badly assembled, the dealer’s pre-delivery inspection/prep obviously consisted only of washing the car.
I also recall that the paint looked like it had been applied with a broom.
There was other evidence of REALLY bad assembly quality, but I don’t recall those details anymore.
@Bing If your BIL purchased a 1999-2007 Jaguar it is technically a Ford. As a die hard Ford fan he does not have to feel guilty.
Were those Jaguars based on the Contour . . . or the Toreass . . . ?
@OlyDoug My next door neighbors had a 1974 Jaguar XJ6 coupe. Lingenfelter 383/450hp with a turbo 400 transmission. I drove the car for 2 weeks while they were on vacation. HOLY CRAP!!!
@sgtrock21 Yeah it sounds like a fun car, The v8 is cheaper to buy than the V12 Jag motor and you can have an amazing amount of power with really easy to find parts.
I have had some pavement bucklers but that Jag was scary fast!!!
@the same mountainbike I did buy a Jaguar but got lucky. My landlady’s son had a 1955 MK 7 sedan sitting behind the apartments. It was covered by years of maple tree sap. I bought it for $100. I had the local British car shop send someone to give a restoration estimate. It was $4,000 but they offered $200 for the car. I accepted and they hauled it off. Six months later I visited the shop and asked how the Jag turned out. They put $2,000 into it and sold it for $3,000. I could have put $4,000 into it and sold it for $3,000. I could have spent $4,000 and sold it for $3,000. I dodged that bullet.
I’m familiar with the Chevy-into-Jag engine swaps, but to me they seem misguided. As Doug stated, the XJS had malfunctioning lights and door latch. They were notorious for electrical gremlins. A new engine addresses none of that. And it destroys nearly all the resale value.
Top Gear once did a road test on an XJS reproduced by some English company that took old ones and remanufactured them using modern components that addressed all the shortcomings. Seemed like a better approach, though I recall it was pricey.
As for the earlier comments about not buying car produced on Mondays or Fridays: yes, you can still look up your build date. But consider this, what you’ve gotten is the day your car was ASSEMBLED. Cars today are an assembled of prebuilt components. You engine, transmission, seats, dash, etc, were all built at some earlier date, and then assembled on the built date. So if you are worried that your engine will fall out because the hung-over auto worker forgot to torque the motor mounts, you can avoid Monday cars. But I’d be much more concerned about how well that engine was assembled in the first place; on an earlier day.
I agree that swapping American V8s into classic foreign cars is “misguided”. Many times it is the only way to fiscally keep the classic car on the road. Chevrolet small block V8s are usually available and affordable and ditto for parts. Some of the most popular Chevrolet small block transplants Are Jaguars and old Toyota Land Cruisers. The most popular domestic transplants are Jeep CJs and Chevrolet Vegas, These seem to work quite well if done properly. In about 1969 or 1970 I answered a newspaper ad for a Jaguar XK-150 for sale. It was at a small independent auto repair shop in the small city where I now live. A basic visual inspection revealed a decent body, bald tires, ratty interior, and top. I asked how/if it ran the answer was 10 times better than it used to. It’s got a Cadillac engine!!! My response “Really”? We opened the hood/bonnet. I was treated to a greasy dirty giant (I would guess 1954 vintage Cadillac V8 backed by a greasy dirty hydramatic. The most impressive thing was the torched out inner fender wells for clearance and the flex pipe exhaust headers. He wanted to “fire it up” I replied that’s OK I trust that it runs great. "walk away, walk away, walk away. No! run away, run away, run away!!!
February 15
Were those Jaguars based on the Contour . . . or the Toreass . . . ?
Ford purchased Jaguar. The were still technically Jaguars but Ford managed to slip in some of their crappy components to save a few dollars.
@TonyCarlos I have owned four British automobiles, 1960 Austin Healey Sprite Mk 1, !960 MGA roadster 1600, 1962 MGA coupe 1600 Mk II, 1967 MGB. I was fortunate that the shadow of Sir Joseph Lucas Prince of Darkness did not pass over these vehicles. I had absolutely no electrical problems not even a burnt out bulb!
@sgtrock21: Ford may have put in their cheaper components, and I’m no big fan of Ford, but based on the abysmal reliability of the Jaguar brand, this likely only improved it.