Okay, full disclosure – We have to tell you that we have a conflict of interest on this one. The Jaguar XK-SS is one of this author’s top ten sports car designs of all time. This partially-civilized, D-Type-derived, semi-comp car is just plain awesome. Seeing one of them at a museum or event is like glimpsing the Pietà as you enter the Vatican – Its beauty can overwhelm you if you’re not prepared to see it. Imagine our delight, then, when we learned that the organizers of the 2010 Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance had put together a small gathering of XK-SS roadsters to celebrate Jaguar’s 75th birthday. It’s their birthday, and we get the presents.

Just 25 of these incredible machines were built during their short run – a tragic fire at the factory took nine of them and halted development of not just the XK-SS, but of the D-Type as a whole. Try as they might, the Pebble Beach folks simply couldn’t get all 16 of the survivors together for this occasion…but how does a full dozen sound? Any event that has one SS in the field is pretty remarkable in our books. Having more than one is almost unheard of. Having a dozen on hand, all in one place at one time… in an almost perfect line on the Pebble Beach golf links with nothing behind them but the course and bay? Sublime.

Why does the XK-SS draw such admiration? Well, all you need do is look at it and you have your answer, but there is much more to the story. When Jaguar withdrew from racing at the end of 1955, they had a few spare D-Type chassis on hand. They also had something of a budget crisis at the time. Why not make a few changes for road use and offer the unfinished cars to the public? Jaguar added an extra seat, another door, a full-width windshield, luggage rack and folding top and the SS was born. It weighed but 2,000 pounds and had the D-Type’s 250-horsepower 3.4-liter straight-six under its shapely bonnet. It only weighed about 100 pounds more than the full-on racer and was sold at a 30 percent discount over the D.

Doesn’t that strike you as something of a bargain for a wild, hairy beast for the street? Steve McQueen thought so. In fact, the legendary actor and racer owned the same example twice. After buying one new, he had the interior customized by artist Von Dutch. He later sold the car but missed it so much that he bought it back a few years later. He had the car in his collection until the day he died. It’s now in the Petersen Museum in Los Angeles, but was in Pebble Beach for the Concours on Sunday…along with eleven of its friends. Check out our stunning gallery of high-res images below.

[Source:Autoblog]

Jaguar’s new 5.0-liter V8 has seen its fair share of praise since its introduction, but even the best petrol mill is worthless without fuel. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration website indicates that 5,048 of the automaker’s 2010 and 2011 XF and XK models equipped with the 5.0-liter engine are being recalled for a faulty fuel pump relay.

The problem can reportedly occur if the in-tank electronic fuel pump isn’t properly activated when the fuel pump relay is energized at vehicle start-up. When this happens, the engine could receive inadequate amounts of fuel, resulting in the vehicle abruptly stalling with little or no warning, which would potentially result in an unscheduled (is there another kind?) accident.

Beginning August 30 of this year (or possibly earlier) owners of affected vehicles can simply take their faulty cat to the nearest Jaguar store for a free software update that should fix the issue. Hit the jump to read over the NHTSA press release.

Vehicle Make / Model: Model Year(s):
JAGUAR / XF 2010
JAGUAR / XK 2010-2011
Manufacturer: JAGUAR LAND ROVER NORTH AMERICA, LLC Mfr’s Report Date: JUL 21, 2010

Component: ENGINE AND ENGINE COOLING
Potential Number of Units Affected: 5048

Summary:
JAGUAR IS RECALLING CERTAIN MODEL YEAR 2010-2011 JAGUAR XK AND MODEL YEAR 2010 XF V8 5.OL GASOLINE ENGINE VEHICLES. THE IN-TANK ELECTRIC FUEL PUMP MAY NOT BE CORRECTLY ACTIVATED AS THE FUEL PUMP RELAY IS NOT ENERGIZED FOLLOWING A VEHICLE START UP CYCLE. AN INADEQUATE SUPPLY OF FUEL TO THE ENGINE COULD RESULT.

Consequence:
FUEL STARVATION TO THE ENGINE LEADS TO ENGINE STUMBLE FOLLOWED BY ENGINE CUT OUT WITH MINIMAL WARNING AND COULD POTENTIALLY CAUSE A CRASH.

Remedy:
DEALERS WILL DOWNLOAD REVISED SOFTWARE FREE OF CHARGE. THE SAFETY RECALL IS EXPECTED TO BEGIN ON OR BEFORE AUGUST 30, 2010. OWNERS MAY CONTACT JAGUAR AT 1-800-452-4827 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting 1-800-452-4827 end_of_the_skype_highlighting.

Notes:
JAGUAR SAFETY RECALL NO. J017. OWNERS MAY ALSO CONTACT THE NATIONAL HIGHWAY TRAFFIC SAFETY ADMINISTRATION’S VEHICLE SAFETY HOTLINE AT 1-888-327-4236 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting 1-888-327-4236 end_of_the_skype_highlighting (TTY 1-800-424-9153 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting 1-800-424-9153 end_of_the_skype_highlighting), OR GO TO HTTP://WWW.SAFERCAR.GOV .

[Source:Autoblog]

Ford spent a fortune to buy Jaguar in 1989 and Land Rover in 2000, then spent billions on each of them getting them into fighting shape. Tata spent billions to buy JLR in 2008, and has since been raising and spending billions to retain their fighting shape and get them even fitter. The Indian firm is planning a funding round via shares, equity and the like in order to scare up another $1 billion.

Tata is a massive conglomerate and the funds will go to reducing the company’s overall debt-to-equity ratio, but the number we were most interested in was £600 million pounds – almost the entire amount of the funding round, $908 million. That’s the amount Tata says it will spend this year on new product development at at JLR.

In May we were told that Tata would invest £1 billion per year on JLR, but we won’t quibble about being short £400 million for now with the Evoque, a meaner XKR, an XE and maybe also an F-Type being forged. So even if the Ford and Tata initial experience with JLR sound familiar, we give Tata credit: for all those billions they’re spending, there isn’t an X-Type in sight.

[Source:Autoblog]

According to Autocar in the UK, Jaguar Land Rover is still hard at work on series hybrid vehicles. Similar to the stance General Motors has taken with the 2011 Chevrolet Volt, Jaguar believes that the only real way electric vehicles can be made compatible with everyday life is to add a small range-extending gasoline-powered engine that’s capable of keeping the batteries charged on the go.

Unlike GM, though, Jaguar has seen fit to contract its small engine work out to Lotus, which makes sense given the two British company’s differing product specialties. Lotus has reportedly delivered a 1.2-liter three-cylinder engine that generates 35kW of power, which is carried – with a little help from a UK government grant or two – inside a new 2011 XJ sedan with a lithium ion battery pack.

Motive force comes courtesy of what Autocar believes is a 145kW (194 horsepower) electric motor with 295 pound-feet of torque. Performance specifications sound pretty good – though not quite as impressive as we might have imagined – assuming all of this is accurate, with a range of 600 miles, combined fuel economy of 47 miles per gallon (57 mpg UK) and carbon emissions of under 120 g/km. Top speed would reportedly come in at 112 miles per hour.

An unnamed source at Jaguar tells Autocar that the electric XJ handles quite well “because of the bulk that’s removed from car when you strip out the conventional drivetrain.” Future Range Rover models are also rumored to get a similar drivetrain.

[Source:Autoblog]

The man installed by Tata to guide the Jaguar/Land Rover ship, David Smith, has left the company. Smith was the head of finance for Ford Europe, and had helped sell Aston Martin to Dave Richards’ group before he assisted in the sale of Jaguar to Tata. He has been the CEO since 2008, and just last year helped the company secure a £340 million ($553 million) European Investment Bank loan guarantee. A short statement from the company itself gave no reason for the departure, saying only that Ravi Kant, company director, will take over in the meantime while a successor is found.

[Source: Jaguar/Land Rover, BBC]

[Source:Autoblog]

As if the X-Type experiment didn’t go poorly enough, the Leaper may be heading back to the wagon trough, with four-cylinder engines, no less. Yet it’s not as lame as it sounds. According to Autocar, the idea of an XF wagon is on the plate for when the model gets its refresh in 2012. Jaguar wants to beat back its Audi and BMW estate car rivals, and were it to have a five-door XF, the car’s sales would stand a good chance of being on top, instead of in third place in UK sales.

The four-cylinder talk centers around a diesel engine that is rumored to be a revised 2.2-liter borrowed from Ford by way of Land Rover. While the XF’s current V8 has taken some flak for being an underachiever, it at least provides a delightful soundtrack. The bray of a four, even a diesel, may be acceptable to UK buyers who already snap up such powertrains in competitors wagons, but we’d want our family-style XF to kick it with big V8 brawn. Here’s hoping we get the chance.

[Source:Autoblog]

We may still be a ways off before customers – on this side of the Atlantic especially – can begin placing orders for a new Jaguar XJ, but that hasn’t stopped Coventry from launching its online configurator post haste.

Visitors to the Jaguar website can spec out their dream Jag and find out already just how much they should be putting aside. The configurator lets you choose between the three levels of specification (standard, Supercharged or Supersport) and wheelbase (standard or extended) before going on to choose from a palette of 14 exterior paint colors, six unique wheels, six interior leather trims and six veneers, as well as no-cost options like deleted badging, an ashtray and lighter, leather steering wheel and a whole mess of optional accessories from floor mats to chromed rims. So sit back, cancel your plans for the evening and take the leap.

[Source: AutoBlog]

There’s a lot to love about the all-new Jaguar XJ, but if the slick dual-view console screen system was one of the elements that caught your attention amidst the big cat’s debut, you may be in for a disappointment. With the dual-view system, Jaguar devised a way to let the passenger watch a movie, for instance, while the driver sees the navigation system. The idea is to keep the passenger entertained without distracting the driver, offering up the best of both worlds. Problem is, it may be illegal in the United States.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration currently prohibits the display of entertainment in the center console. The idea is that it would distract the driver, and they’re right. However while the XJ’s display may be “technically illegal”, as Jaguar’s noted designer Ian Callum admits – that is, by the letter of the law – the whole point of the system is that it removes the distraction from the driver’s eyesight, thereby complying with the spirit of the law. Whether the NHTSA will change the regulations to allow the system, however, remains to be seen. Think they ought to let this one pass, or is the law the law and that’s that? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.

[Source: AutoBlog]

The steep downturn of the world’s luxury automotive markets has taken a toll on Jaguar/Land Rover, and the company’s bottom line has taken a huge hit as a result. Automotive News is citing a Financial Times report that says Tata Motors’ British luxury marques lost 673.4 million pounds ($1.11 billion U.S.) in 2008. That’s a $2 billion swing from the 641.5 million pound ($1.05 billion) profit the British brands earned in 2007. Tata Motors said last month that Jaguar/Land Rover lost 306 million pounds ($504 million) for for the fiscal year ending March 2009.

The Financial Times report comes as Tata Motors is working out a deal with the British government to provide short-term financing for the cash-strapped automaker. The report that says the U.K. government is willing to provide a 175 million pound ($288 million) commercial bridge loan to keep operations running. The reports says Tata Motors would like a 12-month loan, while the British government would like a six-month term, along with representation on the board.

[Source:Autoblog]

In January, the UK government set aside £2.3 billion for loan guarantees to help automakers start producing electric cars on the island. In April, Tata applied for £10 billion from the program to build its Indica Vista EV. Last week the Indian firm was told that it would be another eight weeks before the Department for Business Innovation and Skills would decide on Tata’s application.

Tata can’t understand what the holdup is and plans to deliver a petition to the minister in charge of the program to make its case. It can’t help that while Tata waits it’s watching UK government figures give speeches at Nissan facilities in an attempt to woo the Japanese automaker to produce electric cars in England. Nor can it help that Tata’s Norwegian arm has already been approved by for a loan by the Norwegian government to make electric cars there.

Tata is also waiting on its €340 billion European Investment Bank loan to be approved by the UK government. That loan was for Jaguar and Land Rover aid, but the issue of both loans is said to be about the British government wanting to make sure that Tata can repay the money. If the government doesn’t decide soon, they might have much bigger things to deliberate on — like more job losses at JLR…

[Source: Guardian]

[Source:Autoblog]