The Jaguar is manufactured by an independent firm named Jaguar Cars Ltd., of Coventry, England. They produce only the Jaguar: the chassis, engine, and bodies are all produced in their own plant. Since their introduction before the Second World War, Jaguars have been noted for smart, eye-catching styling, and better-than-average performance, all produced at a comparatively moderate price.
They are not sports cars in the strict sense of the expression, though out-and-out sports models such as the well-known pre-war SS-100 and the present XK-120C have been produced from time to time. Rather the Jaguar has been designed to appeal to the sports car driver who has had enough of the hard riding, rough motors, minimum weather protection characteristics of the full sports car, and now prefers something more comfortable and quiet, but also something that performs and handles like the cars to which he is accustomed.
This is one reason why Jaguar cars are fitted with a tachometer and the positive, business-like sports car gear shift lever. Both these characteristics cause endless questions in the North American market where sports cars are just becoming well known, but they are fittings which are demanded by driving enthusiasts to whom a car is a source of enjoyment rather than purely transportation. Immediately following the last war Jaguar Cars introduced the now famous XK-120 engine, and their present success may be credited to a large degree to the outstanding performance of this engine.
The twin overhead camshaft design employed in this engine, together with the hemispherical combustion chamber had long been used in racing cars, and was recognized as probably the most efficient and reliable design available, however, it is an expensive type of construction and consequently was never considered for mass production until produced by Jaguar. The XK-120 engine was first introduced in the Jaguar Special Sports two-seater. This car was designed as a fast safe roadster, but is performed so outstandingly that is was soon entered in sports car races with numerous successes. The XK-120 engine is now used in all Jaguar cars. The same engine power the luxurious sedan as is used in the spectacular two-seater.
Jaguar successes in motoring competition include: the Worlds Production Car Speed Record at 132.6 miles per hour, numerous wins and class wins in the famous Alpine Trial and Monte Carlo Rally, both of these being long distance, high speed en- durance runs; the first British car in 16 years to win the famous LeMans Twenty four Hour En- durance Race; and numerous road racing successes in Europe and the United States.
Jaguar’s most recent outstanding performance took place at Montlhéry Track in France, where a team of British drivers under the strict supervision of the Automobile Club of France drove a Jaguar XK-120 coupe for seven days and seven nights, covering 16851 miles and averaging 100.31 miles per hour for this period. A broken rear spring caused by the roughness of the track was the only mechanical failure in this grueling test.
As proof of high-speed reliability, this example is hard to beat, and few manufacturers would risk their reputations on such a severe test of a purely stock car. – Forgetting performance which the average motorist cannot use, but which is nice to have available in an emergency, the next feature of the Jaguar which causes most comment is the luxurious finish, ― soft leather upholstery beautifully fitted, polished walnut dashboard, and window cappings; brass (no rusting) window frames and trim strips.
Add to this a roomy, long legged interior, plus a trunk that will take four suitcases and four golf bags and you have little to desire for comfortable touring. Tom McCahill of “Mechanix Illustrated” magazine summed the Jaguar up very aptly in a recent description of the Jaguar Mark VII sedan. He said that there are faster cars, there are better handling cars, there are more luxuriously fitted and comfortable automobiles, but there is no car that combines such a high degree of all these qualities in one automobile at such a reasonable price.
The most common remark in journalistic reports on the Jaguar is that the car offers so much for so little. Jaguar has taken North America by storm. Eighty five per cent of the factory production now comes west across the Atlantic. As a dollar earner in England’s battle for economic survival, the Jaguar Company has been second to none.
