9781422279571

speed Rules! r R Inside the World’s Hottest Cars

A Tradition of Luxury and Style jaguar

By Paul W. Cockerham

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© 2018 by Mason Crest, an imprint of National Highlights, Inc.

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Series ISBN: 978-1-4222-3828-8 Hardback ISBN: 978-1-4222-3832-5 EBook ISBN: 978-1-4222-7957-1

First printing 1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2

Additional text by Bob Woods.

Cover photograph by NaturSports/Dreamstime.com.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file with the publisher.

speed Rules! r R Inside the World’s Hottest Cars

BMW C orvet te

F errar i J aguar L amborghini M erc edes -B enz M ustang P orsche

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CON T E N T S

I N T R O D U C T I ON 4

C h a p t e r O n e B E G I NN I NG S 12

C h a p t e r T w o G R OWT H W I T H G R A C E 30 C h a p t e r T h r e e A H E R I TA G E R E N EWE D 50

C h a p t e r F o u r L E A P I NG I N T O T H E 2 1 S T C E N T U R Y 80

R e s e a r c h P r o j e c t s 92 F i n d O u t M o r e 93

S e r i e s G l o s s a r y

o f K e y T e r m s

94 I n d e x

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I NT RODUC T I ON

T he automobiles of Jaguar have always been singu- larly beautiful creations, as well as enthusiastic performers and outstanding values. From the be- ginning, they appealed to a society that wanted transportation that was more appealing than Great Britain’s generally pedestrian offerings, but more reasonably priced than the top–end marques such as Rolls–Royce and Bentley. The company was launched by a pair of motor- cycle enthusiasts in Blackpool, Lancashire: William Walmsley, and a young entrepreneurial fellow named William Lyons, a son of a local family whose business sense and eye for design would ultimately make Jaguar an extension of his personality and vision. With loans from their fathers, the pair established the Swallow Sidecar Company in a tiny Blackpool shop in 1922. Lyons’ business savvy allowed the company to thrive, and within four years the com- pany moved to larger quarters that allowed it to expand operations to include automotive body building and repair. At the time, the tiny Austin Seven automobile was enjoying considerable success, which Swallow duly noted. The company bought a rolling chassis and designed and built an attractive body, launching the car in 1927 as the Austin Swallow. The car was an overnight success, with the volume of dealer orders necessitating to a 40,000-square–foot factory in Foleshill in the Midlands. Production soon rose to 50 cars per week, including production on chassis from other car companies such as Standard, Swift, and Morris. Standard Nine and Sixteen rolling chassis would soon form the foundation for new designs from Swallow, the SS 1 and SS 2. Introduced to the public in 1931 as drophead and fixed–head coupes, the SS

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The long hood and cycle wings mark this vehicle as an early– vintage (1931) SS 1. The hood ornament appears to be a one–off parody of a Rolls–Royce appendage.

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Swallow’s first fully original car design, the SS 1, was built on a modified chassis supplied by Standard. The long hood and rakish lines suggested speed, but it was not to be found in this car: it’s six– cylinder engine developed only 16 hp.

cars had long, low lines and were as impressively equipped as cars selling for four times the money. They propelled Swallow’s profits to £38,000 ($190,000) by 1934, at which time the business became a public company and Walmsley’s interest was bought out by Lyons. Lyons first applied the Jaguar name to a model with the introduction of the SS Jaguar saloon series in 1935. A six–cylinder, 2.5–litre engine that had twin carburetors and produced 103 hp powered this very sleek four–door design. Leather and woodwork graced the interior in rich abundance. Also produced were 1.5– and 3.5–litre versions, with the latter propelling the SS Jaguar to a top speed of 90 mph. By the time World War II started, 14,000 Jaguars had been produced. At the same time, SS Cars Limited started work on its first sports cars. First was the SS 90, based on a shortened SS 1 chassis; the model was never truly promoted and only 23 units were built before it was replaced by the altogether lovely SS 100, introduced in 1935 in 2.5– and 3.5–litre versions. During the war the company produced parts for and repaired, military air- craft, and in a return to its roots, manufactured approximately 10,000 motorcy- cle sidecars for the military. The sidecar business was ultimately sold in 1944. With the war and the much publicized excesses of the Nazi period giving an unfortunate connotation to the company’s “SS” initials, its name was changed to Jaguar Cars Limited in February 1945, with car production resuming that September with the resurrection of pre–war designs.

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I N T R O D U C T I O N

While on fire–watch duty during the war, Lyons and his engineers sketched out a design for an advanced new engine for a new postwar saloon design. Development continued in Jaguar’s early days, along with work on a new chassis and front suspension. The chassis and suspension was ready by 1948, but the engine was still being developed, as was the saloon’s new body, the lines of which were quite complex for steelworking. An interim model, the Mark V, debuted with the new chassis and suspension; although its lines were highly reminiscent of the SS Jaguar, the public loved it. The new engine bowed later in the year in what had been planned as a limited–run sports car, the XK–100 (a four–cylinder vehicle) and XK–120 (six cylinders). The price differential between the two was so small the XK–100 never entered production, but the XK–120 was a sensation and the focal point for expanding the company’s distribution into the lucrative United States market. It also provided a starting point for Jaguar’s brief but success- ful history in sports–car racing. The top–of–the–line saloon finally bowed in 1950 as the Mark VII, a large, lavish car fitted with the 160 hp–XK engine and the company’s usual rich leather and wood trim treatments inside. Factory space at Foleshill soon became tight, so Lyons, in 1950, purchased a former Daimler factory, with one million square feet of space, in Coventry. A new mid–sized car, the 2.4–litre saloon, was introduced in 1956, the same year William Lyons was knighted for his work in the automotive industry. A 3.4–liter model was added the following year. These were heady days for Jaguar: its models were exemplars of style and performance, the company was profitable and growing. So when a major factory fire destroyed hundreds of cars on Feb. 12, 1957 and sus- pended production, it was indicative of the drive of Sir William Lyons and

FOLLOWING PAGE: Leftover D–types were converted into hairy XK–SS passenger cars with the addition of bumpers, convertible tops, and Ford Consul windscreens. Only 16 were made before fire swept through the Coventry works.

A fold–down wind- screen and cutaway doors made the SS 1 Tourer a sport- ing proposition. This is a 1935 model.

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the dedication of Jaguar’s workforce that production resumed within only a few days. Growth forced another move in 1960 which resulted in the outright purchase of Daimler Car Company Limited, giving Jaguar another major factory within a couple of miles and a total workforce of over 8,000 workers. Purchases of truck manufacturer Guy Motors Limited of Wolverhampton followed in 1961, and race–engine/forklift truck–maker Coventry–Climax in 1963. By the end of 1959 a new compact saloon, the Mark II, had been introduced, and during the 1960s it became the most popular Jaguar saloon ever, with over 92,000 produced, until the XJ series was introduced. But the car most representative of Jaguar’s heritage was the E–type sports car (also known as the XK–E), produced between 1962 and 1975. Its mystique and influence has probably never been equaled by any other production automobile. The 1960s and 1970s saw the company continue to develop several genera- tions of what were now known as XJ saloons in the face of economic pressures affecting the entire British automotive industry. Lyons merged Jaguar with British Motor Corporation in July 1966 to form a new conglomerate called British Motor Holdings (BMH) Limited; by 1968 he resigned as the group’s managing director. BMH merged with the Leyland Group that May to form British Leyland.

A front–on view of the Mark II cat on the prowl. The grill–flanking foglamps were a distinctive feature.

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I N T R O D U C T I O N

On the car front, a new XJ6 was introduced in late 1968, which was voted Great Britain’s Car of the Year for 1969. Three years later a V–12 engine became available; in 1972 this XJ12 was similarly honored. A controversial coupe utilizing this engine, the XJS, bowed in 1975, a design unlike anything Jaguar, or any other manufacturer, had ever produced. Despite mixed reviews, it remained in production into the 1990s. Jaguar ceased to be a separate company in October 1972. The following 10 years saw company morale, and more importantly, build–quality, erode to desperate levels. The company started to revive early in the 1980s under the direction of John Egan, who negotiated the purchase of Jaguar’s facilities to make the company fully independent and private by 1984. The company’s board was confident enough to launch a new engineering, research, and devel- opment facility at Whitley. The 1987 model year saw the launch of a new XJ saloon series that helped start rebuild Jaguar’s shattered reputation for build–quality. By the early 1990s, Jaguar, with its niche market of fast, luxurious cars, represented a tasty takeover target for a larger company, and rumors swirled involving possible interest by BMW and General Motors. But it proved to be the Ford Motor Company that took over in January 1991, and the company since then has prospered with the introduction of incremental models, a major investment in new assembly capacity, and dramatic increases in performance, refinement, and build–quality. Armed with resources equal to its distinctive legacy, Jaguar’s big cats from Coventry appear poised for future prosperity.

The XJ200 boasted 500 hp and for a while was considered the fastest car on earth.

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J A G U A R

Swallow Sidecar bought a rolling chassis from Austin of its popular and diminuitive Seven model, added stylish bodywork, and launched Britain’s first “people’s car”, the Austin Swallow, in 1927. The car was an instant success.

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C h a p t e r O n e

B EG I NN I NGS W ithout William Lyons there never would have been a Jaguar, for the company had his personality written all over it. Not only did he direct its operations, but also he served as chief stylist, developed more than a dozen significant automobiles, while directing engi- neering operations, advertising, and racing. He worked well with organized labor and the English government. Born in Blackpool on September 4,1901, William Lyons was the son of a visiting Irish musi- cian who never went home because he had fallen in love with a local girl known as Minnie. At the time of William’s birth, the family had an established business selling pianos. His interest in cars was germinated during an apprenticeship at Crosssley Motors Limited, and by the age of 18, he was working as a salesman at a local car dealership. Compared to the United States and Germany, England had a relatively late start in deveop- ing an automotive industry, and had no popularly priced automobile for the middle class during the the pre–World War I period. Youths of the time drove motorcycles, with sidecars attached, as a means of transportation. Lyons owned an early Harley–Davidson bike, and got to know a fellow enthusiast named William Walmsley, whose family had recently moved into the neighborhood. Walmsley was building sidecars out of his family’s garage; Lyons bought one and soon proposed the pair go into sidecar manufacturing together. They waited until Lyons’ twenty–first birthday, so he could obtain loans from banks, and with support from their fathers, the pair founded the Swallow Sidecar Company on September 4, 1922. The aluminum bodied, torpedo–shaped Swallow sidecars were built on ash frames, fitted to chassis supplied by Montgomery’s of Coventry, and were priced under £30 ($150). They were also aerodynamic, which was proven at the Isle of Man Tourist Trophy race in 1924 when motorcycles fitted with Swallow sidecars finished second, third, and fourth. By this time England did indeed have a mass–market automobile in the form of the little Austin Seven, so named for the number of horsepower its engine provided (and could be taxed for). Lyons and Walmsley had their eye on the Seven when they moved their company to larger quarters on Cocker Street in 1926 and renamed it the Swallow Sidecar and Coach Building Company, for Lyons knew they could build a custom–bodied version of the rather plain Seven and sell it at not too expensive a price. A chassis was bought for $560 in 1927, and Lyons gave it a two–seat sports body with a hinged top. A large Austin dealer, Henley’s of London, ordered 500 of the cars, ensuring success for the new venture. By 1928 a four–door saloon had joined the Swallow family, and the company indicated its future intent by simplifying its name to the Swallow Coachbuilding Company. That November, the company moved to Foleshill, near Coventry, England. Coventry was the center of the English automotive industry; Lyons and Walmsley were signifying their intent to be an influential presence in that industry.

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J A G U A R

Swallow expanded their operations to include cars built on chassis provided by Fiat, Standard, Swift, Morris, Wolseley, and Austin. Lyons persuaded the managing director of Standard, John Black, to sell a modified version of Standard’s six–cylinder chassis, and with this, Swallow’s first total car design, the SS 1, was created. What “SS” stood for has never been proven—’’Swallow Sports” or “Standard Swallow” seem the most likely candidates—but with its long hood and low–slung lines, the car proved a sensation. Journalists dubbed it “The Car With the Thousand–Pound Look,” but it sold for only $1,550. It was not a fast car, initially. The 16–hp 2–liter Standard engine meant the car took over 20 seconds to achieve 50 mph, and its top speed, when in tune, might reach 70 mph. The SS 1, however, looked as though it could run with the best of the period, which certainly contributed to its success. The original fixed–head coupe was joined in 1933 by a four–seat convertible, the Tourer, which also had a fold–down windscreen and cutaway doors. Later that year Lyons totally redesigned the SS 1 on a new chassis that was 7 inches longer in its wheelbase. The Standard engine was enlarged

The SS 1 Airline was an extremely stylish automobile, with the rear coachwork featur- ing a curved rear roof and a pillarless window treatment.

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