The minute it appeared at the Geneva Motor Show in 1961, Enzo Ferrari called it “the most beautiful car in the world”. Fifty-six years later and the Jaguar E-type is still the most seductive, sexual and sensuous car ever built, the object of heated desire by both baby boomers and Gen Xers.
The man who gave the E-type its curves, Malcolm Sayer — who trained as an aerodynamicist — used secret mathematical formulas to calculate the ellipses that defined the classic outline as well as the bumpers, lights, wheels and other exterior elements. The Who wrote a song about it. In 1961 Road & Track magazine said: “The E-type is a great crowd drawer and can be a terrific ego booster, but if you want to get away from it all, we can’t think of a nicer way to go.” Three years later, E-type owner Steve McQueen tested a 2+2 model for Sports Illustrated: “I had driven the two-seater XK-E, and as far I could see, the 2+2 handled just like it, which is bloody good.”
For $5000 in Britain and $7000 in Australia, you could buy a car that was just about as fast as a $20,000 Ferrari Spyder. It looked better and went better than most Ferraris, Maseratis and Aston Martins. It was — and still is — the ultimate chick or rooster magnet. Today an E-type in good condition will cost you $180,000. In two weeks at the Monterey auctions, Mecum will be selling a 1962 Series 1 Roadster for close to $400,000. In January, Bonhams sold Australian racing legend Bob Jane’s lightweight E-type for $10 million.
The interior of one of the ground-up restorations of the Jaguar E-type. Picture: Supplied.
The interior of one of the ground-up restorations of the Jaguar E-type. Picture: Supplied.
Jaguar made 72,520 E-types between 1961 and 1975 and the bullet-shaped sportsmobile is back in limited production. In 1999, Henry Perman’s Eagle began remanufacturing the Jags. These were ground-up restorations that basically turned out an E-type as it would have come off the showroom floor. Today you can go on the waiting list to buy one for between $642,000 and $1.4m. Last year Jaguar built six lightweight E-types and sold out as soon as they announced them at a low price of $1.5m, drive away no more to pay.
An E-type engine with all the trimmings. Picture: Concours Sportscar Restoration
An E-type engine with all the trimmings. Picture: Concours Sportscar Restoration
But the best of the best of the new old E-types are being built in the Lake Como district of Australia, Tuggerah on the NSW central coast. Just down from the Westfield and across the road from Speedway Garage is Gavin King’s Concours Sportscar Restoration. His cars win concours and historic races here, the US and Europe. His customers keep coming back. King has never spoken to one regular. He just picks a car, sends a money transfer and airfreights the Jag to a climate-controlled garage in Switzerland.
King has spent his whole working life under Jags. In 1993, he started his own business renovating and building new E-types for serious people in Australia and Europe. For somewhere between $200,000 and $450,000 King and his team will make an old E-type look and drive better than new or build you a lightweight one from scratch. Of course, from when you give him a deposit to when you pick up the car will be two years so more time to work out a payment plan with Amex. The big choices are: do you have an original restoration but where the Lucas electrics (three positions on the headlight switch: dim, flicker and off) work, the oil doesn’t leak, the panels aren’t rusty and the brakes function or do you have the more modernised version with great brakes, modern gear box and super exhaust noise or lastly, a completely new but historically accurate one?
This is a shortened version of the original article – read the rest at The Australian
