88 replies to this topic

[xkssFrankOpalka]

When visiting Brian Courser in Shrewsbury many yrs ago he told me he could have had the XJ13 since it was sitting under a cover at the factory at that time, He had an XKSS and other Jags too. I company in Phoenix, Arizona made a fine replica of the car, they told me they couldnt have made such a fine copy without the help of the Ford Co. It was fuel injected too.

[VAR1016]

I recall reading some years ago that a replica had been made in the UK; this was painted in Ecurie Ecosse colours and had a genuine factory four-cam engine.

PdeRL

[nick stone]

If you have the wherewithal, here's where you can buy a copy http://www.temperocars.com/cars.html

[RayBo]

Wildman is correct. Blackhawk Museum had a XJ 13 on display for about a year. It has since moved on. They also had several Dual Ghias and a Tucker. I'm certain the overhead picture was taken there. The bulding is all black glass or marble and does have a marble floors.
RayBo

[rdrcr]

RayBo,

No one is doubting wildman's assertion that it is the Blackhawk facility...

Thanks for your reaffirmation though.

[Stoatspeed]

Sorry to bump a 2 year old thread, but I just saw this outrageous piece of information in a news release heralding a Red Baron's auction in Atlanta:

"... but also on the block will be another highly desirable prototype: a 1966 Jaguar XJ13, considered by many to be the Holy Grail of Jaguar collectibles. Only seven were made.

Of those, only two are known to exist. One is housed in the Jaguar Daimler Heritage Museum in Britain. The other one will be sold at Red Baron's. The car was conceived by designer Malcomb Sayer as an attempt to rejuvenate Jaguar's presence at LeMans. But it never saw production, and five of the seven were destroyed in crashes."

As a former employee of the engineering department at Jaguar, I KNOW you can't have "a" 1966 XJ13 .... there is "the" XJ13, then there are "XJ13 replicas". Where all the blurb about "only seven were made .... five were destroyed in crashes" came from is anyone's guess!! To be fair, the information in the Red baron site is a little more accurate, but I still question the provenance of the car they are offering.

Reading back down this thread, and with a little judicious Googling, there certainly have been some quite authentic looking replicas of THE car, but of course none have had a real engine ... since I have come to the thread after the fact, here's the contribution I can make from an inside perspective.

For the first few years of my time at Jaguar, the car was stored in the "annex" of the Experimental workshop with piles of junk on top of it ... this was after the 1973 demo outing at Silverstone - (to answer 2F-001's question, the car was driven there by Lofy England, as unlikely a fit in the car as one of it's later pilots, George Mason ... I'll find a picture of George in the car tonight). I the late 70's the car was again put back in running order for demos by Peter Dodd and George Mason. At the time, Pete and George were the senior fitters in the Experimental shop and got to do all the interesting projects. They had done the 1973 rebuild of the car and also assembled the first prototype XJ40 on a hoist just a few yards away from XJ13 ...

In its next demo life, the car ran in several events including a JDC event at Silverstone driven by Richard Cresswell and several other demos driven by Jim Randle and George Mason. I don't recall that Norman Dewis drove the car during this period, although he had not yet retired. maybe a case of once bitten, twice shy? Whenever the car was going out for an event, there was always disruption in the shop as the car was prepared and loaded up on a trailer - of course under its own power! There always seemed to be some reason for a lap or two of the factory roads as part of the preparation, too .... great noise, like a dozen Nortons setting off down the road!
I know that during one of it's track outings, the engine was "buzzed" and sustained some internal damage, and there was consideration given to either doing a dummy engine and consigning the car to static display or fitting a road car 2-valve engine (not an easy retrofit, considering the totally different design of the two units). Fortunately, the real 4-cam engine was rebuilt and the car continued to be a living breathing racer.

I left Jaguar in the early 90's so I don't havce first hand knowledge of the current status, but I know the car is in the care of Jaguar-Daimler Heritage Trust and is regularly on display at the Browns Lane museum. Somewhere in my pile of memorabilia, I actually have a dead Lucas TAC amplifier from the XJ13 program (the finned box in the middle of rdcr's pictures) complete with April 1967 date code. As with any car maker, Jaguar threw away lots of now-priceless artifacts, but a few slipped through the net ....

Hope this fills in some of the gaps,

Dave

[Twin Window]

Originally posted by Stoatspeed

Sorry to bump a 2 year old thread, but...

No need to apologise; that's precisely why the archive is accessible!

[seldo]

Thanks for setting the record straight from the horse's mouth Stoatspeed. I have a friend here at the Gold Coast in Aust who has a superbly-built replica (built here by a guy who was manufacturing excellent GT40 replicas) which he has somehow managed to get road-registered. He also confirms the facts as you state them.

[cosworth bdg]

While on the subject of Lucas T.A.C. amplifiers I have in my collection , several units that are very far from being dead............

[VAR1016]

Originally posted by Stoatspeed
Sorry to bump a 2 year old thread, but I just saw this outrageous piece of information in a news release heralding a Red Baron's auction in Atlanta:

"... but also on the block will be another highly desirable prototype: a 1966 Jaguar XJ13, considered by many to be the Holy Grail of Jaguar collectibles. Only seven were made.

Of those, only two are known to exist. One is housed in the Jaguar Daimler Heritage Museum in Britain. The other one will be sold at Red Baron's. The car was conceived by designer Malcomb Sayer as an attempt to rejuvenate Jaguar's presence at LeMans. But it never saw production, and five of the seven were destroyed in crashes."

As a former employee of the engineering department at Jaguar, I KNOW you can't have "a" 1966 XJ13 .... there is "the" XJ13, then there are "XJ13 replicas". Where all the blurb about "only seven were made .... five were destroyed in crashes" came from is anyone's guess!! To be fair, the information in the Red baron site is a little more accurate, but I still question the provenance of the car they are offering.

Reading back down this thread, and with a little judicious Googling, there certainly have been some quite authentic looking replicas of THE car, but of course none have had a real engine ... since I have come to the thread after the fact, here's the contribution I can make from an inside perspective.

For the first few years of my time at Jaguar, the car was stored in the "annex" of the Experimental workshop with piles of junk on top of it ... this was after the 1973 demo outing at Silverstone - (to answer 2F-001's question, the car was driven there by Lofy England, as unlikely a fit in the car as one of it's later pilots, George Mason ... I'll find a picture of George in the car tonight). I the late 70's the car was again put back in running order for demos by Peter Dodd and George Mason. At the time, Pete and George were the senior fitters in the Experimental shop and got to do all the interesting projects. They had done the 1973 rebuild of the car and also assembled the first prototype XJ40 on a hoist just a few yards away from XJ13 ...

In its next demo life, the car ran in several events including a JDC event at Silverstone driven by Richard Cresswell and several other demos driven by Jim Randle and George Mason. I don't recall that Norman Dewis drove the car during this period, although he had not yet retired. maybe a case of once bitten, twice shy? Whenever the car was going out for an event, there was always disruption in the shop as the car was prepared and loaded up on a trailer - of course under its own power! There always seemed to be some reason for a lap or two of the factory roads as part of the preparation, too .... great noise, like a dozen Nortons setting off down the road!
I know that during one of it's track outings, the engine was "buzzed" and sustained some internal damage, and there was consideration given to either doing a dummy engine and consigning the car to static display or fitting a road car 2-valve engine (not an easy retrofit, considering the totally different design of the two units). Fortunately, the real 4-cam engine was rebuilt and the car continued to be a living breathing racer.

I left Jaguar in the early 90's so I don't havce first hand knowledge of the current status, but I know the car is in the care of Jaguar-Daimler Heritage Trust and is regularly on display at the Browns Lane museum. Somewhere in my pile of memorabilia, I actually have a dead Lucas TAC amplifier from the XJ13 program (the finned box in the middle of rdcr's pictures) complete with April 1967 date code. As with any car maker, Jaguar threw away lots of now-priceless artifacts, but a few slipped through the net ....

Hope this fills in some of the gaps,

Dave

Most interesting, thanks.

However, in the article I referred to above I am certain that there was a photograph of the 4-cam engine. I imagine that there must have been more than one engine; could one have "escaped"? I seem to recall that the piece (I cannot remember where it was, but perhaps in C & SC) stated that five engines had been built.

PdeRL

[cosworth bdg]

There was more than 1 engine built and tested.....................

[Peter Morley]

Originally posted by VAR1016


Most interesting, thanks.

However, in the article I referred to above I am certain that there was a photograph of the 4-cam engine. I imagine that there must have been more than one engine; could one have "escaped"? I seem to recall that the piece (I cannot remember where it was, but perhaps in C & SC) stated that five engines had been built.

PdeRL

I'm sure I read a story a few years ago that someone found one of the spare 4 cam engines and it was used in a very accurate replica of XJ13 - possibly built by one of the companies who specialised in accurate C or D-type replicas.

[VAR1016]

Originally posted by Peter Morley


I'm sure I read a story a few years ago that someone found one of the spare 4 cam engines and it was used in a very accurate replica of XJ13 - possibly built by one of the companies who specialised in accurate C or D-type replicas.

One more memory of this; I think that it was in Scotland.

PdeRL

[275 GTB-4]

There is also an excellent facsimile here in Canberra, Australia....I will check my pictures to see if it is a twin cammer

EDIT: here tis....



http://img.photobuck...J13Canberra.jpg

[Tmeranda]

[i]
I still cannot believe that even under Frord ownership the original car could have been so buggered up... [/B]

Other famous race cars have not been treated so kindly under Ford's stewardship. The Le Mans winning Mark IV is in such sad shape that it cannot even be pushed! In addition the Indy winning Lotus 38 is in even worse shape.

[Stoatspeed]

Originally posted by Peter Morley
I'm sure I read a story a few years ago that someone found one of the spare 4 cam engines and it was used in a very accurate replica of XJ13 - possibly built by one of the companies who specialised in accurate C or D-type replicas.

I am also aware of the rumour! IIRC, it was Brian Wingfield's excellent D-Type Replicas firm that was alleged to be building a true copy of the car around a 4-cam engine, but I have never actually seen evidence of it existing. If it had a Scottish connection, the signs would point to arch Jaguar collector Campbell MacLaren, but he has never been shy about sharing his cars with the world (he is the owner of the XKSS registered 'JAG 1' which has been displayed and photogrpaphed often) so I'd have thought we'd have seen the car by now.
I am very impressed by the appearance of most of the replicas being built - there seem to be several firms doing a great job of reproducing the shape, and there are even a few good tries at the structure of the car. I am really more comfortable with people building XJ13 replicas thatn I am with the host of C's and D's - some of them are dangerously close to the real thing, and with the relatively large numbers of origianl cars in those types, together with the confused history, there seems substantial risk that over time some of them may be mistaken for (or assume the identity of) the real thing. At least with XJ13, there is only one real one .... and hopefully that will survive in the care of the right people, as Tmeranda warns ... I think we're safe if it remains in Coventry, but if it ever gets to Dearborn, we could be in trouble. Mind you, even at the rumoured offer prices, the sale of the car would not make much of a dent in Ford's latest financial disaster - $5.8 BILLION loss .... in 3 months!!
As stated by cosworth above, there were definitely several engines, and indeed one of the engines was installed for road testing in the spacious engine bay of a Mk.X saloon - now that would have been quite a Q-car .... the original BMW M5 concept! If you Google "XJ13" you find a few links to an article about one of the Essen shows where there was a visually complete 4-cam engine for sale, but I don't know if this was really a working unit. Since most of the parts of the engine were unique, it would be coslty (but not impossible) to get it operational in an authentic manner.

Glad the revival of the thread has stimulated more interest .... I love this place!

Dave

[aaron]

The Australian built replica you see is built and owned by John Wilson and yes he did develop a quad-cam V12. He has a website too! As for original 5 litre engines which "escaped" the factory - yes - one ended up in the hands of Brian Winfield who built a replica using it. The Blackhawk car was apparently made for some Ford exec. by whom I don't know. The other replica seen in the U.S. was one of the Tempero cars and they have built 4 I think. The comments about the wheels are valid in as much as they are Simmons wheels made in N.Z.
The punchline is that MY Xj13 replica will be finished early next year. Tempero changed hands with my car in build. I supplied the 6 litre (yes I know it should only be 5) race engine and ZF gearbox.
The other glass bodied replica made in Qld was at Speed on Tweed recently and the owner, Digby Cook, loves it. It is not so authentic as some other versions but nevertheless an exciting looking car with such comforts as air-con, 16" wheels, webers etc. The moulds jigs etc. were sold off to America and the company is now making them there. There is a website but the name escapes me. Try looking at Tempero too! It starts to become a matter of taste and quality of build. The tempero cars are hand beaten alloy bodies. On the subject of race success??? The car would have needed serious re-engineering for new wider tyres and subsequent cars would have had to be done in fibreglass with removable panels etc. Regarding the aerodynamics which were diabolical at high speed, take a look at a Ferrari P4 or the various GT40 incarnations and you can see where the body would have needed to change. The beautiful rear was all wrong for stability. John Wyer's The Certain Sound is good reading on just how much was to be gained at that time by aerodynamic bodywork as his work on the Porsche 917 showed. AARON.

[275 GTB-4]

Johns car is indeed beautifully made.....he is an authorised auto modification inspector down this part of the world.

Fantastic to read:
The other glass bodied replica made in Qld was at Speed on Tweed recently and the owner, Digby Cook, loves it.

[bradbury west]

I imagine that there must have been more than one engine; could one have "escaped"? I seem to recall that the piece (I cannot remember where it was, but perhaps in C & SC) stated that five engines had been built.

PdeRL [/B][/QUOTE]

There is a useful article by John Simister in the 10/06 issue of Octane, in which he was seconded as one of the team which restored/rebuilt/recommissioned the XJ13 prior to Historic LM this year. In it he says that 7 prototype 4 cam engines were built. I was lucky enough to see the car at Silverstone in the 80s, parked behind the hospitality boxes overlooking the pit lane entrance, albeit with an old camera.

Roger Lund.

[Huw Jadvantich]

There were three XJ13 engines, and they bore no real resemblance to the production Jaguar V12.
XJ13 was never used as a test bed for the production Jaguar V12 engine.
Apart from the one sitting in the car which was buzzed by Richard Cresswell finding the wrong gear at Silverstone (Circa 1975), and then rebuilt (there was no shortage of parts like this at that time as indicated earlier).One engine I am pretty sure is in the hands of JDHT, and one did escape.
Since Scotland and Campbell McLaren are mentioned, the original escape route is fairly obvious to me. There followed a few 'redundancies' which may or may not be connected.
I have a feeling the Lynx replica used that engine.
The Tempero bodies are the wrong shape around the front of the car (too square) and could never be passed off as the real thing.
The most likely cause of the original accident at MIRA (Lindley) was right rear wheel fatigue. The accident happened during filming for a promo film for the up coming V12 E-Type (completely different engine) which was being compared by Raymond Baxter.
Norman was quite a small bloke and had the presence of mind to pull himself below the dash board once he knew there wasn't anything he could do to recover it.
The original car had slightly 'fared in' wheels like an early E-type, and when the the replacement wheels were built with a slightly different offset the wheel arches were made larger with flares (which actually looked better than the original), and conveniently looked like the wider new V12 E-Type.
As rebuilt by George Mason and Pete Dodds the car first appeared ant the British GP meeting 1973 driven by Lofty England. Unfortunately a flapping inner panel in the radiator cowl prevented the car from going at any great speed or complete enjoyment of the noise.
Subsequently until George and Pete left the company no one else other than Richard Cresswell drove the car (and that was only once). Once that had happened it was pretty much a free for all between Ford Execs.

Could it have been competitive? Too may ifs and buts, but the real biggy was finance and the change in tyre technology over a very short period. The Ford GT took a long time to get right even with Fords huge resources and the likes of Shelby and McLaren (with a large helping of Firestone money) at the top of their game being involved.
The answer is undoubtedly Yes, had it had sufficient urge behind it from Jaguar and Dunlop, but Jaguar simply wasn't big enough to put the sort of budget behind motor racing that Ford did -it was a completely different game to the fifties. At best with a completely focused programme they could have done something in 64/65 - by 67 they would have been out of the game. It needed a specialist race team to be involved in it development and racing, and I can't think off hand of one that would have fitted into the equation at that time.

Much later I was priveleged to be asked by Bob Tullius to attend the first test session of XJR-5 at Silverstone, where it was evaluated in ints current livery and IMSA spec by Derek Bell. Another fabulous racing car. Although I have no complaints about TWRs subsequent handling of the sports car programme, I felt that Tullius had been shafted at the time.

[green-blood]

Jaguar had this car on its stand at the Goodwood festival in 1997 - stunning it was too.

There must be some pics in the Goodwood books, I'll check when I get home, see what they say

That 10/06 Octane articval was pretty good, not my favourite mag so it was the XJ13 that made me buy it. The story seems to be true that a broken piston ended its demo runs shortly after its goodwood static display, until it was refurbished over 2 years. It doesn't look "over done" either which is a relief.

[VAR1016]

I recall the XJ13 being at Goodwood in '97.

As a huge fan of Lucas injection I was studying the car carefully with a friend, when a bloke turned up, got into the car, flicked a couple of switches and "Whang, whang, whang" it went for a couple of minutes.

Nothing like a V12 - a real treat.

PdeRL

[FLB]

I didn't buy the mag, but I saw earlier today an ad for The Sportscar Factory, a builder of 'replica' XJ13s in the November/December issue of Vintage Motorsport. The featured car in the picture was red.

http://www.sportscar...y.com/About.htm

[275 GTB-4]

Originally posted by 275 GTB-4
Johns car is indeed beautifully made.....he is an authorised auto modification inspector down this part of the world.

Fantastic to read:
The other glass bodied replica made in Qld was at Speed on Tweed recently and the owner, Digby Cook, loves it.

[Sharman]

I have a feeling the Lynx replica used that engine.

Done a little asking around on this, my source who was quite senior in Lynx says that they never made an XJ13 replica, he also confirmed that with colleagues in case it happened before or after his service with the company. He did say that a lot of parts which escaped the works were acquired by Bryan Wingfield who was taken to court over the matter and eventually served with injunctions to prevent him profitting from the car

[Cynic]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Stoatspeed
Sorry to bump a 2 year old thread, but I just saw this outrageous piece of information in a news release heralding a Red Baron's auction in Atlanta:

[B] "... but also on the block will be another highly desirable prototype: a 1966 Jaguar XJ13, considered by many to be the Holy Grail of Jaguar collectibles. Only seven were made.

Of those, only two are known to exist. One is housed in the Jaguar Daimler Heritage Museum in Britain. The other one will be sold at Red Baron's. The car was conceived by designer Malcomb Sayer as an attempt to rejuvenate Jaguar's presence at LeMans. But it never saw production, and five of the seven were destroyed in crashes."

(snip)




The owner of Red Baron lives about a tenth of a mile from me, and the auction house is perhaps two miles away. I last visited there to check out an Alfa "Disco Volante" which, for starters, was LHD unlike the actual cars. Theyve also had some sort of "Ferrari race car" which appeared to be a blacksmith's side project.

I won't even waste the trip to see their XJ13; I'm just not much for replicas, no matter how well described.

Cynic

[Pedro 917]

Here are some pictures I took at the Nürburgring Old Timer GP in 2004 :

[VAR1016]

Nice pictures, Pedro.

In a couple of them you can just see the axial fuel-injectors - I would love a set of those! And this was why I was studying the car so closely that time at Goodwood!

PdeRL

[Huw Jadvantich]

Pedro's pictures are excellent.
The first one shows quite clearly the difference between the original and virtually every replica I've seen, and thats the way the nose sweeps in under the headlights towards the front air intake. Replicas for some reason have squared this off. Other differences are in the front wheel arch area and obviously the direction the engine intake trumpets!!
Its quite the most gorgeous looking sports car I reckon, but wouldn't have stayed that way for long if it had raced.
I used to imagine it with 330 P4 type duck tail rear spoiler and canards on the front -it would have been interesting to see what Sayer would have done to the front.

[Vrm]

Hi all,
I shot these pics at Silverstone in the early 90s:
http://public.fotki..../jaguar-1/xj13/

Note the red and white Jag nose emblem that I have not seen on any of the other cars posted here. So is this the original?
Sorry there are only 4 shots of it, I was more interested in shooting cars that had more of a race history. That and the fact that I really didn't know what it was at the time. The only reason I shot it at all was because it just looked stunning!

Steve

[CcHhAaOoSs]

Originally posted by Peter Morley


I'm sure I read a story a few years ago that someone found one of the spare 4 cam engines and it was used in a very accurate replica of XJ13 - possibly built by one of the companies who specialised in accurate C or D-type replicas.

Brian Wingfield built what i hesitate to call a replica.
the car was a last nut and bolt recreation using a genuine 4 cam factory engine (tho as i recall the cam gear was different as the factory had several different things they were trying)

the original body bucks were used to form the body and it was painted in ecosse blue.

the car was the subject of an article in (iirc) the much lamented "Supercar Classics" magazine in the late 80's

[tonyb]

Would the Jaguar XJ13 have been competitive at Le Mans?

In his just-published bio, Norman Dewis reveals that he took the XJ13 to Bruntingthorpe , the old RAF (and very long)
runway near Leicester. He says 'We got over 200mph there (206mph I believe) and the car felt superb.
I didn't even have to grip the wheel ... the car could have achieved 215-220mph on the Mulsanne straight."

For interest, here a are a few pics of THE XJ13 that I took over past years - at the Goodwood FOS in 2000
and some of the body panels just after respraying at the JDHT Browns Lane workshops during a
rebuild in May of 2002.

The first one is a photo of the car being built in 1965/66 at Jaguar, courtesy Paul Skilleter.


XJ13 being assembled at Jaguar's Browns Lane development facility sometime in 1965/66.
The large sills contain the fuel tanks, minimising the large front/rear weight distribution
change experienced with the D-type as the fuel was used.


















Norman Dewis who test drove XJ13 back in the 1960/70s and famously
had a 'slight' accident at M.I.R.A. while driving it for the press. Here he is aged 80.
His wish is to reach 100 years and celebrate by driving XJ13 at M.I.R.A again!










Author Paul Skilleter (left) examines bodywork originally styled by Malcom Sayer while Keith Helfet,
Jaguar's stylist at the time this photo was taken (far right) chats to the JDHT technicians. Keith will
primarily be remembered for his XJ220 styling but there were many other masterpieces as well
including the XK180.

Tony Bailey
http://www.mike-hawthorn.org.uk/

[Huw Jadvantich]

It should be noted that Kieth Helfet was the designer of the XJ 220 (amongst others) but not XJ13, which was Malcolm Sayer's work. Keith would have been about 10 when the XJ13 was designed.
Tony Burton, at the back of the shot would have been around at the time, but not involved in the XJ13 until he retired and then became a JDHT volanteer. Stuart Spencer another Jaguar stylist is in some of the more recent shots.
The contemporary shot of the 13's first build has me perplexed. The guy with his back to us doesn't look like the build of Pete dodd or George Mason, so i wondered if it was Bob Blake, who was an ace body builder of the time and worked on some very interesting projects.

[tonyb]

Something else I have, hanging on my wall - the original artwork for the XJ13 illustration used in
various magazines in the 1970s.

It was used twice, once on 12 July 1973 in Autocar but without any colouring, and again on 1st May 1974 in Classic Car,
this time coloured as illustrated below. Drawn by John Hostler, it's some 25 inches across and has amazing detail!
The pics below are from a digiphoto rather than a scan:







BTW, when I checked this morning, there were less than 140 copies of Norman's book left
from the 1150 copies printed. Thanks to all those on this forum who have ordered it...

Edited by tonyb, 02 February 2011 - 15:44.

[Phil Rainford]

www.newspress.co.uk/DAILY_LINKS/arc_jul_2008/160708speem.htm

Chance to see the XJ13 this weekend......


Kind regards

Phil

[KerryStagmer]

Let me check my sources, but as I remember it.....

Note that on the proper car the intake is BETWEEN the cams making it almost unique.

I'm pretty sure time will show there were several dual cam engines built but ONLY 2 with gear driven cams. The original engine is said to be with jaguar and has the piston repair, the second gear driven engine is now in the car.

I was rather suprised to see Alan take it for a run in that Victory By Design episode! What a treat that must have been.

[Frank S]

Images 13 through 19 in this album of photos from the Coronado Festival of Speed, 2004 show XJ13.

--
Frank Sheffield
San Diego CA
USA

[tonyb]

Originally posted by Frank S
Images 13 through 19 in this album of photos from the Coronado Festival of Speed, 2004 show XJ13.

... show a replica XJ13 ....

[Nev]

I'm pretty sure time will show there were several dual cam engines built but ONLY 2 with gear driven cams. The original engine is said to be with jaguar and has the piston repair, the second gear driven engine is now in the car.

Having spent many many hours trawling through the JDHT archives and with reference to the original engine build/test logs I can confirm the following facts:

SIX complete engines were assembled and tested. Only ONE had gear drive to the cams added (added in 1978 - engine number 1). This engine was not fitted to the XJ13 with fitted gear driven cams until 1978 - long after development had ceased and to replace the No.7 engine that had been over-revved. For all its active development life, the XJ13 NEVER ran with gear-driven cams.

Incidentally, two project specifications were issued for the V12 - one "standard" and a second "competition" spec. Development of the XJ13 ceased before the competition spec engine could be installed in it (engine number 8). However, the heads from this competition spec engine were installed on engine number 2 for emissions testing in 1969 and remain with it until today. Engine No2 was the most highly-developed of all the V12 engines and, fortunately, left the factory as a complete unit and is being restored to original spec as I write this. It will be installed in an authentic copy of the 1966/67 (pre-crash) car.

Sadly, the original car was changed during its rebuild in 1972/73. The XJ13 log confirms that not only was the outer skin replaced but also the "chassis platform". I suppose that if it had been rebuilt today, as many of the original panels as possible would have been reclaimed/used rather than disposed of?

There is much more info on my personal blog at XJ13 - Building The Legend