Tag Archives: Jaguar

News

Jaguar Type 00 Begins Testing: A Bold Electric Gamble for a Historic Brand

The news that Jaguar has begun testing its radical Type 00 electric model is unlikely to sway the brand’s most vocal traditionalists. For those who see Jaguar’s future only through the lens of inline-six engines and supercharged V8s, this announcement changes nothing. But for the new clientele Jaguar is openly courting, it could be the first meaningful sign that the company’s dramatic reinvention is moving from theory to reality.

Jaguar is clearly in no rush to execute its ambitious plan. The British marque, now under the ownership of Tata Motors, has already confirmed that its future will be defined by low-volume, exclusively electric vehicles positioned firmly in the ultra-luxury segment. This strategy places Jaguar in a small and highly exclusive circle of manufacturers aiming to compete on prestige, performance, and design rather than outright sales volume.

Unveiled last year as a concept, the Type 00 was met with mixed—often negative—reactions from long-time Jaguar enthusiasts. Yet that reaction may be beside the point. The Type 00 is not designed to appeal to Jaguar’s past, but to define its future. With the release of the first images of a heavily camouflaged prototype, Jaguar has now confirmed that real-world testing is underway, and that the production version is scheduled to debut by mid-2027.

Internally known as the X900 project, the Type 00 is shaping up to be an ultra-luxury electric GT with formidable performance credentials. Power is expected to come from a tri-motor setup—one motor at the front and two at the rear—delivering a combined output of more than 1,000 horsepower. Energy will be supplied by a battery pack with an estimated capacity of around 120 kWh, enabling a projected WLTP range exceeding 640 kilometers on a single charge.

Although Jaguar remains tight-lipped on official performance figures, unofficial reports suggest that one of the 150 test prototypes has already reached nearly 260 km/h during high-speed testing. These prototypes are currently being evaluated across a wide variety of road surfaces and climatic conditions worldwide, underscoring the company’s intent to match its traditional refinement with modern electric performance.

The production Type 00 will reportedly ride on 23-inch wheels and feature adaptive suspension as well as rear-axle steering, reinforcing its grand touring ambitions. Measuring over five meters in length, the car’s proportions include a long, sculpted nose—an element that visually hints at classic combustion-era Jaguars. Despite this, Tata Motors has been unequivocal in its stance: Jaguar will produce only electric vehicles going forward. Even with its imposing size, engineers have set a strict target weight of under 2,750 kilograms.

Perhaps the most telling detail lies not in the hardware, but in Jaguar’s expectations. Company estimates suggest that only around 15 percent of current Jaguar customers are likely to choose the Type 00. The remaining 85 percent? Entirely new buyers, for whom this electric flagship would be their first encounter with the leaping cat.

It is a calculated risk—one that could redefine Jaguar for a new generation or further alienate its traditional base. As ever in the automotive world, only time will reveal whether luck truly favors the brave.

Source: Jaguar

SOCIAL MEDIA

When a Jaguar X-Type Goes Rogue: The Wildest Big Cat You’ll See This Year

The American car scene has always had a streak of unpredictability. Show up to the right strip-mall parking lot on a Saturday afternoon and you might spot anything from pristine time-capsule survivors to builds that look like the result of losing a dare—and then doubling down on it. This particular machine falls squarely in the latter category.

What began life as a respectable Jaguar sedan has now mutated into something else entirely, something that makes even the famously polarizing Type 00 concept look like a design-studio masterpiece.

The beast in question surfaced on Reddit courtesy of user Al Leftwich, and it drew the kind of attention usually reserved for UFO sightings or a Huracán straddling two handicap spots. According to the post, the car was spotted outside an auto parts store in southern West Virginia—suggesting that the owner’s creative journey may not be finished.

At its core sits a pre-facelift Jaguar X-Type, a compact executive sedan that appears to have had a very bad day. Instead of hunting down OEM panels, the owner seems to have embraced full-tilt improvisation, repurposing anything and everything that could be bolted, glued, or wedged into place.

Front and center is a yellow hood with black plastic trim, looking very much like it once belonged to a bargain-bin ATV or side-by-side. Perched on top are a pair of auxiliary headlights that call to mind the Nissan Juke’s bug-eyed upper lamps—except these clearly came from a different donor. Peer beneath the layers and you’ll find the original Jaguar headlights still present, simply entombed beneath homemade aero covers and paired with a hand-built splitter.

And if stacking one hood atop another wasn’t enough, the builder went ahead and lined the roof with PVC pipes running the length of the car. They mimic roof rails in form, if not in function. What they actually do—other than defy explanation—is anyone’s guess.

Viewed from the side, the chaos eases up slightly. The profile wears mock side vents, angular mirror extensions, and chrome-accented seven-spoke wheels. Next to the front end’s creative explosion, the midsection almost feels unfinished, as if the builder either lost interest or ran out of materials.

The rear remains mostly hidden in the available photos, which may be the car’s saving grace. For all we know, it could be the final refuge of the X-Type’s original dignity.

For context, the Jaguar X-Type entered the market in 2001 as the brand’s attainable entry point, sharing its platform with the European Ford Mondeo and offering both front- and all-wheel-drive variants. Its design came from Geoff Lawson—the same visionary responsible for the XJ220 supercar. Jaguar wouldn’t revisit the compact executive class until 2014, when Ian Callum’s rear-drive XE brought the brand back to familiar territory.

But none of that heritage, none of that engineering pedigree, and none of that British refinement could have prepared the X-Type for its current fate. What stands in that West Virginia parking lot isn’t a Jaguar anymore. It’s something new, something bold, something that probably shouldn’t work—but exists anyway.

And in the wonderfully chaotic world of American car culture, maybe that’s the point.

Source: Jaguar; Photo: Al Leftwich / Reddit

Restomod

Eagle E-Type Lightweight GTR: The Jaguar That Remembers What It Means to Be a Jaguar

Enzo Ferrari once called the Jaguar E-Type “the most beautiful car ever made.” He wasn’t wrong. Sixty-odd years later, the car still looks like it was sketched by a deity with a taste for long bonnets and dangerous curves. But while Jaguar itself seems to have traded its soul for silence — with a future full of EVs and corporate PowerPoints — one British outfit is determined to remind us what the big cat once was.

That outfit is Eagle, and for over four decades they’ve been fettling, perfecting, and flat-out worshipping the E-Type. Their latest creation, the Eagle E-Type Lightweight GTR, isn’t just another restomod. It’s a rolling love letter to speed, purity, and the kind of mechanical theatre modern cars have forgotten how to perform.

Featherweight Fury

The name tells you most of the story. “Lightweight” doesn’t just mean a few panels swapped for aluminium. Eagle’s engineers went full monk on the diet plan: aluminum, magnesium, titanium, and carbon fiber everywhere. The result? A kerb weight of just 930 kilograms — yes, about the same as a first-gen Mazda MX-5, but with an entirely different appetite for violence.

Beneath that long, impossibly beautiful bonnet lives a 4.7-litre straight-six, hand-built and gloriously mechanical. It sends 450 horsepower and 500 Nm of torque through a Getrag five-speed manual to the rear wheels. There are no flappy paddles, no digital trickery — just clutch, lever, and the guttural snarl of unfiltered combustion. 0–100 km/h arrives in four seconds flat, and if you keep your foot down, the GTR will howl all the way to 305 km/h.

Handling the Heritage

To keep all that feral energy in check, Eagle’s fitted Ohlins adjustable dampers, independent suspension, and AP Racing brakes that could probably stop a small planet. The result is a car that’s razor-sharp but never synthetic. It moves, it breathes, it talks to you through the wheel — not through a touchscreen or a mood light.

Inside, there’s a nod to civility. Alcantara-trimmed seats, air conditioning, a subtle audio system, and decent sound insulation make sure your spine doesn’t file for divorce after a few hundred miles. It’s the perfect balance between Le Mans weekend and Cotswolds getaway.

A Million Reasons to Smile (and Cry)

Now, the price. Eagle will happily build you one for just over a million euros. Which sounds obscene, until you remember that this isn’t a car so much as an act of resurrection. It’s what happens when passion, craftsmanship, and mechanical purity are valued over efficiency charts and app connectivity.

Meanwhile, at Jaguar HQ…

And here’s the sting. While Eagle handcrafts reminders of Jaguar’s golden age, the actual Jaguar brand seems adrift — steering toward an electric future that feels more spreadsheet than soul. The Lightweight GTR stands as both a tribute and a quiet protest. It whispers (loudly) what the world’s carmakers seem to have forgotten: that weight is the enemy, noise is good, and beauty should always come before battery percentage.

In the end, Eagle hasn’t just built the ultimate E-Type. They’ve built a time machine — one that doesn’t take you back, but shows you what the present could have been, had we never lost our nerve.

Source: Eagle