Photos courtesy Jaguar Land Rover Classic.
In March of this year, Jaguar announced it would complete production of its legendary XKSS model, assembling the nine cars destroyed by a February 1957 fire at its Browns Lane factory. Eight months later, the “pilot car” XKSS was revealed during a media event at the Petersen Automotive Museum in Los Angeles, California, held in conjunction with the 2016 Los Angeles Auto Show.
Finished in Sherwood Green, the pre-production XKSS is identical in almost every way to the 16 cars assembled by Jaguar from 1954-’56. As before, the magnesium alloy bodies are formed by hand over wooden bucks (which themselves had to be re-created), while frames are bronze welded of tubing supplied by Reynolds. Even the Dunlop disc brakes and two-piece magnesium wheels are period-correct, though Jaguar admits a few details (such as the construction of the car’s fuel cell) have been updated in the interest of safety.
As with the original XKSS models, each comes powered by a 3.4-liter, double-overhead camshaft inline-six, fed by a trio of Weber DC03 carburetors and rated at 262 horsepower. Race-proven in the D-Type, the cast iron block engine is mated to a four-speed manual transmission that features synchronizers on all four forward speeds. Expect the continuation cars to mirror the original in performance, which translates to a 0-100 MPH time of 14 seconds, on the way to a top speed of 144 MPH.
Creating the new XKSS models was a laborious process that began with the detailed scanning of several existing XKSS models. A three-dimensional model was built from the data gathered, allowing the Jaguar Land Rover Classic staff to duplicate the original cars as accurately as possible. The pilot car shown at the Petersen will serve as a blueprint to guide the assembly of customer cars, but even with the assistance of modern methods and technology, each car is ultimately built by hand. Jaguar Land Rover Classic estimates that 10,000 man-hours will be required to assemble each and every XKSS.
Of the project, Jaguar Classic engineering manager Kev Riches said:
The XKSS is one of the most important cars in Jaguar’s history, and we are committed to making the ‘new original’ version absolutely faithful to the period car in every way. From the number, type and position of all the rivets used – there are more than 2,000 in total – to the Smiths gauges on the dashboard, everything is the same as the original cars, because that is the way it should be.
That attention to detail, and the amount of effort required to build each example, almost makes the £1,000,000 ($1.24 million) price seem like a bargain. All nine examples have already been claimed, and for those lucky enough to be on the list, deliveries are set to begin in 2017.
