1995 Jaguar XJS
VEHICLE DESCRIPTION
The Jaguar XJS enjoyed a long production run, but the later cars have become particularly coveted thanks to their increased levels of performance, comfort and quality. This 1995 Convertible carries with it the additional appeal of having covered just over 26,000 miles from new.
It was delivered on 15 May 1995 to Jaguar Cars Ltd’s company vehicles department, and its pre-delivery inspection was carried out in the service department at the Browns Lane factory.
The XJS was subsequently sold via Hollingdrake Jaguar in December 1997 to an owner who was based in Stockport. The service book shows that it was maintained by main dealers in the north-west of England through to 2012, when it was serviced by Royles Jaguar in Wilmslow at 19,910 miles.
The Jaguar covered less than 1000 miles between then and 2016, when it was serviced by marque specialist Classic Motor Cars in Bridgnorth. More recently, it returned to CMC in February 2024 for a full service, since when it has been used only sparingly.
The car sports a stylish quad-headlamp conversion, but the original headlamps have been retained and are included in the sale. The same goes for the original five-spoke wheels, which have been replaced by Jaguar’s distinctive ‘lattice’ alloys, and the factory jack is in the boot, wrapped in its leather case.
Inside, the XJS still features its factory floor mats, but elsewhere it has some well-chosenmodern upgrades. A Jaguar Classic infotainment system has been fitted and provides sat-nav, a USB connection, DAB radio and Bluetooth phone pairing. Parking sensors have been installed and are activated via a discreet button next to the steering column, and a wooden gear knob has been fitted.
Being a 1995 car, this XJS also benefits from having outboard rear discs, makingmaintenance much easier than on the earlier cars, which had inboard brakes.
This superbly presented, low-mileage Convertible is now being offered for sale with a full set of service and maintenance books, while its combination of an ultra-smooth six-cylinder engine, luxurious interior and top-down style make it an extremely rewarding grand tourer.
MODEL HISTORY
Famed Jaguar aerodynamicist Malcolm Sayer started work on the car that became the XJ-S during the late 1960s, at a time when the marque was being absorbed into the British Leyland Motor Corporation. It then took until 1975 for the production-ready car to be launched at the Frankfurt Motor Show, by which time BLMC was on the verge of collapse and had to be rescued by the British government.
The XJ-S nonetheless weathered the storm. It was based on a shortened XJ platform, with independent suspension all round and power-assisted rack-and-pinion steering. Beneath the bonnet was a fuel-injected, 285bhp, 5.3-litre V12 engine, which drove through a choice of an automatic gearbox or a four-speed manual; the latter was a rare option and was dropped during the late 1970s.
Autocar recorded a top speed of 153mph when it road-tested the XJ-S and praised the engine’s ‘truly astonishing flexibility’. The magazine also said that here was ‘a reminder that we do still build cars that are world-beaters’.
In 1981, the HE model was introduced with a new Michael Mays-designed cylinder head, plus suspension upgrades, wider wheels and a revised interior. Two years later, the all-new,3.6-litre, six-cylinder AJ6 engine was added to the line-up alongside the V12, and the car’s profile was boosted by a motorsport programme masterminded by Tom Walkinshaw, who won the 1984 European Touring Car Championship in an XJ-S.
A Cabriolet variant was first offered in 1983, then a full Convertible in 1988, and sales boomed as the 1980s progressed. Ford invested heavily in the model after it had acquired Jaguar, and a restyled and much-improved XJS (now written without the hyphen) was introduced in 1991.
The AJ6 engine subsequently grew to 4 litres, while the V12 was enlarged to 6 litres and 304bhp in 1992. Production of this great survivor lasted until April 1996, by which time just over 115,000 XJSs had left the factory.