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The Jaguar XJ-S is a luxury grand tourer produced by the British manufacturer Jaguar. The XJ-S replaced the legendary E-Type in September 1975, and was based on the XJ saloon. It had been developed as the XK-F, though it was very different in character from its predecessor. Although it never had quite the same sporting image, the XJ-S was a competent grand tourer, and more aerodynamic than the E-Type. The last XJS was produced on 4 April 1996, with the XK8 taking its place. Motor sport For 1977, the "Group44" racing team had a very successful season in Trans Am with a race car based on the actual production XJ-S chassis and running gear. The team won the series' 1977 drivers' championship cup for Bob Tullius but missed winning the manufacturer's title by 2 points (only one Jaguar was competing in the Trans-AM series compared to many more Porsche entrants). In 1978, a purpose built tube frame "silhouette" style XJS race car was constructed which greatly reduced the weight compared to the full production chassis car campaigned in 1977. This silhouette car had only the production car's roof panel as the sole piece of factory XJS sheetmetal on the car. Group 44 succeeded in again capturing the driver's championship for Bob Tullias and also captured the manufacturer's title as well, by entering Brian Fuerstenau driving the 1977 car at some venues to gain additional manufacturer's point for Jaguar. The silhouette car survived and has surfaced recently in the SVRA historic sports race series. The 1977 factory chassis race car is believed to still be in the hands of Group 44's Bob Tullius.
BBC Top Gear The XJ-S has been featured on BBC's Top Gear television series several times: Richard Hammond and Jason Dawe used a £500 1985 XJ-S HE as a test car to see the advantages of weight reduction by stripping the car of all of its amenities. With The Stig behind the wheel, the stock car had a 0-60mph time of 8.6 seconds. After stripping out 223kg (491.6lb) of weight (to Jason Dawe's dismay), the time was only 7.4 seconds. The 0-100mph time was also improved by five seconds. In the next series the stripped down '85 Jaguar was pitted against various (significantly younger) exotic cars in standing quarter mile to see ' which country builds the world's best supercar'. In a drag race against the German Porsche 911 Turbo, the Japanese Honda NSX, the American Chevrolet Corvette, the French Venturi Atlantique, and the Italian Ferrari 360 the Jaguar fared poorly, coming in last, way behind all the others, with a time of eighteen and a half seconds. Hammond then decided to 'cheat' and had installed a Wizards of NOS nitrous system on the car that added 200hp estimated to total 500 hp (370 kW). The race was then rerun and the Jaguar XJ-S did the quarter mile in only thirteen seconds, beating all the other cars, the Porsche coming second and the Ferrari third. The original (black-suited) Stig was "killed off" when he went 109 mph (175 km/h) in the modified XJ-S on HMS Invincible, flying off the deck. All that was found of him was his glove. James May tested a XJ-S that had been modernized by Knowles Wilkins Engineering to correct many of the original's flaws and was very impressed. May later used a Knowles Wilkins XJ-S convertible to traverse much of France in another television programme, Oz and James's Big Wine Adventure. For a Cheap Car Challenge, the "£1,500 coupé that isn't a Porsche challenge", James May bought an XJ-S HE for £1,100. It proved to be the least reliable of a group of three cars, the others being a Mitsubishi Starion EX and a BMW 635CSi. Despite this it managed to outlast its rivals to win the challenge. However, May offered the title to Clarkson if Clarkson admitted that he was a clot and that he had wrecked his Starion by fitting it with an oversized turbocharger for the final endurance race that overwhelmed the cooling system.
