Sold 1992 XJS V12, MoTd, 91K - £SOLD!

[Skizzer]

Overnight financial news:

FTSE down 7%

Pound down 11%

Brent crude down 5.4%

V12 XJS's down 12.5%

 

 

I can recommend the big block Jag experience, and they are getting more expensive (apart from this one since yesterday, obv).

[Bear]

Oh, it's not dropped in price per se - I figure it's a £4K car, but hadn't decided if I wanted to try for £4K or not, I still feel like it needs cosmetics to find £4K easily.

[Bear]

But I must admit, paperwork aside, I don't think it's £6K away from being a £10K XJS and I'm seeming more and more of those advertised!

[Jim Bell]

I think that's a right bargain. Unfortunately out of my league but fucking amazing none the less.

[dome]

I was going to spend more than that on a late 4l one so that looks like a massive bargain.

[Bear]

Well, you know... it's here and I'd prefer it not to be, particularly as something I do want is possibly on the horizon

[Jim Bell]

That's thinning the fleet correctly.

[purplebargeken]

96.9% of AS'rs are aware of the concept of thinning the herd but are terminally unable to put theory into practice

[Skizzer]

I can recommend the big block Jag experience

 

Scratch that.  Bloody unreliable BL bollocks.  

 

GLWTS though, they are lovely when they work, which is definitely some of the time.

[LC Torana]

British cars, you say?

 

image.jpeg

 

Perfect for bimbling around Nottinghamshire.

 

Nothing bimbles quite like an old Rover.

[Bear]

Scratch that.  Bloody unreliable BL bollocks.  

 

GLWTS though, they are lovely when they work, which is definitely some of the time.

 

 

Mine's got the later setup, though - Marelli, I think? Twin coils, weird-ass double-decker distributor (cap & arm is about £90). I've actually got a lot of faith in it as a car to just get in & drive - the entire time I've had it, I've only had one weird failure of it to start and I think that was the immobiliser having a sulk.

[Bear]

Fun day talking to Jaguar specialists and owners - no, the car is fine! Does underline why I need to sell though, because I'd mentally spent £10K+ just on hearing all the upgrades and things you can get.

Somewhat reassured by their comments on where these cars are good & bad, too - sounds like the interior condition is also fairly normal with with small broken plastic parts here & there and manky headlining. And much, much amazement at both the idea that the head gasket would have gone on a V12, and the fix required.

 

New info "Kevlar hoses bad" - guess what I removed from the bottom hose location...

 

Anyway - anyone up for this? It's on eBay for a grand more and getting many views & watchers, no enquiries yet though.

[Guest Lord Sward]

Fun day talking to Jaguar specialists and owners - no, the car is fine! Does underline why I need to sell though, because I'd mentally spent £10K+ just on hearing all the upgrades and things you can get.

 

 

That and the last one I had stayed put when I sent the two poster ramp up.  

 

Its killing me this remaining unsold.  The missus hasn't even said no.  

[Skizzer]

Go on, you know you want to. Owning a V12 has to be on everyone's list of things to do before you die.

[Guest Lord Sward]

I'd had one.  Thats the problem.  I know how wonderful and naughty they are.  It'll fit in my garage too. But they scare me to death.  And I only have a 2 poster ramp.

[Bear]

I'm taking it out for a spin, just because I can

[Bear]

FWIW I'm open to offers on this, since eBay seems to be dragging along with a LOT of looking and watching, but only one offer so far (and no contact from them so I'm guessing they're one of the people that just offers low on everything and moves on). I really want to get my next car sorted (which is EXACTLY what I want), stop using the SLK as a daily driver, and get life in order - though some of the pressure is off as I'm going to stay at the farm a little longer

[Guest Lord Sward]

FFS.  Has this thing NOT sold yet???

[Bear]

Nope. A couple of enquiries that looked fishy from Gumtree, a derisory offer (then silence when countered) from eBay, and a lot of "OMG it's a bargain but..."

[Bear]

So to bring the XJS thread up to speed - after the SLK's airconditioning compressor showed signs of starting to fall apart, it's been used a bit more, now having got almost 800 miles since going back on the road. eBay advert ended disappointingly - four offers from people who hadn't seen it - but friends and the one potential buyer who have seen the car all liked it and thought it was worth comfortably what I'm asking.

 

I've decided to give it a service, since I've been using it, and it's just had new air filters since they arrived first. On the way are distributor cap (Jaguar Classic's supplied type, though they're out of them and helped me track down the right one), rotor arm (Jaguar), oil filter (Jaguar) and I'm undecided between Millers fully synth 20W50, Royal Purple or "something else", but either way the oil is £100 alone. The dizzy cap and rotor arm equally expensive.

 

 

One of these things is not like the other thing, however, the new ones are definitely correct for this year (and 6.0) and also match the diagrams on the air filter housings.

 

The box from Jaguar should also include a new genuine heated mirror glass for the driver's side mirror, and some of the components needed to revert to a Growler badge, however...

 

 

 

 

It's getting a new leaper - annoyingly additional holes are drilled in the bonnet for the locating pin so I can't revert to the flat badge, and tracking down which leaper was used was not fun. 

 

Once the cap and arm are done, it'll be leads, and then... plugs. Yes, I'm putting that one off as long as I can.

 

Still needs the front wheelbearing. The parts aren't expensive, but it needs a press/someone who knows what they're doing potentially.

 

I've gone to a couple of client visits and popping in to friends with it now - including getting stuck on the A52 for an anxiety-inducing length of time, in 33° temperatures - and it's behaved very well - the only glitches remaining being the lack of washer jet (started investigating that) and the passenger central locking (which I'm not really in the mood to get into).

 

It's even been involved in an AS car mission...

 

 

After a few months of being told I should be Fat Face-dressed, suited and aspiring to a silver Audi TT, it's refreshing to show up to somewhere in black pinstripes, in a Jaguar V12 with one missing mirror glass and a hole in the bonnet where the leaper was, and be treated like the professional, expert-at-what-I-do (whatever that is).

 

 

Tomorrow I'm getting the car that will replace it. For a brief moment I will enjoy insane 1993-era automotive decadence.

 

I'm still open to PXs. So far I've been offered an MX5 px and a Scimitar SE5a px - the latter was too far from "on the road" to tempt me (plus it was a a dealer who I've seen in the CCW classifieds a lot).

[kee616]

Been for a ride in this car with Richard to collect my 406 from him, to anyone who has the money it's worth it lovely beast!!

[John F]

96.9% of AS'rs are aware of the concept of thinning the herd but are terminally unable to put theory into practice

 

Woohoo! I'm now one of 3.1% of AS'ers, having actually sold one of my fleet this year for the first time in 10 years

[Bear]

Woohoo! I'm now one of 3.1% of AS'ers, having actually sold one of my fleet this year for the first time in 10 years

 

 

I've managed to go from...

 

MG F

SLK

Hearse

Beetle

CX GTi

XJS

406 Coupé

Twingo

(Plus the broken A-class)

 

At the beginning of the year, to

 

MGF (which counts as fleet reduction as more fell off)

SLK

Hearse

XJS

Twingo

 

So my fleet is reduced! However, if I can pull together money without selling the XJS, I suspect that it'll be going up again and the XJS will stay, albeit "on tyre protectors in storage" while I think about either doing things to make it more like a £7K XJS or trying it at a specialist auction. Two more offers on it this week, but one where the PX car was good, but not to my taste, and one dealer from RR (yes, I check to see what someone's posting history is like in case they're selling a car I might like!) who called at a very bad moment, then asked me if I'd deliver the car to Gatwick, THEN offered under £3K without seeing the car and got the fastest "I'm not discussing this" response ever.

 

Thing is, I do have a bottom line on it and if someone actually views the car and can tell me why it's worth less, I'll listen - but not unseen. Definitely not unseen, by a dealer, who is asking me to sort a day's logistics to shift it right after I've spent £250 on it!

 

My ideal fleet would probably be:

 

500 SEC

SLK

500 SL

A190-210 LWB with pano top, C180 Sportshatch (panoramic again) or estate, or ML430 with sunroof. But the Twingo, with head gasket sorted, should be ideal really given the quirkiness, simplicity and massive sunroof. And yeah, SLK and 500SL seems a bit redundant, but the real solution there is a Brabus SLK with V8, and that's very unlikely to happen...

[The Reverend Bluejeans]

Regarding the sub 3 grand offer, ask him if he'll pay via bank transfer. If he will, and he does - get the fucking thing sold and deliver it to the moon if required, walking all the way home in your socks. Having had not one but two V12 XJS's in the distant past, I often wonder who in their right minds would even consider one now.  Do they really sell for 7 grand? For me (having been there and suffered for it) the XJS is a great car for someone else to own.

 

On your list, you forgot the E34 525i I relieved you of not long ago. 

[dollywobbler]

If you've got somewhere to store it, shove it away. Values for these are only going to go one way in the coming years, and it's not down. Being a Ford-era V12 makes it fairly desirable I would have thought, but it's still early days for these late XJSs. We're selling the red one I've been tooling around in (4.0) for £3k, with over 189,000 miles on the clock. I think that demonstrates what value yours really is.

[Bren]

You need somebody like yourself to buy it - not somebody hoping to turn a profit on it.

[The Reverend Bluejeans]

If you've got somewhere to store it, shove it away. Values for these are only going to go one way in the coming years, and it's not down. Being a Ford-era V12 makes it fairly desirable I would have thought, but it's still early days for these late XJSs. We're selling the red one I've been tooling around in (4.0) for £3k, with over 189,000 miles on the clock. I think that demonstrates what value yours really is.

 

I'm not so sure. Like a lot of these things, if they were going to shoot up in value, should they not have done so by now? The last one was built 20 years ago. You have to balance any future increase in value against maintenance and repair costs.

 

The V12 really was a magnificent thing, but they scare me (and other relatively sane people) to death. When I had mine in the late eighties I was young, foolish and didn't care! 

[The Reverend Bluejeans]

You need somebody like yourself to buy it - not somebody hoping to turn a profit on it.

 

100%.

[Bear]

Regarding the sub 3 grand offer, ask him if he'll pay via bank transfer. If he will, and he does - get the fucking thing sold and deliver it to the moon if required, walking all the way home in your socks. Having had not one but two V12 XJS's in the distant past, I often wonder who in their right minds would even consider one now.  Do they really sell for 7 grand? For me (having been there and suffered for it) the XJS is a great car for someone else to own.

 

On your list, you forgot the E34 525i I relieved you of not long ago. 

 

 

Haha, yes, I did. That car was amusing.

 

If someone is standing in front of me, yeah, absolutely. There's a good reason I don't want to hang onto an XJS and the 500 SEC is highlighting just that, I'm obsessive and the SEC has an A4 long list of things I'm investigating - but doing so happily because Mercedes parts are consistent quality. The replacement mirror glass from Jaguar Classic looks cheap & nasty, but it wasn't a cheap price.

[The Reverend Bluejeans]

 The replacement mirror glass from Jaguar Classic looks cheap & nasty, but it wasn't a cheap price.

 

OE quality then. 

 

It's only when you take the door trim panel off and admire* the gubbins inside the door that you can truly appreciate Jaguar quality*.

 

Have you given this one a straight 7 day auction? If it got to somewhere near 3 grand and the high bidder was real (not too far away, 100% feedback etc) then end the auction.

 

"Congratulations. You won the item". Imagine the cold sweat.