[brian_]

Jaguar has converted a classic 1964 E-Type to battery-electric:

Jaguar Announces Electric Future With Battery-Powered E-Type
Jaguar E-Type Zero Is The Classic EV Nobody Asked For And It's Perfect
Jaguar has built an all-electric E-Type
​

This is not a production model, or even a prototype... it's just a publicity item to go with their announcement that all of their products will be electric or hybrid by some future date (which is a bit like announcing that the weather will be colder when winter comes ), although Top Gear says the conversion parts are a prototype of what might be offered to convert various classic Jaguar models.

The interesting part is that they apparently didn't want to mess unnecessarily with the original car, so as little as possible is changed and the new powertrain fits neatly in place of the original.

• the battery pack is a single box in the space of the original engine
• the 220 kW motor is in place of the transmission
• the original suspension and final drive (differential) are intact

Cost is no problem for this sort of project, and the original engine is large, so they were able to jam 40 kW-h of battery capacity in that space. DIY conversions typically can't manage this, and battery packs occupy other parts of the car, even with much lower total capacity.

There is no transmission mentioned, and it seem unlikely that there would be room for a multi-speed transmission, but I didn't see any indication of whether or not there is a single-ratio reduction gearbox on the motor output.

There is a claim that some parts from the I-Pace were used, but that could be anything. Neither of the provided specs (battery capacity or motor power) match the I-Pace, which is not yet in production.

The car either weighs 80 kg less or weighs 46 kg more or weighs 100 pounds less than the original, depending on which article you believe. I suspect that the battery is lighter than the engine, but the complete system is heavier than what it replaces, but that's just a guess.

 

[Karter2]

That is probably the one EV , (if i could buy it) that i would tear out all the electricals and re-install the original ICE !!
I really look forward to Jaguars I-Pace, but an electric drive E Type is simply not on !

 

[brian_]

I really look forward to Jaguars I-Pace, but an electric drive E Type is simply not on !

That's a popular sentiment - one of the articles that I saw had a number of similar comments.

 

[ColMosby]

Only someone who has never owned a British sports car would ever want a car with a British ICE engine. I rejected an XKE precisely because of the mechanicals- which are expensive, impossible to find, and break often Only an electric XKE would I buy, and I WOULD buy one.

 

[brian_]

Only someone who has never owned a British sports car would ever want a car with a British ICE engine. I rejected an XKE precisely because of the mechanicals- which are expensive, impossible to find, and break often Only an electric XKE would I buy, and I WOULD buy one.

You could say the same about the chassis. The first time I saw an E-Type in person, it was in a garage with the entire rear end was taken apart. I asked what major failure had occurred to require this level of disassembly, and I was told that it just needed a brake job. They were fine things to drive in their time, and ahead of their time in some ways, but like many other British cars they were also mechanical disasters by any objective standard. I say this from the point of view of a Triumph Spitfire owner.

Although many street rods have been built with Jaguar rear ends (final drive and suspension), that started long ago when better alternatives were not available... and street rods are not known for rational design. What many people would want to drive now would be the classic E-Type body on a completely different modern chassis.

Jaguar's approach with the E-Type Zero is one valid formula for conversion, for people who want the style and much of the driving experience, without most of the operational hassles, and with the currently fashionable novelty of battery-electric power... and without degrading a valuable collector's car.

 

[Duncan]

A local company makes Jaguar "C" types - lovely things with hand crafted aluminium bodies

 

[Karter2]

Only someone who has never owned a British sports car would ever want a car with a British ICE engine. I rejected an XKE precisely because of the mechanicals- which are expensive, impossible to find, and break often Only an electric XKE would I buy, and I WOULD buy one.

Why would you want one at all ?
A Tesla or Rimac Would likely be more to your taste which obviously does not allow you to appreciate classic or historic engineering.
An electric EType is like having a android robot with a female skin, instead of a real woman ! The real thing may not be perfect, but it has a lot more personality. !

 

[Duncan]

Comparing a Spitfire to an E Type is like comparing a Rolls to a Mini

The Jaguar suspension, brakes and engine were decades ahead of their time and are still classy equipment these days

Colmosby has obviously never owned any type of car from that era

There were the:
Brits - good engineering - so so quality

Germans - better engineering and quality - but not as much fun

Italians - when they were good they were good - but the reliability!!

Americans - If you wanted a fast(ish) tractor with out of date mechanics and horrible handling they were for you

 

[brian_]

Comparing a Spitfire to an E Type is like comparing a Rolls to a Mini

Sure. The Rolls got much nicer finishes and a lot more attention to fixing all of the defects which came off the production line, but both were fundamentally mediocre vehicles - at least the Mini was when the same design was still in production after two or three decades.

That doesn't mean Minis were not fun - I had a blast driving one in autoslalom competition, decades ago. Of course it wasn't stock...

I read a great story long ago about the old Rolls-Royce production technique of driving the mechanically complete but bare interior car on the roads around the factory, with a mechanic crawling around inside to find all the creaking and squeaking parts that were not properly constructed, so that they could be fixed before the interior went in. Maybe that was a myth, but it fits with British quality assurance practices (or the lack of them), before the world's automotive industry pummelled the British into near irrelevance.

The Jaguar suspension, brakes and engine were decades ahead of their time and are still classy equipment these days...

They were ahead of their time, but their time was half a century ago.

Common family sedans and wagons have better performing, better riding, and more maintainable suspensions now... as they should, given the decades of development between them. The E-Type front suspension looks elegant largely because the torsion bar design means that there are no coil springs... but try to find a car with torsion bars now, and you'll find that they're gone, because they have technical issues. Those old Jag straight-six engines still look classy (and should be smooth - the one Jag I drove was), but are probably best used as museum pieces or boat anchors now; every V6 family sedan and wagon has more power over a broader power band from less engine weight... of course.

The E-Type is a classic, and every major automobile museum should have one. On the other hand, few people - even enthusiasts - would likely want to actually drive one regularly... and that leads to interesting ideas such as this EV conversion. It's certainly not for everyone, or what should be done to every E-Type, but the same could be said of every DIY Electric Car project.

 

[brian_]

An amusing EV aspect to the latest British royal wedding: the royal family leased Jaguar's E-Type Zero for Harry and Meghan to drive between events. This has led to a new round of media coverage.

One detail the new round of articles fill in: there is a single-speed reduction gearbox on the motor output, which makes sense. Other trivia: Rimac assisted with the conversion.

Although the earlier articles quoted various production or model years for this car, these recent articles all say 1968. Some add detail to the origin: this car was apparently built for export to the U.S. (which is why it is left-hand-drive), and had been the subject of both substantial degradation and a swap to an American V8 engine, so although the electric conversion is designed to be bolt-in and reversible, the selection of this particular example avoids modification of a classic of any significant value. Of course some silly royalty watchers think it was built especially for the royal couple and is left-hand-drive to be more familiar for the bride.

The engine history of this car may explain some of the confusion about weight: recent articles quote a Jaguar rep as saying that it is lighter than stock, and other comparisons may have been to the V8 version (although it's hard to imagine an American V8 that would fit in and would be any heavier than a Jag XK engine).

 

[Kevin Sharpe]

The Jag is at the Fully Charged Live Show in June (here) and they made a video last year