If I’m going to add more Corvette Stingrays to the racing fleet, I’m going to have to add more Jaguar E-Types! Why? Because Jan & Dean say so, that’s why! And since one of their songs gave my track and this very blog their names, I’ll honor another of their 1964 hits about that fateful night that a Stingray met an XKE out on the boulevard and “challenged me then and there to a drag!”
You all know that for quite a long time I was limiting each of my Ultra G racing fleets to 64 cars, and you also know that a little less than a year ago I decided to start dividing each fleet into groups of 32 cars each, which allowed me to blow the top off that 64-car limit! Before, I had cultivated a fleet of carefully selected Aurora Jaguars, choosing models in colors that were all different but not extremely rare, and using bodies that were in decent but not pristine condition, knowing that I was going to modify all of them by “radius-ing” the wheel arches in order the fit the wheels and tires I want to use for my track.
Now, however, having recently added two more Corvettes to the numbered racing fleet, I knew it was time to “up” my count of Jags as well, so I went looking for another example of a slightly beat-up but useable version in a color I did not yet have. I found what I was looking for from a vendor in Pennsylvania I’ve bought from before, and for a reasonable price I got a 2-fer: the body I wanted on an original early Thunderjet chassis, which I could rebuild and use for another car.
The latest arrival is off white, and had a badly chewed up front screw post and a couple of deformities on the hood that looked like distortion caused by heat. I knew that this bad patch was going to be covered by the racing stripes and number roundels I would install, and since the rest of the body was good, I knew I had another perfect specimen for modification.
This time out, however, I had a new consideration I didn’t have with the previous cars. As you may have read here, it looks like the parts I used to buy from Road Race Replicas are not going to be available anymore, and one of their best products were their low-profile silicone tires made to fit under a body with tight clearance. I have used these on all 4 of the previous Jaguars I’ve built, but I only have a couple of sets of these tires left in my stash, whereas I have dozens of the full sized RRR silicone tires. Knowing I need to save those few remaining lo-pros for the inevitable times when I really need them, I thought that this time out, I was going to try to make this the first Jag I’ve built to use the full sized tires. It also took me a while to choose a wheel style; I tried 3 different styles before settling on a set of the Vincent “Steeles” which have a tough look on a racing car, and this will be the first E-Type to use them, as all the others have some variation of wire wheels.
This new addition will wear a duplicate number 65, so it can’t ever race in the same group as the white Cobra Daytona Coupe. It is a 1966 4.2 Litre Series I model christened “WARLOCK,” which will be piloted by Harlan “HACKSAW” Hackland, the California born son an American father and an English mother. So-pun fully intended: off to the races! A screw post repair, the needed modification to the wheel arches, the chassis fitting procedure, the addition of the stripes and numbers, and the road test, are all here in this video for you to see up close, with the accompaniment of another great song that just couldn’t be more perfect! Let me know what you think, dear readers!
Nice job, man!!!
This Jag can fly, it launches like a bullet.
Yes, I’ve learned to beware of putting these small light bodies on brand new Ultra G chassis! The Jaguar uses the short wheelbase like the Ford GT 40, the Cheetah, and a handful of others; I’ve found its often best to use lower performing chassis on these, else you wind up with too much of a good thing! We’ll see how this one does when the next sports car tournament comes around!