200mph Road Cars

[Mactech]

Today, there is a good choice of cars you can buy that will do 200mph.
Finding somewhere with the space required to do this legally is much more difficult.
Tonight’s Top Gear features the very same car which I was the first to drive at 200mph.
It’s one of my old development XJ220s (004) from 1991, now a veteran of some 200k miles.
Nearly 30 years on it is driven by somebody much taller, much younger and considerably better at cricket.
I look forward to seeing if my old friend (the car!) gets stage fright or becomes a bit of a film star.

 

[renault12ts]

Thankfully...not the one they managed to crash.

 

[Bobby Dazzler]

Looking forward to watching!

Reaching 200,000 miles is an outstanding achievement - do you have any idea how much engine/transmission work it’s had over the years beyond routine servicing?

 

[LTD]

One of my alltime favourite cars

 

[Darrell]

I’ve never actually seen one in the flesh.

 

[GeeJayW]

Let's hope said cricketer doesn't stuff it the barrier...

 

[Mactech]

Looking forward to watching!

Reaching 200,000 miles is an outstanding achievement - do you have any idea how much engine/transmission work it’s had over the years beyond routine servicing?

It's the used car everyone would want to buy! Really low mileage, never raced or rallied....NOT!
As is was a development car, then a race car it has undergone some considerable work.
Here is an extract from the details I leave on the screen when I take it to shows.

• The first XJ220 to exceed 200mph
• The first XJ220 to 200,000 miles
• Multi-race winning car.

004 rolled out in April 1991 to start its rigorous life as a hot climate, high speed tyre development and durability car. It was only the second car to be hand built using production intent body tooling as a ‘fully engineered prototype’

By May 26th it had already eclipsed the 200mph mark driven by Chief Development Engineer Alastair Macqueen at the Bridgestone proving ground in Fort Stockton, Texas. The following week it would lap the 8 mile oval at an average speed of 213mph in the capable hands of Jaguar Le Mans winner Andy Wallace.

After a heavy programme of development throughout the summer it would accompany its very slightly younger blue sister car 005 to the Nurburgring in September now painted in a Jaguar production intent red colour. 005 stole the limelight by setting a production car lap record of 7’46’’ which would stand for 7 years with another Jaguar Le Mans winner John Nielsen at the wheel. 004 pounded around for days doing chassis, tyre and engine development work. It was also driven back to base from Germany to clock up the first international XJ220 road trip and be the first 220 on a hovercraft!

004 then was assigned the very unglamorous task of becoming the gearbox durability car. It was to spend months at Millbrook on a very prescriptive transmission torture routine to sign off all the gearbox components. General durability and fault rectification duties followed in 1992.

Jaguar Sport sold off a very small number of former development cars to race teams at the end of the programme. 004 was bought by Chamberlain Racing and started a new and more glamorous life as a race car in the 1995 British GT Championship and selected FIA GT Races. This particular car, 004 was painted as a monster car for a film project before languishing in retirement at Chamberlain.

It was purchased by Don Law Racing in 1998, prepared by them and raced in the Intermarque Championship in 1999 driven by Win Percy where it proved to be a race winner, obtained pole position at every race, took lap records, and won the 1999 Class C Intermarque Cup for the front running cars.

In 2000 Don Law Racing ran the first pilot race for the new Group C Historic Championship and with Win Percy in an XJR-11 Group C car, driving duties for XJ220 004 passed on to Justin Law. Justin continued to race the car both in the Intermarque Championship and in the GT Class of Historic Group C Racing. When Justin moved on to Group C with the Castrol XJR-10 in 2001, XJ220 004 was put into retirement.

Justin made a decision some time in 2005 to put XJ220 004 back into full road trim. Fortunately all of the original standard trim parts had been acquired with the car and it was rebuilt in its original silver livery after its multi-coloured life as a race car. The engine was also upgraded to full S spec with 680 brake horsepower. Since then, 004 has covered around a further 50,000 miles and been driven by scores of journalists, used by numerous film crews, and continues to be used as a promotional tool for the business

In September 2016 the car really did return to its roots when, after a 25 year gap, it once again became the primary development car for a brand new breed of Bridgestone tyres. Spending almost four months based at Bridgestone’s facility near Rome, 004 undertook

the rigorous duties of a tyre test and development car, covering thousands of test milesat speeds of up to 200mph, without complaint.

The car is now a veteran of around 200,000 really hard miles. Amazingly, it has never suffered any serious damage, so carries all the original aluminium bodywork. It is a great testament to the incredible design of the XJ220 that the honeycomb chassis has survived all this extreme endurance testing with absolutely no issues.

XJ220 004 has pushed the boundaries of performance and durability for all XJ220’s to become an important, heroic and historic car.

It has never been a ‘garage queen’, but it was driven here today by A Macqueen…...

 

[roviw1]

Interesting article thanks, I will be watching it later on tonight

 

[renault12ts]

By May 26th it had already eclipsed the 200mph mark driven by Chief Development Engineer Alastair Macqueen at the Bridgestone proving ground in Fort Stockton, Texas. The following week it would lap the 8 mile oval at an average speed of 213mph in the capable hands of Jaguar Le Mans winner Andy Wallace.

Quite a claim to fame Alastair!!!

 

[Deleted member 65149]

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[Mactech]

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Really helps if you don‘t miss gears!
The film editing is also well out because you don’t take 5th until you’re well over 160mph.....or maybe that’s the problem

 

[Bert_W164]

XJ220, that brought back childhood memories, back in 1998/9 countless hours were spent playing Toca 2 with the XJ220

 

[unimog]

I'm not a fan of new Top gear so I'm humbled to be able to get the facts from the horse's mouth right here!!

The engine in these was originally to be a V12 but shelved because of weigh and cost, is it true the budget was that tight they raided the Austin Rover parts bin for the V6, based on the V6 developed for the Metro 6R4?

Fantastic car, just arrived at the wrong time which is ironic given that Gordon Murray succeeded at a similar time with the F1 where Jaguar failed I think because of his unrelenting pursuit of perfection, he didn't compromise on anything but then again McClaren was considerably more solvent than Jaguar at that time.

 

[Mactech]

I'm not a fan of new Top gear so I'm humbled to be able to get the facts from the horse's mouth right here!!

The engine in these was originally to be a V12 but shelved because of weigh and cost, is it true the budget was that tight they raided the Austin Rover parts bin for the V6, based on the V6 developed for the Metro 6R4?

Fantastic car, just arrived at the wrong time which is ironic given that Gordon Murray succeeded at a similar time with the F1 where Jaguar failed I think because of his unrelenting pursuit of perfection, he didn't compromise on anything but then again McClaren was considerably more solvent than Jaguar at that time.

Well yes, the facts are almost correct, but not really for the right reasons.
The V12 was too heavy despite the fact we had won 2 Word Championships and 2 Le Mans. But it really wouldn't make the power required with the new emission regulations and we had just developed a winning twin turbo version of the 6R4 engine for our race cars. The 220 engine was derived from this.
The budget was tight. About 10% of the Mclaren budget and about 1% of the Veyron budget!

 

[GeeJayW]

I went to an IMechE evening at Rolls Royce in Crewe a lifetime ago to listen to Jim Randle recounting the early days of how the XJ220 came about. Really interesting. IIRC the prototype was designed and built on a hobby basis by the Jaguar guys in their spare time. Glass donated by Pilkington, tyres given by Pirelli (?). V12 4x4, laser cut aluminium sheet chassis panels.

Around the same time I was doing some work at Millbrook and saw some of the development cars whizzing about either on the mile-straight, alpine route or the bowl. Always a privilege to see them.

 

[Bobby Dazzler]

I really enjoyed that. Shame we didn’t see the F40 do a top speed run.

 

[Bobby Dazzler]

@Mactech next time you’re out in it, if the opportunity arises for my wife to have a looksee then that would get me some serious brownie points. Mrs D has always had a soft spot for the XJ220

 

[Mactech]

I really enjoyed that. Shame we didn’t see the F40 do a top speed run.

The truth was the F40 only managed 178mph and Chris wasn't happy with that. He tried the XJ220 and did 200mph at his first attempt.
So he encouraged Freddie to go for 200.
Back in 1991, I spent a whole day working up to the that speed, checking the data from my engineer co-driver on his lap until I was completely sure that all the design data correlated with what we were seeing. Call me a wuss, but only at the end of the day did I suit up, and go for a wide open throttle run.
I was flat through the first 180 deg turn at Fort Stockton and saw 206mph as I entered the second turn when.....a bird hit the top of the screen!
It was a Big Bang and my foot came straight off the loud pedal.
I drove casually back to the workshop and waited for Andy Wallace to appear the following day.
He was flat on his first flying lap at 213mph. I'm not sure if that says more about his bravery or lack of imagination.

I'm really glad Freddie enjoyed himself, it really is something special

 

[Deleted member 113659]

Enjoyed watching that.

Funny how it looks odd to see manual supercars. How times change.

 

[bolidemichael]

What a brilliant thread!