Running an XK120 in the 1950s
Discussion
Inspired by the “one of the best” www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?t=369200&f=140&h=0 thread, I asked my Father for his memories of the XK120 he owned in the 1950’s:
~~~~~~~~
I bought my first Jaguar in October 1955 when I part exchanged my 1951 Hudson Hornet for a 1954 XK120M, SE Roadster in BRG.
Chassis number S674832, Engine number F1894-8S
Here are some recollections of running the XK for 6 years on a tight budget, initially in the USA and later in the UK.
October 1955. Arlington.
I bought the XK for $2,400 but after a few days of getting used to driving without a roof, of having 2 seats instead of 6, and having to change gears by hand, I realised that this low price was due to the mechanics of the car not matching the pristine bodywork and interior.
Although the previous driver was the son of the owner of the Chevrolet dealer in Arlington USA where I had bought the car, he had apparently driven it hard and had not taken advantage of the maintenance facilities available to him. Or more likely the mechanics were not familiar with Jaguars.
The first task was to invoke the guarantee and to get the clutch sorted. In keeping with the used car dealer’s philosophy they did a cheap job and had a reconditioned unit fitted. This had to be replaced after a couple of weeks when an arm on the release bearing broke.
Further problems came to light over the next months and thousands of miles of driving and were gradually sorted by myself as time and money allowed.
I didn’t have a garage so the car lived on the roadside where maintenance and repairs were carried as weather permitted.
The problems included: -
Unreliable petrol pump, which stopped working at most embarrassing moments.
Twin 6 volt batteries located behind the seats were too weak for starting in cold weather, and heated the long cables rather than turn the engine.
Incorrect valve clearances.
Three broken engine mounts.
Two worn front shock absorbers.
Blown cylinder head gasket due to warped head.
Worn bearing in distributor.
Seal on water pump bearing blew out whenever it was greased, caused water leakage.
Corrosion at bottom and at the hinges of both aluminium doors.
Wear of the aluminium pulley on the crankshaft resulted in fan belt breakages.
One front suspension torsion bar setting incorrect.
Air vents in front brake back plate allowed water ingress.
Leakage between windscreen frame and scuttle.
Loose spokes in wire wheels.
Nighttime driving in town, especially in the winter was a problem as the puny 20 amp dynamo couldn’t cope with the electrical load at slow speeds, and necessitated judicial switching off headlights and heater.
Bodywork suffered numerous dents and bumps due to the lack of reasonable bumpers and use of aluminium doors, when confronted with the American methods of parking.
May 1956. Petrol pump trouble again.
Solutions to these problems varied: --
The petrol pump stoppages were finally cured by fitting a ceramic filter
which prevented build up of deposit onto the diaphragm from the petrol
additives.
American made batteries of larger capacity were installed.
Reset valve clearances. New valve shims were not available, but the local Jaguar dealer kindly allowed shims to be swapped for ones from his used collection.
New engine mounts bought from local Jaguar dealer.
American made shock absorbers fitted.
Cylinder head removed and taken to local machine shop and planed flat.
August 1956. Cylinder head removed for planning.
Distributor rebuilt with bearing and shaft bought from local Jaguar dealer.
Water pump rebuilt and never greased again.
Sheet aluminium purchased and riveted around bottom of door skin and in way of door hinges. Repair almost invisible when sprayed BRG.
When a replacement aluminium pulley wore, it was replaced with a cast iron one.
Plates were screwed in place over air vents.
Other irritations were numerous rattles which required regular application of screwdriver and spanners.
The exhaust was extremely noisy as it was practically straight through, and resulted in being stopped by the police a number of times. Luckily no tickets were received as the officers usually seemed more interested in looking over the car.
The foot pedal rubbers did not work well with wet shoes causing feet to slip off brake and clutch. This together with lack of attention, and lack of break lights on van in front, resulted in some expensive damage to the front wings, lights and grill.
February 1956. Oh Dear.
I covered about 20,000 miles during the first two years, driving mostly at weekends and holidays. The car was extremely comfortable on long trips, and numerous journeys of 600 to700 miles each way were made to Canada without overnight stops. On one trip to Florida I drove along the famous sands at Daytona where the old speed records were run.
March 1956. Daytona Beach.
A local tyre retreader was able to do a good job with Dunlop Roadspeed tyres at about 25% of the cost of new. I drove the car at over 100mph many times and had no trouble with these retreads.
A reasonable amount of luggage could be stowed in the boot and behind the seats. But for long trips and with a passenger I fitted a luggage rack to the boot lid and bolted a tin trunk to the rack.
March 1959. Washington. San Franciso here we come.
The most memorable trip was one to San Francisco and back with girl friend Jenny. We left Washington on 8th March 1959 and returned on 1st April having driving 8,400 miles, and making many sight seeing detours on route. The XK behaved well and the only repairs being a fan belt and pulley, a top radiator hose, and a tyre. Weather ranged from frost in the mornings, a sandstorm near Yuma, torrential rain near San Francisco, 100degrees in Death Valley, and finally a snow storm as we climbed to the top of Sequoia Park.
March 1959. Saguaro Park.
March 1959. Sand storm near Yuma.
March 1959. Picos. Fitting new fan pulley and belt.
March 1959 San Diego
March 1959. Santa Barbara.
March 1959. Rain and Geysers near Calistoga.
March 1959. Sequoia Park.
March 1959. Death Valley.
March 1959.Zion Park. Chequerboard Mesa.
March. 1959. Painted Desert.
A week after finishing this trip I drove to New York, loaded the car onto RMS Ivernia and sailed to the UK.
Once settled in the UK the car was registered as OJR481 in Newcastle.
It was necessary to find a job, and trips were made all around the country as far apart as Aberdeen and the Isle of Wight. Eventually this was sorted and I met up again with Jenny and we decided to get married.
On the night before the wedding in Cornwall, I spun the car on a corner when returning from my stag evening. This was a 360-degree spin finishing on the opposite verge facing the correct way. After confirming no personal damage, I started up and drove away. The next morning however the local garage confirmed that the steering was misaligned due to hitting the kerb, and although they took up all the adjustment it could not be cured. We departed as planned for a honeymoon tour round England, but this was aborted after 1,000 miles as a front tyre had been scrubbed flat.
On return to Bath the local Jaguar dealer was consulted and car was booked in to have new steering and suspension parts fitted. When these would not fit together, further checking revealed that the chassis was bent and there was only one solution - strip the car and send the chassis to a specialist in London to be straightened. While this was happening, the dealer ordered up new parts so that the car could be reassembled with RHD, and the now noisy gearbox was overhauled. This all took about 3 months before the car was returned . Unfortunately a further 5 months passed while the cost of the work was challenged and the car returned numerous times for the correction of errors and omissions in this work.
June 1960. At Dover with RHD and UK Registration.
When we were satisfied that the car was reliable once more we set off in June 1960 on a camping holiday through France to the south coast, returning via a tour around Switzerland. A disintegrated silencer was the only fatality. Italian speaking welders in Switzerland beautifully rebuilt it in two hours at a roadside body shop.
June 1960. Menton.
June 1960. Cassis
Our daughter was born in January 1961, and initially was transported on her Mum’s lap or in a carrycot. For the latter the hood was raised and the cot was put on the body hard against the hood, as it would not fit behind the seats. When Chris grew out of the cot, she travelled in a small flexible baby seat slung over the seat back between driver and passenger.
July 1961 Gosforth
We travelled all over the country in this manner, but when Chris discovered that she could use her foot to push the gear lever out of 4th position I realised that the game was up, and the XK had to go. In 1961 (after exactly 6years) it was reluctantly part exchanged for £275 against PUJ 286, a 1957 2.4 Mk1 SE Saloon in Black.
Shortly before selling the car I carried out a decoke and when the bores were measured the wear was nowhere more than two and three thousands of an inch.
When sold, the car still had the original brake shoes, and mileage was about 80,000 - of which 70,000 was down to me.
~~~~~~~~~
We had assumed that the car was long gone, but a couple of years ago we found the link to the DVLA web site and checked the registration. To our amazement, it was on the database !
After a getting some advise from Racing Green, we made contact with one of the Jaguar clubs, and their archivist found a reference to the and it’s owner car in old club year book from the early 70’s. A phone call later and we discovered that he had bought the car after my father part exchanged it in 1961, and used it for a few years before taking it off the road for a rebuild. The rebuild never happened and although the car was stored outside for many years, was vandalised and a fire started in the interior it apparently was later moved into a garage - where it still resides !
I wonder if he would sell it ... and how much it would cost to restore ?
~~~~~~~~
I bought my first Jaguar in October 1955 when I part exchanged my 1951 Hudson Hornet for a 1954 XK120M, SE Roadster in BRG.
Chassis number S674832, Engine number F1894-8S
Here are some recollections of running the XK for 6 years on a tight budget, initially in the USA and later in the UK.
October 1955. Arlington.
I bought the XK for $2,400 but after a few days of getting used to driving without a roof, of having 2 seats instead of 6, and having to change gears by hand, I realised that this low price was due to the mechanics of the car not matching the pristine bodywork and interior.
Although the previous driver was the son of the owner of the Chevrolet dealer in Arlington USA where I had bought the car, he had apparently driven it hard and had not taken advantage of the maintenance facilities available to him. Or more likely the mechanics were not familiar with Jaguars.
The first task was to invoke the guarantee and to get the clutch sorted. In keeping with the used car dealer’s philosophy they did a cheap job and had a reconditioned unit fitted. This had to be replaced after a couple of weeks when an arm on the release bearing broke.
Further problems came to light over the next months and thousands of miles of driving and were gradually sorted by myself as time and money allowed.
I didn’t have a garage so the car lived on the roadside where maintenance and repairs were carried as weather permitted.
The problems included: -
Unreliable petrol pump, which stopped working at most embarrassing moments.
Twin 6 volt batteries located behind the seats were too weak for starting in cold weather, and heated the long cables rather than turn the engine.
Incorrect valve clearances.
Three broken engine mounts.
Two worn front shock absorbers.
Blown cylinder head gasket due to warped head.
Worn bearing in distributor.
Seal on water pump bearing blew out whenever it was greased, caused water leakage.
Corrosion at bottom and at the hinges of both aluminium doors.
Wear of the aluminium pulley on the crankshaft resulted in fan belt breakages.
One front suspension torsion bar setting incorrect.
Air vents in front brake back plate allowed water ingress.
Leakage between windscreen frame and scuttle.
Loose spokes in wire wheels.
Nighttime driving in town, especially in the winter was a problem as the puny 20 amp dynamo couldn’t cope with the electrical load at slow speeds, and necessitated judicial switching off headlights and heater.
Bodywork suffered numerous dents and bumps due to the lack of reasonable bumpers and use of aluminium doors, when confronted with the American methods of parking.
May 1956. Petrol pump trouble again.
Solutions to these problems varied: --
The petrol pump stoppages were finally cured by fitting a ceramic filter
which prevented build up of deposit onto the diaphragm from the petrol
additives.
American made batteries of larger capacity were installed.
Reset valve clearances. New valve shims were not available, but the local Jaguar dealer kindly allowed shims to be swapped for ones from his used collection.
New engine mounts bought from local Jaguar dealer.
American made shock absorbers fitted.
Cylinder head removed and taken to local machine shop and planed flat.
August 1956. Cylinder head removed for planning.
Distributor rebuilt with bearing and shaft bought from local Jaguar dealer.
Water pump rebuilt and never greased again.
Sheet aluminium purchased and riveted around bottom of door skin and in way of door hinges. Repair almost invisible when sprayed BRG.
When a replacement aluminium pulley wore, it was replaced with a cast iron one.
Plates were screwed in place over air vents.
Other irritations were numerous rattles which required regular application of screwdriver and spanners.
The exhaust was extremely noisy as it was practically straight through, and resulted in being stopped by the police a number of times. Luckily no tickets were received as the officers usually seemed more interested in looking over the car.
The foot pedal rubbers did not work well with wet shoes causing feet to slip off brake and clutch. This together with lack of attention, and lack of break lights on van in front, resulted in some expensive damage to the front wings, lights and grill.
February 1956. Oh Dear.
I covered about 20,000 miles during the first two years, driving mostly at weekends and holidays. The car was extremely comfortable on long trips, and numerous journeys of 600 to700 miles each way were made to Canada without overnight stops. On one trip to Florida I drove along the famous sands at Daytona where the old speed records were run.
March 1956. Daytona Beach.
A local tyre retreader was able to do a good job with Dunlop Roadspeed tyres at about 25% of the cost of new. I drove the car at over 100mph many times and had no trouble with these retreads.
A reasonable amount of luggage could be stowed in the boot and behind the seats. But for long trips and with a passenger I fitted a luggage rack to the boot lid and bolted a tin trunk to the rack.
March 1959. Washington. San Franciso here we come.
The most memorable trip was one to San Francisco and back with girl friend Jenny. We left Washington on 8th March 1959 and returned on 1st April having driving 8,400 miles, and making many sight seeing detours on route. The XK behaved well and the only repairs being a fan belt and pulley, a top radiator hose, and a tyre. Weather ranged from frost in the mornings, a sandstorm near Yuma, torrential rain near San Francisco, 100degrees in Death Valley, and finally a snow storm as we climbed to the top of Sequoia Park.
March 1959. Saguaro Park.
March 1959. Sand storm near Yuma.
March 1959. Picos. Fitting new fan pulley and belt.
March 1959 San Diego
March 1959. Santa Barbara.
March 1959. Rain and Geysers near Calistoga.
March 1959. Sequoia Park.
March 1959. Death Valley.
March 1959.Zion Park. Chequerboard Mesa.
March. 1959. Painted Desert.
A week after finishing this trip I drove to New York, loaded the car onto RMS Ivernia and sailed to the UK.
Once settled in the UK the car was registered as OJR481 in Newcastle.
It was necessary to find a job, and trips were made all around the country as far apart as Aberdeen and the Isle of Wight. Eventually this was sorted and I met up again with Jenny and we decided to get married.
On the night before the wedding in Cornwall, I spun the car on a corner when returning from my stag evening. This was a 360-degree spin finishing on the opposite verge facing the correct way. After confirming no personal damage, I started up and drove away. The next morning however the local garage confirmed that the steering was misaligned due to hitting the kerb, and although they took up all the adjustment it could not be cured. We departed as planned for a honeymoon tour round England, but this was aborted after 1,000 miles as a front tyre had been scrubbed flat.
On return to Bath the local Jaguar dealer was consulted and car was booked in to have new steering and suspension parts fitted. When these would not fit together, further checking revealed that the chassis was bent and there was only one solution - strip the car and send the chassis to a specialist in London to be straightened. While this was happening, the dealer ordered up new parts so that the car could be reassembled with RHD, and the now noisy gearbox was overhauled. This all took about 3 months before the car was returned . Unfortunately a further 5 months passed while the cost of the work was challenged and the car returned numerous times for the correction of errors and omissions in this work.
June 1960. At Dover with RHD and UK Registration.
When we were satisfied that the car was reliable once more we set off in June 1960 on a camping holiday through France to the south coast, returning via a tour around Switzerland. A disintegrated silencer was the only fatality. Italian speaking welders in Switzerland beautifully rebuilt it in two hours at a roadside body shop.
June 1960. Menton.
June 1960. Cassis
Our daughter was born in January 1961, and initially was transported on her Mum’s lap or in a carrycot. For the latter the hood was raised and the cot was put on the body hard against the hood, as it would not fit behind the seats. When Chris grew out of the cot, she travelled in a small flexible baby seat slung over the seat back between driver and passenger.
July 1961 Gosforth
We travelled all over the country in this manner, but when Chris discovered that she could use her foot to push the gear lever out of 4th position I realised that the game was up, and the XK had to go. In 1961 (after exactly 6years) it was reluctantly part exchanged for £275 against PUJ 286, a 1957 2.4 Mk1 SE Saloon in Black.
Shortly before selling the car I carried out a decoke and when the bores were measured the wear was nowhere more than two and three thousands of an inch.
When sold, the car still had the original brake shoes, and mileage was about 80,000 - of which 70,000 was down to me.
~~~~~~~~~
We had assumed that the car was long gone, but a couple of years ago we found the link to the DVLA web site and checked the registration. To our amazement, it was on the database !
After a getting some advise from Racing Green, we made contact with one of the Jaguar clubs, and their archivist found a reference to the and it’s owner car in old club year book from the early 70’s. A phone call later and we discovered that he had bought the car after my father part exchanged it in 1961, and used it for a few years before taking it off the road for a rebuild. The rebuild never happened and although the car was stored outside for many years, was vandalised and a fire started in the interior it apparently was later moved into a garage - where it still resides !
I wonder if he would sell it ... and how much it would cost to restore ?
Edited by red rose on Saturday 14th April 23:51
Edited by red rose on Saturday 14th April 23:53
Edited by red rose on Saturday 14th April 23:55
Edited by red rose on Saturday 14th April 23:56
Edited by red rose on Sunday 29th April 09:42
BUY IT!
Red Rose said:
While this was happening, the dealer ordered up new parts so that the car could be reassembled with RHD
Aha! My eyes didn't deceive me!
This is one of the finest threads I can remember. It's very generous of you and your father to share such memories, Red Rose. This thread will have brought smiles to the faces of all that have read it!
It would be a real fairytale to see the car restored and reunited with its previous owner. I hope you'll keep us posted.
BTW - If you listed all those faults on a modern car, many would exclaim you had a lemon on your hands! Because the XK is such a beautiful piece of art, we'll overlook the minor issues such as a warped head
It wouldn't surprise me to see one of the classic car mags take an interest in this story. It would make for a superb article. Tell them they can have the copyright if they pay for a restoration job!
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