XE Launch party -thoughts
Discussion
I went to the Hepworth Gallery (Wakefield) last night to see the XE launch, have any others been to see it around the country and what did you think.
Thoughts:-
Outside - Looks like a cross between a shrunken XF and an A5, but looks good.
Boot - Due to the raked design the boot lid area is small so you cannot drop anything into the boot as you could with the X type.
The hinges for the boot are the huge LOOP type and they take alot of space out the boot so you have no space upto the inner wings, unlike the X which used the small X hinges which although complicated did not take any space away from the boot. Therefore the XE boot is long and narrow as it runs the width of the car inside the wheel arches.
Front - Getting in, two points to note:-
1. Because of the alloy construction (assumption) the sills appear huge to get over and the footwells appear smaller. The outer sills are likely to scratch as people lift their feet(shoes) over the sill to get in.
2. I'm 5' 10'' and I banged my head getting in and out because of the steep rake of the door frame and everybody I watched entering the car of my height and above did the same as you try to slide onto the seat.
Rear - the rear seat cushions look long and therefore the footwell isn't very good. Numerous people commented that anybody over average height driving or front seat passenger who pushes the seat back left no footwell room for rear seat passenger legs!, therefore fails as a long distance 4 seater adult car. Note not 5 seats because the drive train is wide and fairly high so a rear middle passenger will not want to straddle for too long.
Overall Interior: The dash is high and on the passenger side a huge lump of black plastic to look at, it could do with some kind of relief. Definitely a cockpit design with the front doors curving into the dash. The centre console is very wide and high. This causes your elbow either driver or passenger to be rested at a high height, on the console just where the cupholders are. The console does have padding but it is right to the back of the console near or behind the seats dependent on where you locate your seat so is useless! I'm use to soft touch interior on door coverings, but the XE goes for the hard plastic look also the top of the binacle has a hard surface that doesn't sit with the rest of the dash. The infotainment system seemed good and was quick to react to touch screen.
My overall impression slightly disapppointed 7/10, exterior is fine, but the boot and interior feel cramped and I'm not sure of some of the materials used. I believe the red and white car on show were pre-production but the way the side sill meets the rear wing under the rear door looks a great trap for mud and dirt.
Your thoughts
Thoughts:-
Outside - Looks like a cross between a shrunken XF and an A5, but looks good.
Boot - Due to the raked design the boot lid area is small so you cannot drop anything into the boot as you could with the X type.
The hinges for the boot are the huge LOOP type and they take alot of space out the boot so you have no space upto the inner wings, unlike the X which used the small X hinges which although complicated did not take any space away from the boot. Therefore the XE boot is long and narrow as it runs the width of the car inside the wheel arches.
Front - Getting in, two points to note:-
1. Because of the alloy construction (assumption) the sills appear huge to get over and the footwells appear smaller. The outer sills are likely to scratch as people lift their feet(shoes) over the sill to get in.
2. I'm 5' 10'' and I banged my head getting in and out because of the steep rake of the door frame and everybody I watched entering the car of my height and above did the same as you try to slide onto the seat.
Rear - the rear seat cushions look long and therefore the footwell isn't very good. Numerous people commented that anybody over average height driving or front seat passenger who pushes the seat back left no footwell room for rear seat passenger legs!, therefore fails as a long distance 4 seater adult car. Note not 5 seats because the drive train is wide and fairly high so a rear middle passenger will not want to straddle for too long.
Overall Interior: The dash is high and on the passenger side a huge lump of black plastic to look at, it could do with some kind of relief. Definitely a cockpit design with the front doors curving into the dash. The centre console is very wide and high. This causes your elbow either driver or passenger to be rested at a high height, on the console just where the cupholders are. The console does have padding but it is right to the back of the console near or behind the seats dependent on where you locate your seat so is useless! I'm use to soft touch interior on door coverings, but the XE goes for the hard plastic look also the top of the binacle has a hard surface that doesn't sit with the rest of the dash. The infotainment system seemed good and was quick to react to touch screen.
My overall impression slightly disapppointed 7/10, exterior is fine, but the boot and interior feel cramped and I'm not sure of some of the materials used. I believe the red and white car on show were pre-production but the way the side sill meets the rear wing under the rear door looks a great trap for mud and dirt.
Your thoughts
Edited by Domf on Friday 7th November 12:26
ali355 said:
The other thing that was quite apparent, and bearing in mind its based on the 45 mins I was there so might not be too relevant, was how many of the people in the room were more senior than I would have expected for a car that is aiming at a younger audience for the brand.
I totally agree about the age demographic and I'm 52 having owned Jaguars since I was 40 and felt that many around me were long standing senior citizen jaguar owners. The car park gave it away top end XJ, XF and XK's with the odd X type (the sector the XE is aiming at) and not too many other makes. As an X type owner I found the XE interior cramped so all the comments coming from existing XF owners were on the interior dimensions in relation to their existing larger car. My other thought is since the X was discontinued in 2009, those owners who wished to stay with Jaguar had to upsize to the XF and therefore the existing Jaguar core potential XE Jaguar owner will come from a diminishing base of Jaguar X type owners and new external blood (Audi A3/A4, BMW 1,3, Merc C-Class)owners is needed. It would be interesting to know the split between Jaguar and non Jaguar owners there last night. I'm also now considering buying a runout XF or late registered XF as I the price point between the two is not great (discounts on XF) and the all important interior dimensions
Edited by Domf on Friday 7th November 11:36
Well 3 months on since the launch and this week attended my local dealer launch. I'm assuming the dealer cars are production and not pre-prod we saw late last year. There was only one car on display and it was White low spec. My wife came to this launch and made her own comments. No surprise on entry, "that sill is very wide and not easy to get in or out of the car and she's 5' 7''", shorter women and children may well have a problem. It's a saloon, but entry is like a low slung coupe (F type). I sat in the back and she sat in the front, when she pushed the seat back, the top of my shoes got a good clean/scrub as the front seat rear bottom is low and traps your foot. Has anyone noticed the dash side vents are so far back, all they can warm is your elbows! My wife likes Jag's but she wasn't wowed by the XE in fact she saw a XF RSPORT in deep blue and said that has Jag presence, so an 8 year old design impressed her more!
Gassing Station | Jaguar | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff