Jaguar X-Type 3.0 V6 Estate | Shed of the Week

The compact wagon was the first Jaguar designed by one Ian Callum - X factor enough for you?

By Tony Middlehurst / Friday, 23 January 2026 / Loading comments

For this week’s sub-£2k smasher Shed was drawn, Magpie-like, to a bright and shiny Peugeot 208 GTI. Then he remembered some of the mechanical issues with the pre-facelift 208 GTIs, so he made the perfectly sensible decision to switch to this Jag, which, as we all know, is a problem-free marque ha ha.

As those of you with functioning peepers will note it is an X400 X-Type Estate. The saloon was designed by a team led by Geoff Lawson, who was also responsible for the XJ220, a nice one of which has just been bought by ex-Stig Ben Collins. The estate, however, was penned by Ian Callum. It was the first Jaguar to slide off his drawing board, and although 25 years have passed since X-Type production began it still looks good today, especially with it being a pre-facelift model with more chrome and less front-end blobbiness than the last cars.

The X-Type didn’t quite hit the 100,000 a year sales target that Jaguar was hoping and probably praying for, but they did shift 350,000 of them over an eight-year run, not bad considering it was competing against the BMW 3 Series and Merc C-Class. Not to mention the Ford Mondeo, whose front-wheel drive platform it borrowed and adapted to run with all four wheels driven on a 40/60 front/rear split. Our shed is a 2004 example, which might mean it doesn’t have the viscous coupling that was dropped for cars in that model year. With luck however our car will have the Dynamic Stability Control that made up for the lack of that LSD function, sort of.

The variably valve-timed 3.0-litre AJ-V6 engine that we have here was the one to go for as it produced a noticeable amount of extra horsepower (25, but it felt like more) than the 2.5 V6, with very little difference in the fuel consumption figure (27 instead of 29mpg). When new, the 0-60mph time for this estate was in the low 7s and it was meant to top 140mph.

Although we can’t see it in the pics, the estate was supposed to come with a 320-watt Alpine audio system along with all the other bits and bobs, like real wood, that Jaguar owners had come to expect. This one even has the Smoker’s Pack, surely something to brag about in these nannying times as long as previous owners didn’t stink the cabin out by taking advantage of it, of course.

There’s a little scuffing to our car’s rear bumper but otherwise it looks good to go for a fair bit longer as the odometer is yet to reach six figures. If you’re the next owner you will need to keep an eye on the fluid level in the auto box despite Jaguar’s assurances that it was sealed for life. The same goes for the transfer box that only had a small amount of fluid in it to start with so it couldn’t stand to lose much before it blew up.

According to the last MOT a month or so ago there’s a smattering of so far non-threatening brownage in all corners of the suspension. If you felt the urge to replace the affected parts, new rear coil springs are under £40 each, and if it’s the drop links the MOT tester was on about at the front of the car they’re about the same money as that or less.

Shed is assuming that the metalwork attached to the roof rails is a dealer sales aid rather than some sort of adventure rack, but as ever he stands ready to be corrected on that, as he does on the annual tax bill that for a 254g/km petrol car comes out as – oh. For some reason, the Govt insists on keeping this information secret unless you’ve got the 11-digit V5C reference number, so we’ll have to rely once more on the dog-eared sheet pinned to the door of Shed’s workshop. That says £735. Look at it this way though, if the CO2 had been 256g/km the bill would have been £760, so you’re saving £25 there, hurray! Better still, if you look at Parkers you can save even more as they reckon it’s only £430 - double hurray!

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