Jaguar xkr

franki68 · Jaguar xkr

Had a 35 minute drive today in one,since it was limited to crawlng through manchester and a quick blast on the motorway my commments are limited as there was little opportunity to test the handling.

I like the look of the xkr,it is handsome and stylish.It still has those stupid rear seats which annoy me but apart form that is a rather nicely designed bit of kit.
The interior is very very good.Very comfortable,lots of space for the driver,fantastically well equippied (to get a merc,bmw or porsche up tot he same spec I would think you would be looking at 7-8k of options easily ) with the best ipod connectivity I have seen ,although I did not test the stereo preferring to concentrate on the cars vocals.Overall the interior was a great place to be,and the only faults I could think of were that the dials were a bit tricky to read whilst driving ,and some of the plastic trim made to look like steel was cheap feeling.

Anyway on the drive the car suprised me in many ways.It was fast,I would say about as fast as my car ,but the highlight was how useable the performance was...any gear just put your foot down and take off was immediate.The engine was muted until about 4-5000 rpm when it gave off a nice roar,but it did not excite.I also noticed theperformance tailed off as you reached the upper end of the rev counter,a bit like the 997tt.In a straight line it felt no quicker overall than my car but you would be working the socks off in my car,whereas this was truly effortless performance.
The brakes were good,I had no real chance to test them so I cannot say much more than that.
UNdoubtedly the highlight for me was the gearbox,easily the best auto I have driven.in normal mode I just could not notice the gearchanges so seamless were they (and so accessible the performance).Switch into dynamic mode and flip the paddles and you have a rather excellent system,with quick gearchanges and the real highlight..it held onto the gears until you changed,yep no computer deciding to change up mid corner ,you could hold it all day long (or until the negine exploded) at the red line in your chosen gear.It makes all sequential gearboxes pretty redundant tbh.
So far so good,just two problems and rather important ones.

Now I have read the reviews and they say the opposite about what I found with regard to the steering.It is quick and very accurate ,but far too light and had no feel whatsoever,exactly like the current m3.Maybe I do not know what I am talking about but I like my steering to have some feel,not to the degree where you feel every feather you drive over,but enough to let you know what is happening to the cars weight when you go into and through a corner.I felt this was far to lifeless but it seems many manufacturers are going this route now.
Finally and most suprising,how bad the ride was.Now it is a jag,which all the mags says ride firmer than normal jags,frankly I found it was too hard compared to how a 997/r8/m3 rides.It was never truly uncomfotable and I did not have the opportunity to see how the handling balanced it out,but when you have rivals like the m3/997 r8 etc which ride well and handle brilliantly maybe jag have gone too far with the harshness.
Anyway it is a fantastic car overall and a mighty effort from jaguar.

PG

Sounds great. A pity about the harshness of the ride though. It sounds as if the standard XK but the with the XKR engine would be a perfect compromise?

So are you an auto convert now?

Matt

When the S-Type went in for its MoT on Thursday - passed without any work needed - there was a new 5.0 XKR in the showroom.

The smell of the interior was almost worth the entry price alone.

Guitar Zero

Hmm - this would be the same interior that (last year) everyone said was shit and unbecoming of a £70k car ?.

The ride quality issue is a disturbing one - I've not read a single write up yet that doesn't mention the poor ride - and apparently the standard XK is just as bad.

Same with the XF, if you read the yank and kraut press for the 5.0 n/a and diesels - they aren't too happy with the ride on 20s.

This is bad people - a Jag that doesn't ride n' glide is like a man with no knob - pointless

The new E-class (on the other hand) is the Daschund's nuts apparently.

franki68