Hey,

Just a quick question...

I'm in the market for a used X-type, but being vegetarian I dont want leather seats, did the x-type only have leather interior as an option? seats and trim?

Cheers,


Minty

 

Depending on year and market specification, the X-Type was offered with leather, cloth or alcantara (synthetic) seats.

In Europe, you should be able to find all three options.

Graham

 

Actually, the interior option description from Jaguar is "Part-Leather Seating", so only a few, high-wear portions are leather. The rest of it (unless you are looking at the "Sport" interior) is good quality vinyl, harvested only from Naugabeasts who die of natural causes. Go that route, and you need only feel a twinge of guilt every time you open the driver's door.

Just as a matter of interest, what DO you put the mint sauce on?

 

Most of the leather is synthetic. The seating surfaces that you actually sit on are real, but to my knowledge pretty much everything else (like seat backsides etc) is fake. As mine has dove (light grey) interior, it doesn't bother me because that means there's far less leather to clean & take care of.

I think alcantara seats have leather and alcantara, so full-cloth is the only non-leather option. I'm also fairly certain that all cars had genuine leather-trimmed steering wheels and gear knobs, though perhaps some basic models (trim level "classic") may have synthetic ones. As most indeed had leather, you would be severly limiting your choice of used cars to just the least-equipped base models (electric windows only in front, manual air conditioning, no satnav, no cruise control, etc).

A Jag isn't a very good car for such ethical values as it's all "traditional luxury", that is, animal skin and dead forest

However, IF you're willing to spend quite a bit of money, you could buy an X-Type and have the interior re-configured. As in, you could go to a shop and have them re-trim the seats and steering wheel etc in alcantara (a very pleasant material, my father's Citroën C5 had such seats). That would likely be several thousand euros. If you dislike the veneered trim, you could swap them for genuine carbon fibre trim bits that I believe were available in the last few model years.

 

I don't think there is any "dead forest" in the X-type no matter the trim level.

 

The veneer in all trim levels is genuine wood, aside from carbon fibre and possibly aluminium.

 

+1

Yes - amazing but true.

It must have taken a huge amount of effort to make real wood veneer look just like plastic.

Graham

 

Yes the finish on the trim is amazing(my brother is a woodworker so i know what it takes to get a finish like that) but when the sun shines on it just right there is great depth to it. You don't get that with plastic. Plus birdseye maple is a beautiful fluke

 

What impresses me even more is the veneer on my steering wheel. It is one thing to apply veneer on reasoably flat surfaces but quite another around the relatively thin rim of a wheel.

I am very happy with my Sapelle Pommelle veneer and will buy the ashtray and gear surround as the existing trim is a total mismatch.
Nearly £300 for two bits of trim hurts.