As I understand it, the FR came out only months after TaTa bought Jaguar. So that means at least some of the components came from Ford. I beleive the 5.0L engine is a Welsh design. And I think I've read that the XF is built on an updated version of the S platform, but I don't know if that was originally Ford or not.

So does anyone have a better understanding of what carried over from the Ford ownership to the XF? Could explain some of the similarties with the new 2013 Ford Fusion.



The takeaway from Hamilton's Fusion/Mondeo design review is that Ford worked hard to make it come off as a premium sedan that can compete with, and beat cost-conscious commodity sedans. Take the trunklid sacrifice panel, designed to take rear impact and allow a lower trunk floor height.

"If you look at the back of a Jaguar XF, which has a similar area, it does not have this panel," Hamilton says. You'll see an offset here of about 60mm. Jaguar used to be our sister company. We know they wanted to do this for the XF, and they couldn't afford to do it.

"It's an expensive part of what we do ... but we had to do it. The message is, we didn't cut any costs in the car."



Read more: 2013 Ford Fusion First Look - Motor Trend

 

All of the XF is Ford, technically. Tata had nothing to do with it. It will be a good while before Tata can influence the product line in more than detail, given product lead times.

The XF is a rebodied S Type which was "jointly" designed with Ford as a Lincoln model (the LS). Some refinements to the suspension were made. The body rests on an S Type floorpan.

However, if you check out the shape and general dimensions of the concurrent Mazda 6 and Ford Fusion models you cannot help seeing the similarities. There is no doubt in my mind that Ford and Mazda shared engineering of the bodyshell for all three cars. Jaguar is the only rwd version.

The older V8 dates back to Pre Ford days in design. It is built in Ford's engine plant in Wales. The newer 5.0 design is all Jaguar but built in that same factory. Tata has just broken ground on a new engine plant in England so presumably intends to take over assembly of its powerplants. At some point Tata will need to re-negotiate engine supply. Talk of sourcing from BMW continues to surface from time to time.

Having said all that there is nothing wrong with the engineering coming from Ford of Europe. Even Ford in Detroit is bringing that engineering straight over to our market in the form of the Fiesta, Focus and Fusion models.