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Just joined the forum after this acquisition, so thought I should start a post, as this is one of those things that you read about, but you never extent it to happen to you.
I’ve been on the hunt for a Series 2 XJ12 for some time, after owning an XJS 20 years ago.
I was originally born in Coventry, and whilst I live in Western Australia now, the family has strong connections to Jaguar.
About 6 weeks ago I received a text from a 77 year old guy, saying that he had an XJ12 in his garage, where it had been parked for 10 years. Engine was find when parked, no rust, interior was OK, and was I interested.
The car was in the City and I couldn’t get there for a few weeks, but it wasn’t advertised, and the owner said that he would wait for me to get to see it, before he advertised It.
I was in no rush, as I didn’t really believe the introduction, having seen so many supposed great or honest cars with no rust and great interiors, that were in truly terrible condition.
So expecting very little I went round to the house 4 weeks later, to find this view;
This was after I’d moved a pile of stuff to get to the doors.
Inside was the XJ12 as promised, surrounded by piles and piles of rubbish, furniture, boxes, tools and some stuff that has yet to be determined as animal or mineral.
Inspection was difficult, I couldn’t get to the front of the car, couldn’t open the bonnet or get to the LHS of the car, and the age and fail health of the owner made moving anything heavy impossible,
from what I could see, there was no obvious rust, the interior was worn but dry, no smell of mould or damp, the chrome was tarnished but intact and good too. All four flat tyres were sitting on Kent alloys, and I had to take his word that under that bonnet sat the V12 engine.
He gave me the license papers so I could check the numbers, all matching, so then I asked him the price, waiting for ridiculous number.
His price was unbelievably fair, so we shook hands and made a deal, on the basis that I would clear the shed and get the car out myself.
I went home and transferred the money, and then made arrangements to go back to the City to collect and empty the shed.
My future son in law came to help, and bit by bit we moved piles and piles of stuff, slowly unveiling the dusty jag.
I managed to get a jack down the side of the car, jack her up, free up the wheels, and pump up the tyres.
Opened the bonnet to find the original V12, complete with 4 carbies, oil free of fuel or water, gearbox oil that smelled as sweet as the day as it was poured in (well relatively speaking !!) and even nice wet oily plungers in in the top of the carbs.
Everything was covered in an inch of dust and grime, the windows couldn’t be seen through and even the engine, with the bonnet closed was covered in dust and cobwebs.
I pushed the car out as far as possible, and after many hours of freeing and extracting the car, the two truck arrived to pick her up.
For the first time, in many years, the car was in the sunshine, and wiping the windscreen revealed the registration sticker, 2004.
So this car has sat in that dusty old garage for 18 years.
Extracting the car revealed a small strip of rust bubbles on the bottom of the driver door, and rust in the floor on the drivers side.
Rust free would have been better, but with what little the car cost me, sorting out these issues seems only fair.
So after a 5 hour trip home, the car is now parked up, and today will get a wash, after 18 years of dust are blown from every orifice.
I’ll post pictures later today (I hope) once she had some TLC
Try not to remove too much of that vintage dirt, get it running and drive it as is for a good 6 months and then proceed to wash it on IG or Youtube as you peel back years of dust. Itd be fun. Of course, lets hope its not a rats nest and all you need to do is replace all rubber components, clean, and refresh the fuel system. Drive train should be fine, but the engine is a mystery. You have your work cut out for you.
So with the car home, and the sun shining, I had chance to have a closer look, and give her some TLC.
started off with a soft brush and air compressor to get rid of the inch of dust and thousands of leaves in every orifice of the car.
Followed by a good wash and rinse down.
The chrome is in pretty poor condition in parts, some will recover with 0000 wire wool and autosol, other parts will need to be rechromed.
I found some rust inside the passenger door, which hasn’t come through, so that will need to be attended to fairly quickly.
There is also some rust in the RHS floor, not sure how much as yet, but I’ll get the interior out and have a closer look next week.
Barn find Series 2 XJ12
