I will start by saying that I have not worked on anything British before....I build Jeeps for a living. That being said, a friend called me up to see if I would build his wife's 1974 Jaguar XJ12 that they covered up in the barn 23 years ago for her birthday. Being that I am the only person he trusted to do the work, I said yes, and I am working for him. The car is a bit of an unusual build (very cool though), and I would like to get some info on parts ability to swap from year to year before I start a build thread on here. The car was nice, the interior is red...and no rips, with the exception of mice have made homes in it for the 22 years it was in the barn covered up. I will most likely have to trash it, unless someone here wants it for free in the next few days, before I get rid of it....I cannot take a chance that there will be a smell in the car once they get it back. I will need to find what years interiors fit this car, because I need to replace it with another interior. A local junk yard has a few that I can piece together, but they range in years up to the late 80s, and I do not want to get parts that need major fabrication or customization, that will end up costing more than replacing with aftermarket upholstery. Thanks for a great site.....I have been lurking for a few weeks learning alot...and becoming quite interested in getting a Jaguar for myself.

 

I wanted to add something to the post, but I guess I have to reply as I could not find the edit button....what would the drive train be worth out of this car. It was not locked up, clean, V12 automatic 4 strombergs, 66,xxx miles on it. They wanted to go a different route (and no not a V8, or another Jaguar motor...I will get to that in another post once it is all complete).

 

An abandoned V12 and transmission is not going to be worth very much, frankly; only a few hundred dollars at most.

For interiors, I think the seats front and rear are common to all, but the dash and instruments differ. Series 3 cars from 1979 will have different trim due to the body shell changes.

 

Even with the different trims, do the lines match up? I do not are about mounting holes and such, just that the lines match up...Thanks.

 

Series 1 & 2 have the same bodyshell, but different dash and instruments. Don't forget there were short and long wheelbase versions, except the Series 3 which was only a long wheelbase. AFAIK, seats on Series 1 and 2s are the same. Most numerous cars are the Series 3s then the Series 2s. Series 1s will be very rare now.

 

Will the series 3 interior (dash and such) fit the series 1?

 

Difficult one, that. The Series 3 shell had the front windscreen slope changed to a more streamlined angle. This meant the dash top had to be extended, with little side trims to cover the side of it, but the dash and instruments are probably the same. With this sort of thing, the only real way of finding out is to try it. Anybody who can tell you for certain is probably dead by now, (or at least well retired).

 

BTW, don't be in a rush to junk a Series 1 dash. It has those wonderful 6" (or is it 7"), speedo and rev-counters, Series 2 and 3 had much smaller ones, not so impressive in my view.