Flawed but Awesome: Jaguar’s XJ220 Supercar is 25 Years Old

The Jaguar XJ220 started out as a concept car displayed at the Birmingham auto show in October 1988. Jaguar was riding high, having won Le Mans in June and only four years into what turned out to be a short interval as a fully independent automaker after nearly 20 years under British Leyland and its predecessors.

When the production model arrived in 1992, it had undergone a massive transformation. The Jaguar XJ220 had lost its all-wheel-drive system in favor of rear-wheel drive, and the V-12 was replaced by a turbocharged V-6.

Development work was mostly handled by engineering house TWR, which simultaneously proceeded to create its own XJR-15. That supercar (foreground in this photo) got the engine the XJ220 was missing: a race-bred V-12. Its chassis was derived from TWR's Group C racer that won Le Mans, and the entire package was more compact, if less roomy inside.

With exposed headlights, an XJ220 in action: At 194.1 inches long, 79.1 inches wide, and 45.3 inches tall, it is a huge car even 25 years after its market debut.

Conceived in the 1980s and executed in the early 1990s, the Jaguar XJ220 is one of the last supercars unbridled by excessive regulation. This car was developed exactly as the engineers envisioned it, with minimal interference from the bureaucrats. In a 1993 road test, we reported a zero-to-60-mph time of 4.4 seconds. It ran a standing quarter-mile in 12.4 seconds at 121 mph.

It never reached the 220 mph Jaguar aimed for, but it came close: A Jaguar XJ220 can achieve well in excess of 200 mph. It claimed a Guinness world record in 1993 as the world’s fastest production car at over 217 mph (with its exhaust catalysts removed and the rev limiter bumped up). Today, Jaguar claims the more modest 213 mph it achieved in its unaltered state when citing the XJ220 as the fastest car it has ever put in production.

Besides the original wheels, Jaguar offered these more classic performance wheels. The tire situation is favorable: Both Bridgestone and Pirelli developed brand-new tires for this supercar in 2016.

The turbocharged 3.5-liter V-6, named the Jaguar/TWR JV6, produced a whopping 542 horsepower and 475 lb-ft of torque, mated to a five-speed manual gearbox. Two catalytic converters were standard.

Classic in style and clad in leather, the interior sported a considerable number of primary and auxiliary instruments. It’s not a typical Jaguar interior, but it befits a supercar of its era.

Basing it on the XJ220, Jaguar and TWR built the XJ220C racing version. The racing history of the XJ220 has its ups and downs; a run in the GT class at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 1993 saw the Jaguar finish two laps ahead of the second-place Porsche, but it ended in a controversial disqualification. The authorities complained that it had run without its standard exhaust system’s catalytic converters.

When Jaguar and TWR found themselves with more cars on hand than they had buyers awaiting delivery, a brilliant scheme came together: a one-make, made-for-television racing series that would raise awareness of the XJ220. Oddly, though the car was not certified for sale in the United States, the TV show was an American production. Ten cars were delivered to the Indianapolis headquarters of TV producer Terry Lingner, who put together a series of races to be driven by big-name, championship-winning pilots, all over 50 years of age. Fast Masters, it was called, and the races were telecast on ESPN’s “Saturday Night Thunder” slot. The biggest misstep here was the venue: Indianapolis Raceway Park, a 3/4-mile oval converted into a “road course” by the addition of what amounted to a big chicane, a left-right-left series of 90-degree corners. Originally, the idea was to run two 10-lap heats, one on the oval and one on the “road course,” and then a third, 12-lap finale with six laps of each layout. The driver names were, indeed, big, and they were drawn from all corners of the racing world. Participants included Bob Akin, Bobby and Donnie Allison, Buddy Baker, Derek Bell, Bob Bondurant, Vic Elford, Walker Evans, Gene Felton, George Follmer, David Hobbs, Paul Newman, Benny Parsons, Henri Pescarolo, Brian Redman, Rodger Ward, Bob Wollek, and, well, the list goes on . . . that’s just about half of it.

It was an embarrassment to all parties, now preserved for history on YouTube. Putting nine or 10 of the oversize 200-mph Jags on such a short, tight track with aggressive drivers well past their prime turned out to be a recipe for an expensive crash fest marked by more yellow flags and race stoppages than real racing action. After the first round, subsequent races were divided into a pair of eight-lap heats, both on the “road course” configuration, with only four or five cars in each. This pared down the carnage and repair costs without appreciably raising the entertainment value. After five events, cumulative points determined participants in a sixth championship round, which saw Bobby Unser, then 59, emerge with the series title and a $100,000 payday. Lingner tried to have Fast Masters renewed the following year, but 1993 was the one and only occurrence of what became known among wags as Crash Masters. It may have been poor publicity for the XJ220, but at least it was telecast in a market where you couldn’t buy the car anyway. — Kevin A. Wilson

The Competition model, in turn, inspired a roadgoing model called the XJ220S, pictured here. Six units were built.

The Jaguar XJ220S was lighter and less luxurious than the road car, and the covered headlights were replaced by fixed units. Shown here is the TWR logo, which stands for Tom Walkinshaw Racing.

Placed next to each other, the XJ220 and the later XJ220S spinoff show off their similarities and differences.

Jaguar continues to support the XJ220 for its faithful owners, although such support doesn’t come cheap. Prices on the supercar haven't quite kept up with those of the cars it was built to compete with, the Ferrari F40 and the Porsche 959.

Taking out the powertrain gives a good glimpse at the aluminum chassis of the XJ220. It was extremely forward-looking for its day, which helped keep the supercar’s weight at a claimed 3241 pounds —impressive given its huge dimensions. Our road test of a car as equipped for the Fast Masters racing series reported an even lighter 3172 pounds.