1963 Jaguar XKE Lightweight

As market demand for its road-going products continued to increase during the late 1950s, Jaguar shifted its focus away from competition with a short retirement from the sport. Jaguar had proven to be a worthy adversary, with the Scottish team Ecurie Ecosse claiming its second consecutive victory at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in June of 1957 in a Jaguar D-Type. This gave the sports racer a third straight victory in the endurance contest. The combined efforts of the C-Type and D-Type earned Jaguar five overall victories at the 24 Hours of Le Mans alone during the 1950s.

Content with its accomplishments, Jaguar embarked on a renewed focus on its road-going models. The decision was further reinforced by changes to racing regulations along with a devastating fire at Jaguar's Browns Lane Works in 1957.

The replacement for the Jaguar XK140 was previewed in the E1A development car and the E2A prototype which was raced at the 1960 Le Mans by privateer Briggs Cunningham.

Aerodynamicist Malcolm Sayer applied the principles of aerodynamics to the creation of this new model, known as the Jaguar E-Type (XKE) which was officially introduced to the world in March of 1961 at the Geneva Auto Show. Although introduced without factory-backed racing pretensions, its racing pedigree was evident through, including its double overhead cam engine, a fully independent rear suspension, and four-wheel disc brakes (inboard at the rear) designed by Jaguar engineer Bob Knight. Its purposeful design featured a monocoque central structure/body shell, front subframe, and tilting bonnet.

Although retired from racing, Jaguar understood the importance of competition and the publicity it offered. Thus, several early production roadsters were offered to valued customers with close Jaguar relationships. Success was immediate, with Graham Hill driving Tommy Sopwith's 'ECD 400' E-Type to victory at Oulton Park on April 16, 1961. During its next outing on May 21st at Crystal Palace, Roy Salvadori won in John Coombs' 'BUY 1' E-Type. Coombs soon received limited factory support for his E-Type, which was uprated to competition specification, and regularly driven by Graham Hill.

Low Drag Coupe
As competition quickly gained ground, Jaguar's experimental and competition departments worked in secret to build chassis EC 1001, a thoroughly uprated E-Type race car. It was named the 'Low Drag Coupe' for its lighter and more aerodynamic body. All of the cockpit glass was perspex, except for the windscreen. Beneath the bonnet was a tuned version of the 3.8-liter engine with a wide-angle cylinder head design.

The project was eventually shelved while the development of Coombs' car continued. Hill scored several more podiums during the 1962 season until the arrival of Ferrari's 250 GTO.

Lightweight E-Type
The Ferrari 250 GTO was homologated as a 250 GT with different bodywork. In a similar fashion, an all-aluminum, 'Special GT' version of the E-Type was developed. Beginning with a production 3.0-liter engine, it received a lightweight aluminum block and was tuned to produce 300 horsepower, an increase of 35 hp over the production unit. Early examples received a close-ratio version of the four-speed E-Type gearbox, while a few of the later built examples received a ZF five-speed gearbox.

Initially, eighteen examples were to be built but ultimately only 12 were constructed. Demonstrating the prowess of the new E-Type Lightweight, Ed Leslie and Frank Morrill finished 1st in Class at its March 1963 debut in the 12 Hours of Sebring, followed by four victories in Britain by Graham Hill in the Coombs car. Three examples wore the Cunningham colors of white with two blue stripes when they arrived at Le Mans. Before the 40th lap was completed, two of the three E-Types had returned, and the lone surviving example finished 9th overall and 2nd inc lass.

Although they were the ultimate competition development of the early E-Type and one of the greatest GT-class racing cars of the early 1960s, they were quickly overshadowed by other GT cars. They did find some success in national events, and may have evolved into an international threat had Jaguar continued its development. Many years later, Jaguar Special Operations revisited the project and brought the E-Type Lightweight into the 21st century with the construction of six brand-new examples to original specifications, following one prototype, in 2014. The chassis numbers assigned to this six-car batch (plus one prototype) are the ones that were reserved by Jaguar for the six Lightweights planned but not built during the original production run in 1963.

by Daniel Vaughan | Feb 2006