Jaguar Super V8 - Selling an old SORNed car

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Thu 13 Aug 2020 18:07
Jaguar Super V8 - Selling an old SORNed car - Pondlife

I've got a 2003 X350 Jaguar Super V8 which I used to drive but has been SORNed for about a year now.

The car runs fine, but it needs both front door locking mechnisms replacing and it looks a bit of a mess as I removed the driver's door card to work on the locking mechanism.

I'm semi retired now so probably won't drive it enough to make it worth taxing and insuring, hence I'm considering selling it, and I'm wondering what's the best way forward. My options seem to be:

a) Finish off the door locking mechanism work, tidy up any other niggles, get tax, MoT & insurance and sell it in the normal way.

b) Sell it as is to someone if anyone buys cars in this sort of "needs minor work" category without offering silly low prices.

c) Get someone to fix it up then sell it.

Not sure if it's worth the time and cost to fix it up, i.e. whether prices obtainable for option (b) would be much lower than options (a) or (c) after taking into account the time/cost of fixing the car.

Not sure if it's old or desirable enough to be classed as a classic.

I'm in SE London.

Any ideas?

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Thu 13 Aug 2020 18:17
Jaguar Super V8 - Selling an old SORNed car - Andrew-T

As a non-expert, I reckon that good bodywork, proper history and moderate mileage would sell a car of this age. Mechanicals are usually fixable if parts are available. If you pay someone to make it drivable you might want to keep the car, so perhaps fix what you can and see what an ad brings.

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Thu 13 Aug 2020 18:44
Jaguar Super V8 - Selling an old SORNed car - _

I have a friend with a 2007 XF 2.7 diesel which has developed a fault that is expensive to fix, strangely enough also with the keys and door locks, tried a programmed key from ebay which worked, but then other things have happened and the cheapest possible repair is minimum £1000. Bodywork has lots of dings and it has been flogged since he bought it at auction many years ago, so it has gone for spare or repairs..

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Thu 13 Aug 2020 19:55
Jaguar Super V8 - Selling an old SORNed car - Pondlife

Door locks and window regulators seem to be a weak point with early 2000s jaguars - I had to replace these in my old 2000 S-Type as well. I think I removed & refitted every door card on that car to fix the guts inside the doors.

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Thu 13 Aug 2020 19:00
Jaguar Super V8 - Selling an old SORNed car - SLO76
If we’re talking about the supercharged V8 XJR and it’s in good condition with full history then it’s worth repairing and selling. A rough retail price would be around £7,000 and privately I’d try it at £4995Ono if it’s nice, has history and is in full working order with a years ticket. If it’s just a normal V8 then it’s probably borderline and will be hard work to sell on.
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Thu 13 Aug 2020 19:50
Jaguar Super V8 - Selling an old SORNed car - Pondlife

Yes, the Super V8 X350 is a supercharged 4.2 V8 - effectively an XJR with all the bells and whistles.

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Thu 13 Aug 2020 20:03
Jaguar Super V8 - Selling an old SORNed car - _

It is a while ago, but I remember keeping winfow motors and regulators as a stock item for those cars !! and lots of other bits too.

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Fri 14 Aug 2020 09:18
Jaguar Super V8 - Selling an old SORNed car - pd

It's worth fixing. Unless it's mega leggy or tatty these cars have bottomed out and are beginning to rise in value.

I've seen horrible examples with 200k fetch close to £3k in the trade so a nice one is £5-£7k or more all day long.

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Fri 14 Aug 2020 09:47
Jaguar Super V8 - Selling an old SORNed car - John F

These are lovely cars. This flagship all aluminium model was on the shortlist when I was looking for my 'forever car' seven years ago. It seems the current acceptable depreciation for even bog standard newish cars is anything between two and five thousand pounds a year which, as yours will have virtually stopped depreciating, makes it worthwhile repairing it, especially if it's low mileage. That's if you like inherently unbalanced V8s, of course (I don't). And it's old enough to qualify for reduced VED. Repair and enjoy!

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Mon 17 Aug 2020 10:42
Jaguar Super V8 - Selling an old SORNed car - barney100

I'd look into repairing if it's a first car. If it's a second car perhaps not.

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Wed 19 Aug 2020 14:54
Jaguar Super V8 - Selling an old SORNed car - Pondlife

Yes, it's a nice car to drive as it wafts along without needing to be pushed, and although the supercharger is not really needed IMO (a N/A 4.2 would be more than enough), the supercharger cutting in when needed means the gearbox never needs to change down in normal driving.

The ali body is also nice as it means no rust, but it has a couple of small corrosion spots, so it's not completely immune to rust/corrosion.

Not sure what you mean by "inherently unbalanced V8s" though. It's a very smooth car to drive with virtually no vibration - much smoother than my old V6 3.0 S-Type - and it doesn't have that lumpy V8 sound.

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Thu 20 Aug 2020 12:35
Jaguar Super V8 - Selling an old SORNed car - John F

Not sure what you mean by "inherently unbalanced V8s" though. It's a very smooth car to drive with virtually no vibration..

Take too long to explain here - I assume it's a cross plane rather than a flat plane crank. V8s need balancing to make them smooth. Also, because of the uneven firing -exhilarating at the race track but intrusive in normal use - the exhaust muffler has to do so much muffling to silence the burbling racket that it absorbs considerable power. The smoothness comes at a price of reduced power and economy, which in places where petrol has always cost peanuts is not an issue. It was a long time before the luxury marques of Europe adopted the V8 in any great quantity and to my mind their continued manufacture is irrational, especially in the age of the reliable turbocharger.

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Wed 19 Aug 2020 14:39
Jaguar Super V8 - Selling an old SORNed car - Pondlife

Thanks for the info. I thought it might be more like £ 1-2k. It's only got about 80k miles and is in good mechanical condition (just needs the door innards sorted really), so maybe worth spending something on spares to get it back into full working order if it's worth £ 5k+

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