Published:
8 May 2020It was a contentious decision when Jaguar introduced a four-cylinder engine to one of its sports car ranges three years ago, but also a pretty smart one if you consider that, by doing so, it gave itself permission to keep dropping Bridgend-built supercharged V8s into at least some F-Types.
An element of uncertainty still surrounds the future of this mill, with the Ford plant that makes it set to close in a matter of months and only unconfirmed rumours that the line is to be moved to Jaguar Land Rover’s Wolverhampton engine facility. We’ll put a pin in that for now, however, and just trust that the right decision will be made – because few production engines mix bombastic audible charm with brute strength to such spectacular effect as this one.
It gives the F-Type a multiplicity of roles to play: the sports car, yes, but also the burbling hot rod and even the supercar-scalping point-to-point giant-slayer at times.
The car’s outright performance level is pretty monumental, although this isn’t like a modern turbocharged V8: it needs plenty of revs before hitting maximum reheat, so the F-Type R isn’t a car that’ll take off in a high gear quite like a big Porsche or Mercedes-AMG. At times, if only when you make those kinds of comparisons, it feels just a little lazy and unresponsive from around 2000rpm and the gearbox has to work that bit harder in kickdown to make up for the shortfall.
