The Jaguar XK120 is one of the greatest sports cars ever created and one of the most beautiful at that. Introduced at the Earls Court motor show in London in 1948, the XK120 caused an instant sensation. Orders rolling in at a very surprising rate, Jaguar had to think again about the XK120's method of construction. Originally created with a body framed in wood and skinned in aluminum as many of the coachbuilt cars were at the time, they decided to create an all new steel panel construction in conjunction with the Pressed Steel Fisher company. The heart of the XK120 is the fantastic 3.4 liter inline 6 cylinder XK engine with double overhead camshafts running in an aluminum alloy cylinder head, that when placed into the lightweight 120, the result being an incredible power to weight ratio that propelled the XK120 over 120MPH making it the fastest car on the road in the early 1950's.
Many of the most famous race drivers began their careers driving an XK120 such as Sterling Moss, John Fitch and Phil Hill. They were very popular and around 7000 roadsters were produced from 1948 to the end of production in 1954, but there were a select few special cars that stood above the rest. There were a total of 12,055 XK120's built in all body styles; roadsters, coupes and drophead coupes and almost all of them had engines with an 8 to 1 compression ratio. Out of all of these XK's Only 33 cars were special ordered with a higher compression ratio of 9 to 1 and more than half of those were right hand drive for the British market. The XK120 became one of the most popular cars of its time and one of the most beautiful and iconic sports cars of all time and to have one of the select few cars that were special ordered for racing makes it even more outstanding.
This car offered here is possibly one of the most exciting XK120's that exists today. One of the select 33 XK120's ordered with the higher performance 9 to 1 compression 3.4 liter XK engine from the factory. Even better, out of the 33 cars this is one of only a handful that is a factory Special Equipment model with higher lift camshafts, dual exhaust and a lightened flywheel. To go even further this car is the only 9:1 SE with a real factory racing C-Type head with larger ports and even different camshafts than a factory SE! The wow factor of this car is over the top. Complete with its Jaguar trust heritage certificate, this is a matching numbers car with all of its original components. Even the casting numbers on the cylinder head are proper and indicate its real racing C-Type head configuration. Even the tachometer in this car is special with a green colored "red line." Originally finished in cream with a blue interior and a blue top making the history of this car even more mysterious. Our speculation along with Fred Hammond at the Jaguar Archives North America in New Jersey is that this car was most likely ordered by someone significant such as Briggs Cunningham for racing purposes, especially with its colors and special engine. Fred told us that an average Joe could not have walked into a Jaguar dealer or even directly into Hoffman in New York and ordered a car like this. You had to know someone within Jaguar with pull to have had a car like this. Now finished in red with a tan leather upholstery, this car is absolutely stunning. A restoration was carried out around 20 years ago and has since held up beautifully. More recent work since our recent acquisition that has been carried out includes a mechanical maintenance service and new leather upholstery. This is the best and fastest XK120 we have ever had. If you are looking for an XK120 and want to have something that no one else has, this is the car. Contact us today for more information. Asking $140,000
