So that changes everything! Where you live, the Jag is just an "old car" !! The vette is something rare and exotic.

 

You didn't mention the E-Type's yr. I ***-U-ME you enjoyed the Joesph Lucas Electrical Syst. as much as I did on otherwise nice cars such as a '64TR-4 & '66Austin-Heally Sprite. AAHHH,,, Mr.Lucas "The Prince of Darkness", how I miss thee!! Hrs under the hood{Bonnet} just to find you have made another visit. Have not the space to share these events but willing to listen to yours. I've seen a Ford 289, Borg-Warner T-10 trans and the fantastic Jag rear gears/IRS mated with great results on this side of the pond.

 

both car's are DEAD SEXY

 

You didn't mention the E-Type's yr. I ***-U-ME you enjoyed the Joesph Lucas Electrical Syst. as much as I did on otherwise nice cars such as a '64TR-4 & '66Austin-Heally Sprite. AAHHH,,, Mr.Lucas "The Prince of Darkness", how I miss thee!! Hrs under the hood{Bonnet} just to find you have made another visit. Have not the space to share these events but willing to listen to yours. I've seen a Ford 289, Borg-Warner T-10 trans and the fantastic Jag rear gears/IRS mated with great results on this side of the pond.

 

You didn't mention the E-Type's yr. I ***-U-ME you enjoyed the Joesph Lucas Electrical Syst. as much as I did on otherwise nice cars such as a '64TR-4 & '66Austin-Heally Sprite. AAHHH,,, Mr.Lucas "The Prince of Darkness", how I miss thee!! Hrs under the hood{Bonnet} just to find you have made another visit. Have not the space to share these events but willing to listen to yours. I've seen a Ford 289, Borg-Warner T-10 trans and the fantastic Jag rear gears/IRS mated with great results on this side of the pond.

 

You didn't mention the E-Type's yr. I ***-U-ME you enjoyed the Joesph Lucas Electrical Syst. as much as I did on otherwise nice cars such as a '64TR-4 & '66Austin-Heally Sprite. AAHHH,,, Mr.Lucas "The Prince of Darkness", how I miss thee!! Hrs under the hood{Bonnet} just to find you have made another visit. Have not the space to share these events but willing to listen to yours. I've seen a Ford 289, Borg-Warner T-10 trans and the fantastic Jag rear gears/IRS mated with great results on this side of the pond.

 

Well, I've owned a '68 coupe and a '70 roadster, both e-types, and they were both hi-maintenance jewels, and both left us stranded far away from home on more than one occasion. But even if they weren't, I'd still prefer my Vette. Much more fun! I wasn't all that impressed with the Jags performance, but I did like the looks (although the wheels should have had a better fit in the wells). I'd have no problems dumping a Jag if it meant free cash to build a street thumping Vette.

 

While the Corvette and the E-type are similar in some ways, they are very different in a few key areas.

E-types simply communicate more with the driver. C3 Corvettes, like most American cars of the era (pre-80s,) simply are very numb -- loose steering, little pedal feedback. C3s feel larger than they are, but man they are fun.

E-types have glorious steering feel, and better feeling transmissions (thank god for the better boxes in the E-types from the nasty Moss XK120 boxes.) E-Types, even my in-law's Series III coupe, feel much smaller than they are, although they always felt nose-heavy.

Strangely, I always felt that the E and the C3 both were better road cars than their predecessors, but not necessarily better "sports" cars. I've always felt more comfortable driving a C2 near the limit, and certainly the XK120 had a much more successful racing career, with E-Types simply being way too heavy to compete.

But to answer the question: if you like it, keep it. Gorgeous cars. Too bad, at 6'4", a Series 1, 1.5 or 2 car simply is a no-go for me.

 

I'd sell it. Although the series 1 is my favorite E-type (even with Uncle Joe doing his best to stop it moving), you've got the "disadvantage" of living by the sea. It'll just turn into a pile of rust over time. Just got back from a holiday in Cornwall & the owner of where we were staying has some sort of Japanese pickup truck. Last year it looked OKish, this year it's full of bad rust holes, not small ones, but the sort you could put your hand through. If a modern *** vehicle with corrosion protection can disintegrate that quickly then an old E-type isn't going to have much chance. We went there in an MGB and after a week (of good weather!!!) it's covered in a fine layer of salt that's been carried inland on the wind. It's not for no reason that us people living inland say "Never buy a car from near the sea, especially the west coast". Sell it while you still can.
Hi Theo, what part of Cornwall are you from? I'd love to live there & had a chance to a while ago. What stopped me? What the sea air does to vehicles there, it kills them. One example is a still, hot, sunny day when we parked our bikes outside the pub at Trebarwith Strand (as seen in the film Saving Grace). We were there for about 3 hours & our bikes were white when we walked back to them, just from the fine sea spray drifting inland. It took THREE DAYS just to polish the engine cases back from the corroded mess they'd turned into (they were polished up like chrome when I parked it) & some parts have never polished up as well as they once were. I thought the road salt used in winter was bad, but the salt blown off the Atlantic is evil stuff, like it's mixed with nitric acid

 

Keep them both. You can never have to many nice cars. I have a 67 jag waiting to be restored. Both are sexy in their own way.

 

Here's an interesting thought...

Sell the E-type and get an S-type R. Enough Chassis and Engine to stomp almost any Vette into the dirt.

 

Hi Paul - I was born in Truro, grew up on the south coast outside a little village called Mevagissey (gotta love Cornish place names!)
Then I moved back near Truro in my early teens and stayed there til coming up to Uni 6 years back.
The sea air issue isn't really a problem around Truro, being as you're right inland - but you're completely right though, the cars last for about five minutes anywhere near a beach!
I try and get back as much as possible, I'd love to get work down there but not sure what kind of thing my engineering training would lead me into. I think "see a bit of the world first", then retire down there with a 6 car garage and a private beach....

 

Lucas..the prince of darkness, I'd sell it

 

Ha! I was there last Wednesday Sitting on the harbour wall watching exactly the same type of yacht as we had sailing out on a choppy sea with a strong wind. Perfect sailing weather. Lucky sods, it's not until you lose something that you realise how much you enjoyed it
We were looking at the local job market down there last week. All that were advertised were jobs for cleaners & carers with ridiculously low pay (k10pa). We were thinking of buying a house a few years ago (Tintagel area), but decided not to as we'd only be there some of the time (no work there) & would just end up letting it out to tourists ie. we'd be part of the problem where the locals get priced out of the area due to inflated house prices caused by people buying to let. That moral high ground was really dumb as house prices have increased so much there that we could have made a huge profit & then lived doing jobs that we actually enjoyed. Yet another bad decision
There's ways & means around Uncle Joe's cantankerous behaviour By using modern componants to replace his stuff the electrical system can be made reliable. I've upgraded some of our MGB electrics &, apart from normal service items, it's more reliable than a lot of friends more modern cars. Whoever restored it before we bought it did a good job mechanically, but the paintwork is abysmal (originally Porsche Guards Red, now pink with nice bloom effects) with pieces flaking off & rust patches popping out all over the place. I think it'll last a year or 2 and then be fit for scrap & worthless, which is a pity as it's a fun car. This is why I think the above E-type should be sold. We live in the warmest part of the country & still can't keep on top of the bodywork problems. If an E-type is getting rust appearing, & is kept on the west coast, then it'll be a rapid slide downhill into serious corrosion. The only way to prevent it is to get a decent paintjob done over the ENTIRE body (no shortcuts or skipped parts that can't be seen) & then bitumen underseal applied over all the inner parts, including those inaccesible places where water collects. That'd cost a lot of money & time to do right (a friend has restored his E-type, getting the body protected was one of the most expensive, pita, parts of the whole restoration. Most paintshops I know are just interested in insurance jobs where they touch up paintwork & make a quick buck. Try asking for a decent, full body job & you're talking big money, or unwittingly dealing with Bodgit & Scarper Ltd). So I'd say sell it & if you really want an E-type then either spend out through the nose on getting it sorted, or buy one that's already been done. Cynical? Maybe, but I've seen so many old cars ("classics") destroyed by rust that I think the only way to go is..... Corvette. They don't rust and fall apart around you