SA Road Tests

 

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This is the home of automobile road tests in South Africa. We drive South African cars, SUVs and LCVs under South African conditions. It also just happens that most of the vehicles we drive are world cars as well, so what you read here probably applies to the models you can get at home.

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2010 Jaguar XF 5.0 Premium Luxury

Published in The Witness Motoring on Wednesday 9th September 2009

It works. Brilliantly

Jaguar tried in recent years to appeal styling-wise to traditionalists. It failed. It also tried to compete in the mass luxury car market against the likes of Mercedes Benz, Audi and BMW. It failed. Jaguar then repositioned itself as a niche manufacturer of beautiful, fast cars. It is succeeding.

Just over a year after launch, Jaguar has re-invented the XF sedan by introducing some new features and a range of totally new engines. The 2.7 litre V6 diesel has been replaced by a pair of 3.0 litre units while the 4.2 litre V8s made way for newly designed 5.0 litre engines that render it more competitive against others in the automotive jungle.

The car under review is the 5.0 litre naturally aspirated version available locally in “Premium Luxury” specification or, to special order, in “Portfolio” guise. We made do with the Premium Luxury version – oh, how we suffer for our craft!

The 2010 Jaguar XF is a midsize luxury sports sedan available in three trim levels: Luxury, Premium Luxury and XFR. Standard equipment for Luxury versions includes 18-inch wheels, rear parking sensors, automatic headlights, automatic dual-zone climate control, leather upholstery and heated 10-way power front seats with driver memory functions. Also standard are Bluetooth, a navigation system, voice-activated controls and a nine-speaker stereo with a six-CD changer, an auxiliary audio jack and satellite radio.

XF Premium adds 19-inch wheels, front parking sensors, a rearview camera, bi-xenon auto-levelling headlamps, heated front seats, leather-trimmed dash and door trim, wood trim choices and keyless ignition and entry. The Portfolio package adds 20-inch wheels, 16-way driver and 12-way passenger power seats, contrasting stitching, ebony wood trim, a heated steering wheel and a power rear window shade. The latter two items are stand-alone options on other models.

Optional on Luxury and Premium is a Bowers & Wilkins surround-sound system with 14 speakers and HD radio. The XF Premium can also be outfitted with adaptive cruise control and a blind spot warning system

At the heart of it all, variable camshaft timing, camshaft profile switching and variable-length inlet manifolds work together on the naturally aspirated engine to optimise power and torque throughout the rev range. To describe all the technical stuff would require more space than our Motoring Editor allows, so let’s just say that it works. Brilliantly.

Poodling gently through traffic, the car operates in “Jeeves” mode; quiet and gentlemanly. Add a touch of aggro and it changes character, snarling like the animal it is and moving ever more decisively.  Select “sport” on the gear shift and “firm” on the suspension selector and you just might see drivers of other makes mouthing “Mein Gott” as you go storming past.

Space-wise, the boot is huge, rear seat knee room is good and rear headroom is just enough for six-footers. Like headroom, rearward vision is a bit restricted by the coupé styling, but the built in reversing camera helps.

On the move, one quickly appreciates the car’s balance of properties. Those with access to race tracks or possessed of great foolhardiness might find one make faster on dragstrips or another quicker through artificial slaloms, but this XF’s overall satisfaction index or “grin factor” is really hard to beat. It does everything so well.

Perhaps not retro enough for some, with certain features a bit gimmicky, to my mind this new XF captures the spirit of Jaguar-ness as well as can be expected of any modern saloon interpretation. As such it warrants a place on the viewing list of anyone in the market for this class of car.

The numbers

Price: R755 000

Engine: 5 litre, 32-valve, quad-cam V8

Power: 283 kW at 6 500 rpm

Torque: 515 Nm at 3 500 rpm

Zero to 100 km/h: 5.7 seconds (claimed)

Maximum speed: 244 km/h (limited)

Fuel consumption: 11.1 l/100 km (claimed) or 14.2 l/100 km in 500 km of real world testing.

 

 

What We Do

This is a one-man show, which means that road test cars entrusted to me are driven only by me. Some reviewers hand test cars over to their partners to use as day-to-day transport and barely experience them for themselves.

What this means to you is that every car reviewed is given my own personal evaluation and receives my own seat of the pants judgement - no second hand input here.

Every car goes through real world testing; on city streets littered with potholes, speed bumps and rumble strips, on freeways and if its profile demands, dirt roads as well.

I am based in Pietermaritzburg, KZN, South Africa. This is the central hub of the KZN Midlands farming community; the place farmers go to to buy their supplies and equipment, truck their goods to market, send their kids to school and go to kick back and relax. 

So occasionally a cow, a goat or a horse may add a little local colour by finding its way into the story or one of the pictures. It's all part of the ambience!

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