Jaguar Land Rover sets up facility for £7 million

Jaguar Land Rover has opened new £7million (Rs 51.61 crore approx.) Classic Works headquarters in Coventry, which it describes is “the heart and soul” of its fast-growing global business of restoring, maintaining and selling old vehicles. Classic Works will be supported later this summer by the opening of another new classic cars facility in Essen, Germany.

JLR's classic cars business, set up around a year ago, chiefly operated from the old Browns Lane factory in Coventry, England, till now from where the company has already produced a limited run of “continuation” Lightweight E-Types. Nine XKSS models are next in line.

Tim Hannig, director, Jaguar Land Rover Classic, describes Classic Works’ core mission as being to improve, restore and support older Jaguars and Land Rovers, and to find and restore vehicles it subsequently sells to new owners under a Reborn Legends programme. Last year Hannig announced a plan to rebuild Land Rover Series 1 and two-door Range Rover models for sale, and expanded his offering this year to embrace an initial batch of 10 Series 1 E-type Jaguars.

The new facility also seeks to support repair, restoration and maintenance of models currently out of production by selling almost 30,000 parts and lending various services.

“Classic Works is hugely important to Jaguar Land Rover,” says special operations MD John Edwards. “It’s much more than a building. It is the heart and soul of Jaguar Land Rover Classic for our clients worldwide."

JLR has announced Le Mans winner Andy Wallace as the new classic chief test driver. According to our sister publication Autocar UK, models at the top of the new workshop's priority list include Land Rover Series II and IIA (1958-1971), Land Rover Discovery 1 (1989-1998) and Range Rover P38A (1995-2002) among others.