| D-Type | British Racing Green | ||||
| Open Two Seater | |||||
| Right Hand Drive | |||||
| E2005-9 | |||||
| 1954 | British Racing Green | ||||
| 2008 | Green | ||||
| Rest: Concours | |||||
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168 more photos below ↓
Record Creation: Entered on 20 October 2008.
Database Updates: Show dataplate edits
Heritage Notes
Registered OKV 2
Car Number Prefixes and Suffixes:
- XKC indicates the model is a C-Type or early D-Type.
Car History
From Jaguar Sports Racing Cars by Philip Porter
Second 1954 Works car. 1954 Le Mans, Moss/Walker (race number 12), retired after achieving new record speed on Mulsanne Straight, 172.97 mph. Reims 12 Hours, Moss/Walker, retired. TT/Dunrod, fitted with 2.5 litre engine, Whitehead/Wharton, fifth place.
Refitted with 3.4 engine (E2004-9, which had been fitted, at least temporarily, back in April). 1955 Daily Express race at Silverstone with Rolt driving, 3rd place.
Sold to Jack Broadhead for Bob Berry to race, Goodwood, 2nd place, Oporto Grand Prix, 5th place. With Norman Dewis driving, Goodwood 9 hours, 5th place. Crashed at TT, Dunrod; rebuilt, according to Berry "with a similar integral body sub-frame assembly which was originally built by the factory as a prototype."
In 1956, car was painted a lighter green. Raced at Silverstone, 3rd place. Goodwood, 1st. Heavily crashed at same Goodwood meeting (cartwheeled at St. Mary's) and was virtually written off. 403 was rebuilt, according to Berry, "with spare steel frame and production monocoque. To the best of my recollection all the running gear, ie, front and rear suspension (upon which we did quite an amount of work on our own), brakes (which were the full power system), steering, plus the engine/gearbox assembly, were all transferred from the older car."
Through 1956-1958 continued to be raced by a variety of drivers including Jack Fairman, Ron Flockhart, Peter Blond and cyclist Reg Harris.
In 1958 engine changed at works from E2004-9 to E2065-9. Soon thereafter sold to Gerry Crozier. In 1960 sold, via Chequered Flag, to David Jaycox in Canada. Later owners included George Gordon, James Mace and James Catto between early 1960s and 1980.
During this period, one driver was killed and car was crashed, around 1964, by A. Smith at Mosport Park. In 1980 403 was sold in damaged state to Geoffrey Miller (Canada), and soon thereafter sold to Lynx. Car that was re-imported was to late D-Type production specification with steel frame. In the early 1980s it was rebuilt and sold to James Wallis of Sevenoaks, UK. In 1995 it was sold to Robert Cooper of Gloucestershire, UK.
Philip Porter is the author of numerous books on the Jaguar marque. In additional to writing books and magazine articles and managing several businesses, he runs the XK Club and E-Type club from Worcestershire, England. His latest books include the Jaguar Scrapbook and the Stirling Moss 1929 - 1954 Scrapbook.
© Porter & Porter
Car History
From notes of Terry Larsen
1954
June: Lead team car for Le Mans, driven by Stirling Moss and Peter Walker (car # 12). Set best overall time in practice, led the race and achieved new record speed on Mulsanne Straight of 172.97 mph before retiring.
July: Reims 12 hours, Moss/Walker, retired
Tourist Trophy, Dundrod. Fit with 2 ½ litre engine, Whitehead/Wharton, 5th place
Jaguar factory test car over the winter. driven by Norman Dewis. Refit with 3.4 litre engine.
1955
May: Daily Express at Silverstone, Tony Rolt, 3rd place.
One week later sold to Jack Broadhead for Bob Berry to race (Bob was Jaguar’s public relations manager). Bob referred to it as the “Ecurie Broadhead” team.
Goodwood, Johnson trophy race, Bob Berry, (prepared by John Lea), 2nd place
Goodwood, main sports car race, Bob Berry, 2nd place
Factory fit a new cylinder head.
Aintree, Bob Berry, 3rd place
Goodwood, Bob Berry, 5th place
Oulton Park, Bob Berry, 3rd place
June: Portuguese Grand Prix, Bob Berry. The transporter broke down in route, at Tours, France. OKV 2 was unloaded, filled with all the spares and driven 980 miles across Portugal, Spain and three-quarters of France to Oporto to compete in the race. After the race it was driven the 980 miles back to tours. 5th place
British Grand Prix at Aintree, Bob Berry, 7th place
Two minor race meetings, Bob Berry.
250 mile international sports car race at Oulton Park, Bob Berry. Bob had a fantastic duel with his good friend Masten Gregory in a 3 litre Ferrari. 5th place
August: factory rebuilt the gearbox and rear axle.
August: Goodwood 9 hour race, Bob Berry and Norman Dewis. Car prepared by John Lea and Bob Penney. 5th place
The last big race of the year was the Tourist Trophy race. To prepare for this race the engine was stripped and rebuilt. Bob Berry was teamed with Ninian Sanderson. Berry was 3rd behind Moss and Hawthorn when he clipped the bank at Tornagrough, causing a tire to go down and Bob to go off.
OKV 2 returned to the works for rebuild , including being fit with a stiffer front anti-roll bar and a new anti-roll bar assembly to the rear.
2 minor race meetings, Bob Berry.
Oulton Park, Bob Berry.
1956
Goodwood, Easter Monday meeting, Bob Berry, 3rd place behind Moss and Abecassis. Bob set a new class record for sports cars.
Oulton Park, British Empire Trophy, Bob Berry: after a first class start OKV 2 emerged from the group unscathed and had a lead over Flockhart in the Ecurie Ecosse D-Type. Unable to hold Flockhart off, Bob was able to come in 2nd place.
May: Daily Express Silverstone meeting, Bob Berry, beating both Flockhart and Musy, coming in behind the Aston Martins of Salvadori and Moss. 3rd place overall.
Goodwood Whitsun meeting, Bob Berry, qualified on the pole with fastest lap time of the day and led from flag to flag winning by 23 seconds over second place car. 1st place in class and 1st overall.
Oulton Park, Bob Berry, 1st place.
Goodwood Whitsun 100 trophy race, while leading Flockhart, Hawthorn and Chapman, Bob had a shunt at Fordwater. OKV 2 returned to the works for rebuild and was finished in time for the September Goodwood meeting later that year.
September: Goodwood meeting, Bob Berry, 6th place.
Snetterton 25 lap sports car race, Bob Berry, 5th place.
Oulton Park for the second Lancashire and Cheshire car club meeting:
- scratch race, Bob Berry, 1st place
- 1st handicap race, Bob Berry, 3rd place
- 2nd handicap race, Bob Berry, 4th place
- 3rd handicap race, Bob Berry, 6th place
Bob Berry was considered one of Britain’s best up-and-coming drivers and had much success with OKV 2.
1957
March: according to works records OKV 2 was fit with a full-lenth screen, passenger door, modify drivers door, and fit with a wiper motor.
March: Snetterton sports car race, Peter Blond, 2nd place
April: Forex sports car race, Ron Flockhart, 1st place
October: Oulton Park meeting, Bob Berry, 1st place
JDC sprint meeting, Staverton Airfield, Glos., Bob Berry.
Continued to be raced by Jack Fairman and Reg Harris. Engine # E2065-9 fit by the works.
OKV 2 was the most actively raced D-Type of the 50s and raced by 10 works drivers: Moss, Walker, Whitehead, Wharton, Berry, Dewis, Blond, Flockhart, Fairman, and Harris.
1958
April: factory replaced engine E2004-9 with E2065-9.
May: factory fit new gearbox.
1960
August: sold to Gerry Crozier.
1961
Advertised March in Motor Sport magazine for sale by The Chequered Flag in England for 1,850 pounds.
Purchased by David Jacox (who was to become President of Pacific Western Airlines) for his son. Apparently his son did well in some local drag races and acquired a few too many speeding tickets, which contributed to his father’s decision to sell the car.
1962
April: advertised in April issue of Road and Track for sale for $5,500.
A friend of davids, Jim Baker, (who was a mechanic for the Ecurie Ecosse team) drove the car to Pett and Thompson motors in Toronto to sell for David. I have a letter dated May, 1962, from this dealership to Chris Phillips of Ontario offering him the car for $4,000.
May, 1962: OKV 2 was purchased by Jim Catto of Ontario and had it prepared by a young, ex-patriot english mechanic named Alistair Smith. Alistair raced it at Mosport Park, June 1, 1963. Unfortunatley he had an accident and was killed. Damage to the car was not major and it was driven back to the pits. I have several photos of the car after the shunt. The car remained in storage for the next 18 years.
1980
Purchased by Godfrey Miller (Canada) and sold to Lynx Motors, England. Lynx restored the car and sold it to Jim Wallis (Sevenoaks, UK). All damaged panels were metal finished. There were no panels or major components replaced. Jim used the car occasionally for club events and in 1995 Robert Cooper (Gloucestershire, UL) bought the car. Robert also used the car sparingly (including the Jaguar factory cavalcade to Le Mans in 1996 and 1997).
1999
Purchased by Terry Larson whose first drive in the car was racing at the Goodwood circuit. Used in many tours and raced several times including in the Monterey Historics. It was driven by Norman Dewis in the monterey historics twice.
All major work done during this cars life was done by the factory. As it sits today it is very original to the factory rebuild in 1956.
Chain of Ownership
- 1954 Jaguar
- 1955 Jack Broadhead who had works drivers drive the car for him
- 1960 Gerry Crozier
- 1961 David Jaycox, Canada
- 1962 Jim Catto, Canada
- 1980 Godfrey Miller, Canada
- 1980 Lynx Motors, England
- 1981 Jim Wallis, England
- 1995 Robert Cooper, England
- 1999 Terry Larson, USA.
Additional Items Collected with Car
- Spare freshly rebuilt engine. Both engine blocks are works blocks and each one has an “RAC” stamp, which indicates it did well in a race, was inspected by the RAC to make sure it complied with the rules and passed inspection.
- Several notebooks and files with lots of factory documentation, photos, ads when the car was for sale, original bill of sales, etc. include:
- 1954 lemans factory entry papers
- Over 100 period photos
- Over 100 pages of factory documents and test reports. Norman Dewis used this car over the winter of 54 (after Moss raced it at Le Mans) as a test car and gave me copies of all his records.
- One large 3 ring binder 3” thick has numerous photos in clear sleeves from Le Mans and other period races. Norman Dewis has written on the clear sleeves the names of the people in the photos. Nobody else today could do this.
- There are several photos of Norman racing the car 50 years after he raced it at Goodwood.
- Several magazine stories about this car.
Terry Larson is an internationally recognized expert on Jaguar works racing cars, and operates a restoration and sales office specializing in these cars from Arizona. His web site is terrylarson.net.
© Terry Larsen.
Photos of XKC403
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Exterior Photos (26)
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December 2009:
Interior Photos (11)
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October 2008:
Action Photos (99)
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October 2008:
Details Photos: Exterior (4)
October 2008:
Detail Photos: Interior (4)
October 2008:
Detail Photos: Engine (16)
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October 2008:
Detail Photos: Other (9)
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Comments
Feel free to leave comments about this particular car. (Report problem posts here.)
2008-10-26 02:51:28 | Roger writes:
Many thanks to Terry Larsen for the excellent photos--period and current--of this machine.
2008-10-31 03:21:21 | Roger writes:
Note, all photos credited to the "Terry Larsen collection" may also be credited to:
Corsa Research
Ludvigsen Library
GP Library
Ferret Photos
JDHT
Terry Larson
2009-02-03 00:20:46 | Anonymous writes:
reported to have recieved XKD 556 Engine n° E2065-9
XKD-556 1957 tested at MIRA; destroyed in factory fire same day; dismantled for spares; 1958 engine fitted in XKC 403
2010-09-08 15:01:38 | pauls writes:
Car participated at CSRG Season opener, Infineon raceway April 9-11, 2010. Driven by Dean Meiling.
www.sportscardigest.com/csrg-season-opener-at-infineon-raceway-report-and-photo- ...