Some Assembly Required – Preparing for Concours Competition

The basic restoration of my 1963 Jaguar Etype FHC is complete! As discussed in my previous article Final Assembly, I have spent the time since the beginning of the year finishing up small but important details on my car. At this point, I am preparing the car for concours competition. The car will be campaigned in the Jaguar Club of North America (JCNA) Concours d’Elegance. Complete rules can be found on the JCNA.com website under the Concours tab. Included there is an extensive rulebook, which goes into great detail regarding every aspect of the JCNA concours program. As stated in the rule book, “The foremost purpose of the JCNA Concours is to encourage the owners of Jaguars to preserve, maintain, and present their Jaguars in as clean and authentic condition as possible.” There are several basic categories that a car can be entered in, including Driven, Champion, and Special. The Champion class is the most rigorous and the one that I will be entering my car in.

As I have discussed in many previous articles, the restoration of my car has had the goal having the car be as authentic as possible. For example, one of the last things I did was apply a small decal to the face of the speedometer that warns the owner how to correctly reset the trip odometer. These are the types of things that would typically be removed on a new car once the owner understood the process. Fortunately, the aftermarket reproduction parts scene for the Etype is quite strong and I was able to obtain the decal from SNG.

And so it goes. A restoration may never be truly finished! In the Champion class, it is normal to trailer your car to the concours event. I am certainly doing so and discussed the acquisition of a trailer in my last article. This will allow me to spend quality hours before the show cleaning the car, such that I can roll it out of the trailer and onto the show field with minimal prep work on site. I recently spent some time evaluating the loading of my car into the trailer. The exhaust system on an Etype is very low to the ground and I was rightfully worried about “high centering” the car as it was driven up the loading ramp of the trailer. With the trailer level and the ramp in its normal position, the exhaust would have hung up. I found that by extending the trailer jack, which put the tail of the trailer down, and putting minor sets of wood blocks under the ramp, there was sufficient clearance. This all made me nervous, as you never know what conditions you might find unloading at an event. I decided to install a winch in the trailer with a remote control so I could carefully ease the car in and out of the trailer while observing clearances. I got the car loaded into the trailer and used my race car scales to check the total trailer weight and the tongue weight. The tongue weight can be fine tuned by the placement of the car fore and aft in the trailer. I attached my tiedown straps and took my new rig out for a test drive. Everything seems to be working well. I also purchased and installed a nifty wireless camera that will allow me to see what vehicles are in the substantial blind spot behind the trailer.

By the time you read this, I will have attended my first show, put on by the Jaguar Club of Florida. Having been the past concours chair for the Carolina Jaguar Club, I know that a lot of time and expense goes into hosting a “sanctioned” JCNA concours. I do appreciate the various clubs on the east coast that still make the effort to hold sanctioned concours events and encourage them to continue to do so. In my next article, I will hopefully be able to talk about my outstanding results!