Jaguar C-Type not Jaguar XE?

Is this how the Jaguar XE / Jaguar C-Type will look? Car Magazine thinks so.

It’s being reported that the small roadster/coupe Jaguar are planning for 2012 will be called the Jaguar C-Type not the Jaguar XE.

We’ve reported a number of times in the last year about Jaguar’s plans to build a sports coupe/roadster to slot in below the XK and take on the likes of the Porsche Boxster and Audi TT – the Jaguar XE.

Which all makes a lot 0f sense. The plans are to make the new Jaguar a 2-seater coupe and roadster with a V6 engine. That V6 engine will be engineered by taking the superb AJ-V8 engine and lopping two cylinders off to create a new V6 (probably a bit more complicated than that). That would give Jaguar a new, much more fuel efficient – but still powerful – engine to power the XE. But the car would be engineered to have enough room to take the full-fat AJ-V8 in supercharged form to create an ‘R’ version of the new car.

So far, so good. But Inside Line are now reporting that they have the ‘Inside Line’ on the plans for the new Jaguar. Much of what they say is what we reported on the Jaguar XE back in August last year, but the big news is that Inside Line claim that the XE badge won’t be used, and instead Jaguar has decide to call the new car the Jaguar C-Type.

We bow to Inside Line’s contacts on this. But for us it doesn’t really add up. The original C-Type was in essence the ‘Competition’ race version of the XK-120. So it seems a bit odd to be resurrecting a badge with no real road car history for the new Jaguar. It also doesn’t fit in with the nomenclature on the rest of the range.

Not that that really means anything. The most iconic of Jaguars was the E-Type and – forgetting the S-Type that preceded the Jaguar XF – the 1960s S-Type was a tweaked and refined version of the Jaguar MK II. So there is certainly form for using the ‘Type’ moniker. But with the new Jaguar planned for late 2011/2012 I’m sure we’ll know soon enough.

But we’re still not convinced.