Jaguar F-Pace Crossover FINALLY arrives – price from £34,170

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The Jaguar F-Pace Crossover has finally arrived in production guise at Frankfurt offering a choice of three engines and five trims levels. Costs from £34,170.

It’s been a long time coming, but the new Jaguar F-Pace Crossover (it’s not an SUV, say Jaguar – that’s Land Rover’s job) has finally arrived at the 2015 Frankfurt Motor Show and will come with a choice of three engines – a 2.- litre Ingenium diesel, a 3.0 litre V6 diesel and a 3.0 litre supercharged petrol – and a total of five trim levels – Prestige, R-Sport, Portfolio, S and First Edition.

The F-Pace gets the same aluminium platform as the XE and XF – and sits between the two in terms of size – although 80 per cent of the F-Pace is new, rather than borrowed, with a body that’s 80 per cent aluminium with a composite tailgate, magnesium for the front carrier and steel for the doors.

The F-Pace is also incredibly faithful to the C-X17 Concept, and delivers a higher-riding Jaguar that doesn’t jar too much; despite its blunt front end and high-riding stance it still conspires to look dynamic and appealing and will probably offer a better alternative to the likes of the BMW X3 than the XE does for the 3 Series.

Jaguar will be offering a choice of three engines at launch – the entry-level 2.0 litre Ingenium diesel with 178bhp and 57.7mph, the 3.0 litre V6 diesel with 296bhp and 47.1mpg and the 3.0 litre V6 Supercharged petrol with 375bhp, which can hit 62mph in 5.5 seconds. There will probably end up being a V8 Supercharged version in time too.

The 2.0 litre diesel will come with six-speed manual gearbox and rear wheel drive as standard, but both the V6 cars will get four-wheel-drive and an eight-speed auto.

The suspension on the F-Pace is via double wishbones at the front and integral link aluminium at the back and comes with torque vectoring and optional adaptive damping, with its Intelligent Drive Dynamics 4WD system based on the one in the F-Type which is rear-biased to offer more dynamic on-road behaviour, but Adaptive Surface Response should make it capable off-road if not exactly Land Rover good.

Inside, the F-Pace looks appealing, with, it would seem, plenty of room for five and their stuff, with a standard 8″ Infotainment and an optional 10.2″ screen, instruments delivered by a 12.3″ HD screen, a laser head-up display and a huge panoramic glass roof.

Entry-level Prestige trim comes with leather seats – heated and electric – 18″ alloys, power tailgate, Sat Nav, parking sensors, Wi-Fi and Hill control, with the R-Sport (which costs from £36,670) the Portfolio (from £39,170) and S (from £51,540) adding progressively more toys and plush goodies.

Jaguar are also taking a leaf out of Mercedes book by offering a launch edition – the F-Pace First Edition – with the V6 diesel engine and S trim with added goodies.

The Jaguar F-Pace is now on sale at Jaguar’s UK dealers, although first cars aren’t expected until spring 2016.