Jaguar-powered Lister Knobbly returns as a road-legal continuation model – costs £295,000

Road-legal continuation models of the legendary Lister Knobbly – a Jaguar-powered 1950s track car – are being built with 10 units available at up to £295,000 each.

It seems the world is short of ‘real’ classic cars, so high-end car makers are busy churning out ‘Continuation’ models to build more classic cars to fill a void in the market. Like the Jaguar E-Type Lightweight.

Now, British Sports Car makers Lister are joining the ‘Continuation’ push with something a bit different – 10 units of the Lister Knobbly which will be road legal.

Using the original chassis jigs – and with three original Knobbly engineers on hand to supervise – Lister will be hand-beating aluminium panels, building new tubular chassis and creating a Knobbly which is, to all intents and purposes, just like the original.

However, to make the Knobbly road legal, Lister are making a few changes, including a collapsible steering column, rollover protection, lights, mirrors and a leather dash.

Power will come from a dry sump 3.8 litre six-cylinder built on a Jaguar block with a four-speed gearbox, delivering a very modern 330bhp which is enough to propel the 787kg Knobbly to 62mph in 4.3 seconds and on to 181mph.

There will be a cheaper option of a Jaguar derived 4.2 litre with 350bhp, but even that – said to be more docile – can crack 62mph in 4.7 seconds.

Lister’s CEO, Lawrence Whittaker,, said:

I am really proud and excited that the Lister Motor Company has succeeded by being the first, and to date the only, specialist sports car maker to engineer and launch a fully road legal version of a racing continuation model.

This is a hugely important step for us, making Lister the first to be able to offer our enthusiastic clients the excitement and thrills of driving a historically significant race car on the road. Our new road legal Knobbly also paves the way for more future road-going Lister models too.

Production of the new Lister Knobbly will start in September – with cars starting to arrive with buyers in June 2018 – with the dry-sump 3.8 litre costing from £295,000, and the 4.2 litre from £225,000.