Jaguar XF 2.2 Diesel confirmed. Surely not?

Jaguar XF 2.2 Diesel is confirmed for New York. But we don't believe it.

Jaguar has issued a press release saying the Jaguar XF will get the 2.2 litre diesel engine with a debut at New York. Which must be a fib.

A year ago we heard that Jaguar were going to give the XF the 2.2 litre diesel lump found at play in the Freelander 2. So we asked Jaguar if it was true. They said “Speculation…no plans to announce a new engine in XF”.

That’s all right then, we thought. We must have had a bum steer. It happens. After all, why would Jaguar want to build an XF with a 2.2 litre diesel engine, just because businesses up and down the country would find it tempting?

They’d be tempted by the economy of 52.3mpg and sub-150g/km emissions, thanks in no small part to a new stop-start system that works seamlessly with a new ZF 8-speed auto.

Also tempting would be the performance, which would be around 8.5 seconds 0-60mph and a top speed of a far from shoddy 140mph

But none of this matters because Jaguar has “…no plans to announce a new engine in XF.”

We did get a bit confused in October when we had a spy shot of what the DVLA said was a Jaguar XF with a 2.2 litre diesel engine. Can’t be, we thought. Jaguar told us they weren’t doing that.

So we asked Jaguar. But they didn’t answer. So we assumed the DVLA records must be wrong. After all, Jaguar has “…no plans to announce a new engine in XF”.

But it seems it wasn’t just us who were a bit confused. Adrian Hallmark – Jaguar’s new Global Brand Director and a man clearly passionate about his new job at Jaguar – must have read our earlier story about the 2.2 diesel in the XF and got a bit muddled himself.

At Jaguar’s Geneva press conference earlier this month we were just starting to doze when we thought we heard Adrian talk about the Jaguar XF 2.2 diesel. But we decided it was either part of a dream as we drifted off or we’d mis-heard. After all, Jaguar has “…no plans to announce a new engine in XF”.

And of course when we checked through the recording of the press conference Adrian said nothing of the sort. Or at least not in the recorded version. So we knew we must have misheard.

But it seems it’s not just Adrian who’s a bit confused at Jaguar. Someone at Jaguar has issued a press release today talking about Jaguar fitting the 2.2 litre diesel engine to the XF and giving us all the details at the New York Motor Show next month.

So we’ve dropped an email to Jaguar to tell them someone in their office has had a brainstrom and sent out a press release saying the Jaguar XF is getting the 2.2 litre diesel engine. Which is clearly a fib. Because the only other explanation is that Jaguar has been telling us endless porkies for the last year. Which can’t possibly be true.

Because Jaguar has “…no plans to announce a new engine in XF”.