With 550 British stallions and 502 lb-ft of twist coming as standard, the supercharged 5-liter V8 propelling the Jaguar F-Type R Coupe is what petrolhead dreams are made of. But does that suffice for the tuning world? To be blunt, not exactly.
A prime example of that hunger for more ponies is what Texas-based Hennessey did with the British feline only recently. We can imagine founder John Hennessey taking an R Coupe for a test-drive and telling himself afterwards "It needs more oomph!" Keep in mind this is the full-on V8 variant, not the semi-skimmed 3L V6 we reviewed a while back.
That may or may have not happened, but the fact is that somebody from HPE deemed necessary to squeeze more power than what the 5-liter engine boasts with in factory specification. That's how the Jaguar F-Type R Coupe got its HPE600 tuning clothes on. Mind you, the elegant black exterior finish and black-painted alloy rims are completely standard.
In essence, this tune job is all about the grunt
By upgrading essential stuff like the supercharger pulley and intercooler, as well as a bit of software tuning for the engine's electronic brain, Hennessey Performance Engineering got this two-door coupe kitty up to 623 horsepower (518 ponies at the rear wheels) and 568 lb-ft (770 Nm) of torque.
Pretty impressive stats, but not quite as impressive as the 0 to 60 mph (96 km/h) run, which comes in a blistering 3.5 seconds. To boot, the quarter mile is dealt with in 11.4 clicks at 126 mph (202 km/h).
Considering the 707 HP Dodge Challenger SRT Hellcat is capable of doing that in 11.2 seconds with factory-installed super sticky Pirelli rubber, that's quite a fast Jag, alright, and a heavy smoker as well.
After a 1:43 scale model of a Ferrari 250 GTO sparked Mircea's interest for cars when he was a kid, an early internship at Top Gear sealed his career path. He's most interested in muscle cars and American trucks, but he takes a passing interest in quirky kei cars as well. Full profile
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