XK150 Head Color

John: Thanks, John. I am doing a little freshening up under the bonnet of my 150 FHC and will be asking these niggling little questions from time to time. I appreciate being able to tap into that fantastic pool of knowledge that exists at your end. - Regards, Bruce Baysinger P.S. The Broad catalogue states that the 3.8 two carb heads were painted a metallic blue. Correct

Bruce, 3.8 std heads according to Porter were metallis dark blue. Anyone else care to comment? There are not that many such cars. - Regards, John Elmgreen

Steve Kennedy, I believe that you did some research on this and published an article in the Jaguar Journal. Do you have any new information on this? - Regards, Dick White

Us saloon lovers are familiar with 3.8 std heads; They are definitely dark blue, I don't know about the metallic part since it is painted on bumpy aluminum and the gloss of the paint tends to look sparkly anyway. I know the 3.4 std head paint (that green that is called duck's egg blue) is not metallic. By the way, I'm a new lurker on the xk-lovers. I own a Mark 1 which is undergoing a slow restoration. See the jag-lovers home page, Mark 1/2 section for a write up. My next project will hopefully be an XK-120, hence the lurking. So you may not hear much from me unless there is a question that relates to XKs and Saloons. RE: Driving in England. I've been over twice, renting RHD stick shift cars both times. I made a point not to drive in London, if I could avoid it. The only thing that gave me any problem, other than walking to the wrong door, was right hand turns. For the first couple days I had a tendency to end up on the wrong side of the road if there wasn't any traffic coming at me. Roundabouts were great because everything was a left had turn, so no confusion. If I was in a LHD, I think I would want a co-pilot because, being on the left side would have made it even harder for me to remember to switch side of the road. The co-pilot's job would have been to just keep repeating, "left side of the road, please." I wish slower American drivers would keep the outside lanes of freeways as well as British drivers do. Everyone have a great time at XK50! I envy you all. - "Mark 1" Mark Stephenson, 1959 3.4 Litre Saloon

I had an original 61 3.8 150 dhc, and as I remember, the head was metallic blue, but not a dark blue as I recall. Hope I can be of help to you. - R. Basso

If you have any questions or comments send e-mail to: ted@jag-lovers.org
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