SENTIMENTAL JOURNEY

THERE’S NO denying the future of the now classic-looking X350 series of the XJ, which is the last in line to adopt its styling cues from as far back as 1968, when the first XJ6 was launched. However, this particular series, launched in 2003, marked a change in Jaguar’s manufacturing – from steel bodies to aluminium – that continued through to the end in the X351.

While the X350 series has all the ingredients to become a future classic when second-hand values will start to rise, Alan Prescott isn’t bothered about such speculation. Instead, he is more concerned with preserving a car that has taken him to Germany and back on numerous occasions and transported him around the UK in style, luxury and with impeccable reliability.

In 2006, he decided to trade in the XJ40 Daimler Sovereign he’d bought brand new in 1990 (he’d previously owned a 1984 Daimler Sovereign); rust was starting to get the better of the bodywork and with second-hand values heading in one direction, downwards, he thought it was