Coming of Age, How Technology is Transforming Car Builds

Twenty-one years have passed since legendary British Touring Car Champion and race car builder Andy Rouse proudly unveiled his bold plan for the future of touring car racing in the UK. It was 2004, when Rouse took the wraps off the Jaguar X Type SCV8 at the Autosport International show with fellow series planner and business partner Pete Hall. Sadly the ‘Brave New World’ of SCV8 racing never came to fruition. The only legacy of the plan was the car itself which Rouse and Hall had ploughed a small fortune into.

The car had been tested by Jaguar F1 driver Justin Wilson in 2003, using a 3.2 Nicholson McLaren V8 engine capable of 550 bhp at Snetterton. Wilson at the time commented “Fantastic, it was very enjoyable and quite entertaining to drive keeping me on my toes throughout the session. The SCV8 provided me with some good feedback which allowed me to push harder and harder each lap.”

Sadly, the series was still born, mainly due to TV rights being sold to ITV at the time for the existing BTCC championship and the Jaguar X Type SCV8 went into storage until, July 2021 when we purchased it at Swallow Racing. 

The plan has always been to do what the car was designed for and race it. The Nicholson McLaren units were rented engines, so the intention has always been to fit a Jaguar V8. Other projects have ‘got in the way’ of making serious progress on the car until the last few months difficult. We always wanted to re-commission the car but sympathetically updated with modern parts where technology has made advancements. Modern ECU with mill spec wiring, suspension, brake compounds, tyres and cooling systems are just some of the items getting 2025 update, however the car is incredibly well built as you would expect and very sound. 

The car made an appearance and created a lot of attention on Meguair’s stand at last summer’s Goodwood Festival of Speed. With its Magnesium OZ racing centre lock wheels refurbished in gloss white.

Critical components such as the Hewland sequential gearbox, running gear, brake system are being stripped down to refresh seals, bearings etc. Maximum efficiency and reduced maintenance to a race car is critical when supporting it through a racing season.

The choice of engine for the X Type, the AJ33 4.2ltr V8, is one have been developing last season in Jack’s X100 championship car. The SV8 car will be fitted with a more tuned version of this engine. 

After appearing at Goodwood, the SCV8 has moved forward in the queue of projects and recently has seen it making progress. As covered previously, a huge step forward for us has been our ability to 3D scan components and spaces to precisely map and design perfectly fitting components before we even get to the prototype stage, saving valuable time and materials costs. 3D scanning is now playing a large part in preparing the car to receive the engine and upgraded parts. 

The design stage was started with a full scan of the underside and empty engine bay to map the available space and give us a rough idea of what can fit where. After selecting the AJ33 V8 a dummy engine was scanned to ascertain mounting points and exhaust manifold mounting points. Sitting the engine as low and as far back as possible is also a key characteristic to the original chassis and something we needed to replicate. Lastly a scan of the front structure was needed to design the cooling side of the vehicle for maximum size cores and feeds for flow to all major radiators and coolers. These new coolers will not only improve capacity but will improve pass rate. We’ll be covering upgrades to cooling and radiators in a future article. 

After overlaying the full engine scan into the empty bay, we can see the choke points, and where light modification of the fire wall is needed, also, critically the available space for mounting. Step one is to design the exhaust manifold as this route is not something that we can change too dramatically. Scientifically speaking, this being equal length with specially designed collectors is just as important as say, choosing the correct cams or fuel system. Once this design is finalised through the tight pathway, we can then look to understand the shape and style of the engine mounts for keeping the engine stable, and low for better centre of gravity and handling.

The final part of the design stage is planning the feed of cold air to the intakes. With a naturally aspirated engine the air and fuel supply is critical to making as much horsepower as possible. With this in mind, we intend to go for individual throttle bodies. Calculating the optimum stack length for the trumpets and clearance of all eight throttle bodies on the firewall was the last step for us to take while assuring a fresh direct cold feed to the engine was supplied via a ‘ram air affect’.

Optimal ambient air temperature for combustion is twelve degrees. A stable supply of cool air is critical to maintain this process and not losing horsepower as engine bay temperatures rise, creating heat soak – killing power.  We can therefore consider a BTCC letterbox style air box flowing to the throttle bodies to bypass any hot engine bay air and maximise combustion. The air-box will likely be made from carbon fibre housing a foam element filter over the trumpets.

We are looking forward to finishing the design phase and fitting components to the car. As the X-Type comes together we will post progress on our social media feeds, so keep a look out. This project represents more than just a recommission—it’s a sympathetic reinvention, a tribute to Rouse & Hall, and a bit of motorsport history. We are bringing the car back to life using modern technology, particularly 3D scanning and modern motorsport parts, down the line this has real benefits and influence on the performance parts we design for road cars.