The converters : Lynx Eventer

The handsome Lynx Eventer filled a gap in the market for a top-notch sporting estate, and examples could often be seen at the smarter sporting events.

Step forward Lynx Engineering‘s best-ever car…


Lynx Eventer – an officer and a gentleman

As with the Jaguar XJ-S-based Lynx Spyder, many observers felt that the Lynx Eventer offered a significant improvement to the lines of the original donor car. There was no argument that it offered far greater versatility for, while the boot space was similar to that of the standard car with the rear seats in place, it increased to some 39cu ft when they were folded, with the large rear hatch affording excellent access.

Each Lynx Eventer was hand-built to order, and could be based either on a customer’s existing car or delivered as a brand new model. The overall build time was 14 weeks, and each car came with a complete photographic record of the conversion process.

Production totalled just 67 examples over a period of some 16 years, with the final Eventer being built in the summer of 2002, based on a limited-production 6.0-litre Jaguar Sport XJR-S. At the time, the company speculated that either the Jaguar XKR or Aston Martin DB7 Vantage could be next in line for the shooting brake treatment…

Specifications
Rear platform width: 1130mm / 3ft 8ins
Rear platform length (back seats up): 1181mm / 3ft 10ins
Rear platform length (back seats down): 1880mm / 6ft 2ins
Rear door height: 570mm / 22.5 ins
Total loadspace (seats up): 672 cu dm / 23.75 cu ft
Total loadspace (seats down): 1103 cu dm / 39 cu ft

Lynx_Eventer_1983_30

The Lynx Eventer Page 6

Keith Adams
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21 Comments

  1. I’ve always liked these, but I’m yet to see one. How many survive? Anyone know? Who here remembers the Audi Steppenwolf concept, that came along about 20 years later? Its sort-a-kinda similar to this.

  2. What was the bootlid from?

    The XJ estate used one from a Renault 5.

    Very elegant. Similar to the Reliant Scimitar.

    Can’t think of many contemporary shooting brakes. There was that BMW breadvan thing a few years back.
    Ferrari FF too.

    The whole 2 door estate variant has been abandoned, remember you could get Escort 2 door estates.

  3. I really like these, Jaguar should have marketed this car. They could have easily had these coach built by Lynx or even a coach builder with spare capacity and the workforce to convert standard cars, like Tickford maybe. I have seen a few of these cars in the flesh over the years and they look stunning, as if it was always intended to be this way rather than a very clever conversion. The Avon XJ6 estate however is pants, a real mess.

  4. @ Will M.
    I’d forgotten about those Escorts. Kind of cool in an odd way…most have them have been butchered by modders over the years sadly.
    Modern shooting brakes? Does the Volvo C30 count :-)?

  5. I had a 2-door Mk 2 Astra estate in the mid ’90s. Was practical family transport, as it happens. Sometimes forget I even owned it.

  6. It’s an attractive style, the two door sports estate/shooting brake. The Lynx Eventer is a great example.

    I’m sure it could be made popular again – look at the MINI Clubman. Larger cars could have something similar to its extra side door for improved practicality.

  7. Fine line between a hatchback, coupe, shooting brake and estate.

    If the C30 is such, where does the Scirrocco or the Brera sit? The slow selling Hyundai Veloster?

  8. Article says this car was produced from 1986 till 1982, I clearly remember seeing one regulary in about 1979/80 with the registration XJV 53 parked on the green as you enter Hartley Wintney on the A30. I assume this may have been a very early one off and the reg number is still seen locally but now on a VW Passat!

  9. The above example was used by the boss of the American fast food chain International House of Pancakes, awaiting him off his private jet on his UK holidays.

    Or so it would seem….

  10. An elegant vehicle, but never a shooting brake. I do not see grouse shooters putting their guns or their kills in the back of this one. As for driving across the grouse moors in it…… And just a two door? A designer’s dream more than a genuinely useful car.

  11. Any thing that removed those awful flying buttresses is a plus in my view. I did drive one (the coupe) in the 80’s and it was truly magnificent – at the time it had to be one of the quietest ways to travel in an armchair. Never bought one though – it was those blinking flying buttresses you see…….

  12. The Ferrari FF and GTCLusso are probably the nearest modern vehicles to this idea, though with less overhang at the real far less roomy I’d imagine!

  13. This is a really good looking car and the huge boot would have made it ideal for golfing holidays and long trips to Europe. With the Reliant Scimitar becoming old fashioned by the early eighties, the XJS Eventer would have been an ideal replacement and a lot nicer inside. Also a 155 mph estate car would have been unique for the time.

  14. Just in case this column is still seen, the inspiration for the car came from the MGBGT, as both directors at Lynx had at one time or another an MGBGT. For the record, the lower boot lid is the original Jaguar XJS part and the upper was new-made steel fabrication, but using the glass from a Citroen Ami Estate. The side windows were made to a Lynx design by Tudor Glass (I seem to recall) The rear seats were enlarged so that two adults could sit in it, but when folded down gave a 6ft flat floor area. How do I know all this? I was there…. Guy Black

  15. That’s why I find this site such fun – we have a couple of years of speculation and opinion and then some guy rocks up who actually knows the real story! Brilliant!
    Thank you all.

  16. I owned an Eventer for a while, No 37 I think. It had a one piece pressing for the roof (early ones had a weld and the metal work was by Reeves) but still had a vinyl roof. That was to cover the rust …. Lynx never managed to cure that BL Jaguar problem, and actually managed to add some more where the new panels were let in.

    It was a magnificent drive, the back seat folding mech was ingenious and the boot space was huge, if a little coffin shaped. The well was filled with the relocated fuel tank (which trapped condensation and hid more rust). The rear coil-overs had a 1in lift space which helped the stance a little.

    I think the last conversions must have been superb with all the rust proofing, the face lift body, Ford QA, and 20 years of experience.

    I am working on a 1989 XJS Convertible at the moment and even the 7 years between my Eventer build date and this convertible shows significant quality improvements. Alas, the Eventer was sold as spares as it was too rusty to repair…

  17. I am proud to own Lynx 001, THE prototype aka Briar Rose … she was owned by my late husband (apart from Lynx Engineering’s Guy Black), her only owner since 1984 and he left her to me to maintain and look after; she is magnificent and a joy to drive. Sadly a recent, supposedly thorough restoration proved costly and disappointing, however, am slowly bringing her back to full glory. Classic Cars Magazine did a lovely profile on her in August 2022, which I believe is still available online.

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