If It is not an exotic ? Then is it a SUPER CAR

 

To me, my wife's XK8 is not exotic. It is, however, upscale. And rather rare in our neck of the woods....

The XJ220 is truly an exotic....

 

Recognizing spin, caveats, and subjectivity, I'd venture the guess that the 2000-2006 XKR (and the earlier release in USA XK8) at least early on met criteria for exotic car save for exotic car pricing. Yah, $80k in the day hardly was chump change and yeah today Hyundai is offering 400 hp, but in year 2000 being faster than many Porsches, having timeless (trumping overwrought supercar) looks, and possessing exclusivity that trumped $100k+ Mercedes and such (10k total XK8/R coupes brought to USA vs 750k Lexus LS, etc), made the darn thing a super car for the masses, if such a thing is not mutually exclusive. Certainly it provokes thought

 

The XKR is exclusive, when released had a price tag that priced it too high for most people, is fast and beautiful but the word exotic just does not seem to fit. My business partner drives a 2004 Maserati 4200 Cambiocorsa Coupe. It has specs similar to my 2002 XKR Coupe but I would consider it an exotic. About 9600 XKR coupes were made and about 4500 were shipped to the US. Of these less than 4000 are probably on the road today. They made, total, about 4000 4200 coupes, of which less than 1000 made it to the US. But numbers do not tell the whole story. I consider my XKR coupe a high end luxury sport grand touring car. It is very comfortable, has many amenities, and even in sport mode is easy to drive. When my business partner switches his Maserati to sport mode, he leaves rubber and smoke when he hits the accelerator. These cars, when new, were within $4k in price, and while both are considered GTs, are very different cars. I like his Maserati but would have never bought it (just not my style) but I wouldn't trade my XKR for a dozen Maseratis.

Mark

 

I think I like the definition of how often people have no idea what kind of car it is. Is it exotic because it's known to be or because it's not known, maybe not recognized at all.

mjw

 

Perhaps the upshot of this thread is that "exotic" is ill-defined in this context

 

Here you go:

Exotic Cars Spotted on the Streets - ExoticSpotter.com

Most Exotic Cars & Car Makers in the World: Top 10 Hot Cars List

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note that the second website has Jaguar in the list to the right hand side of "popular supercars". In the Jag link it has some nice history,etc.

 

Can't resist here's another page:

Jaguar XK8 Crashes, Wrecks, Pictures

 

I had an exotic car moment last night. Walked out to my car, valet had it parked out front. All I could say and smile was "dude thats my car". She looked great, Top down flourescent lights refelcting on it. Good feeling.........


I really want some louder exhaust.

 

According to my insurance company it is.

 

XK8/XKR are like entry level exotics....

 

EXOTIC = RARE + QUALITY + EXPENSIVE as a combination.

1. RARE on its own does not merit EXOTIC. A green K-car with pink interior may have been available and extremely rare ...but certainly not exotic. Bentley's in Dubai vs in rural Nebraska indicate importance of location.
2. QUALITY, not exactly reliability, but a least a high degree of fit & finish. If reliability was the scale then all Italian makes and a bucket load of the rest would fall off the list.
3. EXPENSIVE... I'd ballpark a value new first year price equivalent of today at 100K . You can pay more, but gold plating a turd still makes it a turd!

In short, most areas other than a few high end locations North America would look at a nice XK8/XKR as an exotic. Also the fact that when new it sold a crapload of posters & was front page news for years.
My 2cents
Cheers
TheCounty

 

Exotic?
Super car?
Muscle Car?


Which one.


I think in 2000 (my car) it was an exotic/super car.

By 2012 standards its a luxury car/GT cruiser

 

I think a part qualifier to be "Exotic" that has not been mentioned is hand built or portion thereof. I don't know how much the Jag is considered hand built, but I believe many of the so called exotic cars are hand built to at least some degree or percent. Anybody know where Jag would fall in this catagory?