The Jaguar E-Type is regularly thought of as one of the most beautiful cars ever produced. The Toyota 2JZ-GTE engine is a fabled powerplant, one with internet fame, and is so popular that some people who aren’t car enthusiasts know what they are. So, what do you get when you combine these two giants together? Professional drift racer and car builder Faruk Kugay did just that and created a masterpiece powered by the heart of a Supra. This beauty might be close to custom car perfection.
The world of engine swaps is exciting. There’s always something magical about seeing someone execute a vision by combining parts that weren’t ever really designed to be married together. Sometimes, this means getting to see an epic Smart Fortwo with big-block V8 or a classic Ford Mustang with a Nissan RB26 nabbed from a Skyline GT-R. We love to see cool engines ending up in unexpected places. Matt Hardigree and I were in love at first sight when we saw this 1969 Jaguar XKE 2+2 (also known as the E-Type) powered by a Toyota 2JZ-GTE inline-6. Japanese oil company ENEOS is showing off the build at the SEMA show in Las Vegas this week.
The Builders
While Japan’s oldest oil company is hosting the vehicle, the build is credited to Faruk Kugay, a professional drifter, constructor, and car enthusiast. Check out his bio:
Faruk was born in the small city of Swidnik, Poland. His mother is Polish and his father is Laz, a Turkish ethnic minority. His family immigrated to the United States when he was very young. As he grew up in San Francisco, his father taught him the value of care and maintenance of the family car. A childhood friend took him to Sonoma Raceway and he became hooked on motorsports! He started drifting in 2002. Unable to pursue the sport professionally for financial reasons, he remained close to his passion by helping and working at drifting events. In 2007 he moved to Europe and organized, announced, and judged events as well as taught drifting to others. He reentered competitive drifting as a driver in 2012 to dedicate himself to compete professionally in Formula Drift. In 2014 he earned his Pro 2 license through his local Pro-Am series in Northern California and achieved his Pro 1 license in 2015. In 2019 he was featured in multiple episodes of the Netflix show, Hyperdrive. Faruk also manages Sonoma Drift at Sonoma Raceway, which hosts Wednesday night drifting and December’s wildly popular and ever-growing event, Winter Jam. He has a shop at Sonoma Raceway as well.
Kugay’s website says his main vehicles are a Formula Drift Pro 1 1997 Nissan S14 with a 2JZ-GTE, an Ex-Formula Drift Pro 1 2008 BMW E92 with a 2JZ-GTE, and a 2003 BMW M3 Demonstration Car. It sounds like Kugay loves putting 2JZ-GTEs into whatever he can get his hands on!
Kugay built this Franken-Jag at DevSpeed Motorsports in Sonoma, California. Building the car alongside Kugay was a talented team at DevSpeed including Victor Freire, Jose Varguez, Alexander Forsythe, Luke Wright, Sean McLean, Josh Sher, Seth Lewis, and Dustin Volkmuth. It’s really only the latest bonkers swap to come out of the shop. Last year, DevSpeed presented a 997.1 Porsche 911 GT3 with a Subaru Impreza STI EJ25 engine.
In 2021, the DevSpeed team combined an E30 BMW with a Honda F20C engine. Purists, look away and cover your ears because these hot rod builds do not care what you think.
ENEOS, a company that’s been around since 1888, has been supporting race teams for decades. The company doesn’t just deal with the exploration, importation, and refining of crude oil, but it also supports race teams and manufacturers alongside creating tailored engine and transmission oils. ENEOS is a partner in these engine swap projects built by Kugay at DevSpeed.
The Build
ENEOS says that each of the three builds it’s doing this year has a Frankenstein monster theme to them and this Jag is fitting. However, more than that, this build is also supposed to celebrate 75 years of Jaguar creating sports cars. At the same time, the goal of the build was to update the classic British sports car with modern technology.
A Supra’s 2JZ-GTE engine was selected to honor the build’s Japanese hosts. ENEOS says the engine is representative of the vehicles it has supported as the company has supplied lubricants to Japan’s OEMs for decades. For Kugay, just any 2JZ wouldn’t work, so he decided to dig into his Formula DRIFT roots. Kugay is using the same engine found in his Nissan S14 competition car, a 2JZ-GTE 3.0-liter twin-turbo straight-six found in Supras from the 1990s.
From there, Kugay and the team dumped in a ton of components including a new head casting with Deatschwerks Injectors plus a Nuke Performance fuel system. The engine’s internals are beefed up with CP-Carillo pistons and rods, and the boost is handled by a Borg Warner EFR 8474 turbocharger and a Vibrant Performance Intercooler. Toss in Link G4 Fury ECU for spark and Kugay is expecting the engine to punch out 750 HP once it’s all tuned up.
Kugay and the team built the car to be a street rod and a track monster. After consulting Charlie’s Customs in England, a shop that performed a similar swap, Kugay added an E60 BMW 535i rear subframe, suspension, and differential to the build. That should give the hot rod Jag a good platform to put down the power with. Kugay didn’t stop with robbing an E60 for parts, either, as he also nabbed a ZF five-speed manual transmission from an E36 BMW M3.
ENEOS continues with this awesome Jaguar XKE:
The considerable power increase over the original 4.2L straight-six engine meant the Jag required bigger boots. While the generous wheelbase of the 2+2 helped with the engine installation, the XKE’s slender hips weren’t going to accommodate sufficient rubber to get the job done. Initially taking inspiration from the Jaguar factory’s Lightweight racer, fender flares were designed from a 3D scan taken by Adam Bao at Illumasthetic. Once the proportions were confirmed, his team 3D-printed the new pieces. These were delivered to the crew at Vinny’s Autobody in Sonoma, CA where Ken Heilmann laid carbon fiber to strengthen the panels, Matt Thorsson and Jason Mohon prepped the bodywork, before Vinny Thorsson painted it.
The body was then able to swallow 17” Rotiform STL wheels, which were custom-built in two pieces to achieve the desired width and offset; the design reminiscent of the original E-Type Lightweight wheels. Finally, a set of the new high-performance Bridgestone Potenza RE-71 RS tires were fitted to ensure the Jag was equally at home on the road or track.
Additional goodies in the 1969 Jaguar XKE 2+2 build include front brakes from a 2003 Chevy Corvette, rear brakes from the 2010 BMW 535i, Silver’s coilovers, a custom front suspension, and a cage created by DevSpeed. Basically, this thing is a Jaguar with the heart of a Toyota, the bones of a BMW, the stopping meats of a Chevy, and the soul of a racer.
Best yet? Through it all the team managed to maintain the XKE’s stunning looks. Just look at those voluptuous hips, the side dump exhaust, and the incredible engine bay. This car may be a big middle finger to purity, but it looks like a fantastic time. If you’re going to SEMA this year, which runs from tomorrow to November 3, you’ll find this art piece sitting at booth #24233 in Central Hall. Try not to drool all over it.
(Images: ENEOS)
Came here to complain about the typical ‘huge’ wheels and rubber-band tires, but then realized they’re only 17″ and there’s actually some sidewall. These days that represents some restraint, so I have to give it a pass. The 2+2 version is definitely *not* a looker though, yikes! Long live the straight six in general, and the 2JZ in particular 🙂
These 2+2 body XKE cars are considered ugly not beautiful. As a former XKE owner I an happy they decided to ruin a 2+2 car.
This is about 1 million on the Scoville scale, IMHO.
This would be so much more appealing if it were setup as a street car with full interior than ‘just’ a drift car.