After trying my very hardest to find fault with the F-Type Coupe, I have to say it’s come out of the fray rather well. The niggles have been mostly down to my individual test car – and that ridiculous spare wheel swallowing up the boot!

The hard top version of the more popular roadster is, without doubt, the prettier car. And because the chassis is stronger than the convertible, it feels better balanced.

Yes, it’s not as entertaining as a Porsche 911 but it is a lot cheaper – and you will turn a lot more heads. It certainly has more soul and character than the German coupe.

Perhaps the  only disappointing aspect is the interior. It just that luxury feel, even with lashings of leather about the place. There is leather, and there is leather.

This is almost a five star car, held back by the average fuel economy and that uninspiring interior…

Having stripped the spare wheel out of the boot to make space for an overnight bag, I didn’t expect the F-Type to have a hissy-fit and start playing up.

I’m not sure a motoring journalist has penned a piece about a flatulent safety belt before so this could be a first. However, the Jaguar seems to have developed an odd, erm, farting noise when stretched out of its holder.

At first I thought it might have been my sweaty armpit. You know the form – cup your hand under your arm and squeeze. The perfect schoolboy wheeze.

But no. The source of the unfortunate sound is the belt mechanism itself. A cool car with a build in fart sounder. Not quite sure Jaguar had that in might with the F-Type but have any owners out there experienced the same problem?

Anybody remember the Mk II Toyota MR2? Apart from having a name that meant ‘shit’ in French, it also came equipped with the smallest luggage space known to man.

I thought those days were long gone – until I opened the tailgate of the F-Type coupe this morning. Wow! That has to be the tiniest boot ever. Smaller than the Toyota in fact.

And the reason is the space-saver spare wheel. It costs an extra £265 but takes up all of the load area. What the cock was Jaguar thinking when they designed that then?

So, I’ve just had to unbolt the spare wheel to fit an overnight bag in a coupe. Remember, there are no rear seats in the F-Type – only the passenger seats offers usable space.

This is quite mad. I know it is possible to specify a tyre inflator kit but are car designed to this level of detail should not be quite so compromised….

There is something faintly disappointing about the interior of the F-Type. It’s not a particular fault of any kind but simply that the interior doesn’t quite live up to the promise of the exterior.

I’ve already stated my claim for the Coupe being far more appealing than the Convertible. In my mind, the beauty of the hard-top does not continue inside the cabin.

And sitting in the driver’s seat now, I can’t actually tell you why! Everything is ergonomically perfect and well-positioned – even the pop up air vents on top of the dash are cool in more ways than one.

There is just a lack of quality feel to the finish. Too much hard plastic, ‘hard’ leather. The F-Type isn’t a tactile car somehow. It doesn’t cosset the driver and welcome you in…

When was the last time you were frozen out of a car? In this age of heated seats, heated steering wheels and engines that start without a manual choke (remember those?) how bizarre that we haven’t invented something to ensure car doors don’t ice up in sub zero conditions.

This morning I woke to find the F-Type was sealed under what looked like a shaking of icing sugar over the top. The thermometer read -2 – which felt more like -10 in a slight breeze.

As I grasped the pop-up handle – very cool in the right way – the door refused to budge. It was stuck completely to the body work. What am I meant to do now?

In the old days, you would pour hot water over a frozen key lock but not sure that;s a good idea with a £70k F-Type. So what did I do? In the end, I took my old Land Rover out instead. Canvass roof, freezing inside but so simple to get in to!

Big regrets? Selling my 1963 Jaguar E-Type! A Series I coupe in dark blue, it was the closest thing to perfection that ever rested on four wheels.

Strangely, my girlfriend at the time hated it. I foolishly fell under her influence and flogged it for the £1,000 more than I had originally paid. Seven years on, it would have been worth three times as much…

Looking back now, the pain isn’t about losing so much money but letting such an iconic car slip carelessly through my hands. Which is why I’ve been looking forward to driving this week’s F-Type for months.

I can tell you now, it’s never going to be an iconic car like the E-Type but at least it borrows some of the curves and bumps. It’s lovely to look at from any angle. I haven’t seen it properly in daylight yet but more tomorrow when the sun comes up…