Sold Broadsword's Blower Jag

[Ohdearme]

Excellent purchase, XJ308 xjr is still the ultimate sleeper barge for me. Always said I';d own one...didn't expect to achieve this via roffle though. (nudge nudge)

[Isaac Hunt]

Headlining - try this trick. Masking tape it into position stretched - use as little as possible. Buy a big can of cheap unscented hair laquer. Leave the doors open and I'd recommend a mask and goggles and give the whole headling a light spray. You dont want to get it too wet...leave it half an hour. .repeat3 times. You may need a few additional pins at the edges when you removethemasking tape. Its a botch but should hold up. You may want to cover the interior with an old sheet or plastic sheet when doing this.

That's a new one on me, a proper beuafant job. Try the white head drawing pins instead of mastink tape. When the hairspray lets go you get a prop3r quilted look for maximum shite points. Or, cover the interior well, scrape the old fabric, sponge and glue off and get the white emulsion out for that 'toughbook' type look.

 

Top of the list has to be that arm rest innit, feck me, someone's had their elbows out on that.

[Broadsword]

New supercharger belt arrived today. Got it fitted within a few minutes. Cleaned away more talcum powder so that the new belt wouldn't get ruined. The new belt is different as in it doesn't have the diamond cut pattern, but fits perfect. Test drive revealed no more belt squealing, which is nice. There is still quite a nasty sounding noise, exhaust leak aside. I know there is a small leak at the flexi pipe. I had as good a look as possible at the exhaust manifolds. They look quite tidy including the EGR bit. After all this I decided to disconnect the blower entirely by removing the belt, then listening to the engine once more. Still this nasty noise seemingly from the Vee is there. Video attached. Not quite sure what it is. It has plenty of get up and go and isn't smoking. Videos attached.

 

 

[Guest Hooli]

I recall these have a coolant pipe across the Vee that can only be accessed with the blower off, so get one ordered & replace it while your sodding about as they degrade due to the heat all around them.

[Broadsword]

Yep, I was reading around and noted that. I just had an idea which prompted me to get my torch and go and have another look at the engine in the dark. Looking at the EGR valve there is black gunk all around it, then I noticed there is a loose bolt on there. That might explain the chugging noise if there is exhaust blowing out there. Back for another try tomorrow.

 

Also there was some confusion as I went to check tyre pressures today. No valve stems. Damn. Then I saw a threaded hole in place of on the the bolts holding the split rim part. Lucky for me someone left two valve stem extensions so I can put air in them.

 

Attempted to reprogram non-functional key fob. No joy, further fettling required.

[Guest Hooli]

You on https://www.jaguarforum.com/ ? I've not had much help from there but I did download the X308 workshop manual.

 

Probably the same one Richardthestag gave me on CD, but I got this one at work before the car for lunchtime* reading.

[AnthonyG]

Great buy!

 

Since those wheels are genuine (if rather manky) Jaguar, I’d be tempted to get them looking half decent. You can always see if an owner of the standard XJR is up for a swap for your special edition ones once they look more presentable.

 

As ghosty mentioned, I am confused by the state of the outer rims which look like they’ve got some sort of body filler on them - is it really thick paint or something? Also the one you’ve put a pic up of looks like it’s dented in the ‘8 o’clock’ position - that might need sorting properly if it affects the tyres ‘hold’ on the rim (the technical term escapes me at the moment!)

[Guest Hooli]

I think standard XJRs had 17" rims & the Brembo braked ones have 18"s for brake clearance, so that plan might not work.

[xtriple]

That ticking noise is the VVT things on the end of the cam. Apparently an easy fix?

[Broadsword]

I put the S/C belt back on today once again, then tightened up the EGR valve, and patched a bit of exhaust which was obviously leaking. This didn't really solve the problem. Not sure on my next move I washed the car and got as much mud out the wheel arches as possible. The rust situation is that there is a small hole on the driver's side sill (about the side of a 2 p coin at the rear) and when fondling the back of the driver' side front wing (the bit at the bottom), it just disintegrated. Better at least to have all the crud out and drainways clear. The car failed the last MOT on rust and those bits do indeed seem to have been welded up.

 

I'm not sure this XJR actually has VVT. I read somewhere that the blower cancelled out the advantage and hence it was removed. I'm not sure about that though.

 

Finally my mechanic's stethoscope arrived. I went and drove around to make the strange noise aggravated. By the by the car drives really rather well. The noise is most clear on the waterpump. I might take the ancillary belt off tomorrow and see what that does. I still might be completely wrong and it is simply the exhaust blowing somewhere I can't see.

[Guest Hooli]

You haz PM

[Broadsword]

Thanks Hooli! Now that I have checked the workshop manual I can confirm for reference that this engine does not have VVT. According to the manual, only the N/A 4.0 has it.

[Broadsword]

So running the engine with no S/C or AUX belt does not change the sound of the engine at all. So definitively we can rule out the blower and any ancillary item. The exhaust is not great but I don't think it is the underlying issue barring a manifold leak. I tend not to think that is it either because the noise gets worse with the engine warm. I think the EGR is also ok now that it is bolted to the engine properly. No VVT so no worry there either. Oil looks good but I have no idea what's in it.

 

Out with the stethoscope again. This time I was drawn to the passenger side cam cover. There is a bit about 4/5 the way towards the front where there is quite a clear mechanical clacking noise. I think this bit corresponds to the secondary timing chain tensioner. Also of note is that there is oil seepage from the cam cover on this side so I suspect someone else has been digging previously. It doesn't look like too much of a chore to have a peek at least so I might well do that at some point.

[Exiled_Tat_Gatherer]

Total guesswork of course - but sticking tappet or worn cam? Not to be harbinger of doom - but rounded cam on an old Pinto of mine sounded like that but amplified a thousandfold...... hope it isn't of course

[Broadsword]

Yes absolutely possible and quite possibly the reason the car was cheap. At least if the cam(s) were bad, it would become apparent hopefully with the cam cover off while looking at the secondary tensioner.

[yes oui si]

Great buy!

 

Since those wheels are genuine (if rather manky) Jaguar, I’d be tempted to get them looking half decent. You can always see if an owner of the standard XJR is up for a swap for your special edition ones once they look more presentable.

 

As ghosty mentioned, I am confused by the state of the outer rims which look like they’ve got some sort of body filler on them - is it really thick paint or something? Also the one you’ve put a pic up of looks like it’s dented in the ‘8 o’clock’ position - that might need sorting properly if it affects the tyres ‘hold’ on the rim (the technical term escapes me at the moment!)

Barrels look like they just have thick powdercoat on them.

 

They're nice wheels, but not sure if they suit the Jag; if I had them, I'd spend £200-ish having the kurb marks repaired, then vapour blast them, then powdercoat... Perhaps a bit more to have the lip polished. In good nick, they'd be worth a £600 asking price.

 

I'll go double-check the offsets and widths, but there should be BMW wheels which would fit and improve the looks; probably from the 5 series after the E39.

[yes oui si]

I love being right - a plethora of wheels from the E60 will fit. Your current wheels are 18x8 with an offset of +33 (they sold these with up to 21x10 wheels FFS...)

 

http://www.bmwstylewheels.com/5 - anything tagged as E60 should work, personally I would stick with 18s as the long and low Jag body style makes big wheels seem a bit awkward.

 

I like these, they're quite close to a Jag 'style' of wheel: http://www.bmwstylewheels.com/bmw/129

 

Be wary with that website though - it has user-uploaded photos, so some pages are full of random tits, dicks and drunk Russians.

 

Other than those OEM options, there's a huge aftermarket out there.

[Broadsword]

Thanks for the wheel suggestions. I will come back to that business once the engine has been sorted out. Speaking of which, I believe I have probably found the source of the rattle. I decided to take the cam cover (left bank) off today. There is an excellent video on Youtube telling you exactly how to do the job (both sides). It was a bit of a chore getting the cam cover off (right bank is very easy by comparison), but it went ok.

 

Immediately I noticed there was no tension on the secondary timing chain. Also there was no plastic on the tensioner. It has disappeared and the chain has been rubbing on bare metal (note the groove in there). This is a worry. Where the hell did the plastic bit go? The site is not letting me upload images at the moment, but the video should suffice.

 

 

[Guest Hooli]

Time to take the other side off & check too I'd say. Looks like a good time to fit the mk3 tensioners as you obviously can't trust the ones fitted & the earlier versions are known to fail.

[Jim Bell]

You clacked it manually and it sounded the same. Great mechanical detective work man.

[Broadsword]

Thanks. Pleasing to see my tinkering skills improving. It was a rather satisfying problem to solve. I really need to check the the right bank and see what lies beneath. Luckily the right bank is really easy to access relative to the left. On the left bank some of the bolts are hard to access, getting the dipstick tube clamp bit loose is a nightmare and you have to be very careful not to hit he very delicate coolant lines, which will snap on their connectors. Replacement tension era are “Mk. 3” with a metal body. The ones on the car are Mk. 2 which are somewhat better than the original timing chain setup in 98 which was rubbish. I’m not too disappointed, replacent tensioners are £36 each. I’m minded to cable tie the cam sprockets and loosen one cam to allow me to slide the old tensioner out and slip the new one in. TDC can be found by rotating the engine till the frontmost cam lobes are flat or something like that I read.

[Isaac Hunt]

Excellent to see you making progress.

 

There are some good videos on YouTube, these guys make it look really easy.

 

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=tsYmRl7meFE&feature=youtu.be

 

I would be wanting to push all bolts through a piece of cardboard to keep the order right as opposed to lob them in a Chinese takeaway pot, but whenever method works for you. I've spend to much time with the wrong bolt in the wrong hole.

[Broadsword]

I'm glad I checked the tensioner on the right bank. Turns out it was much worse than the left side, and I was fishing bits of plastic out of the timing cover. Note the tensioner on the right bank is upside down so we are looking at the bottom here. It is really rather broken. So what is needed then are both tensioners and new cam cover gaskets. Should be interesting to see how the engine runs after the new tensioners are fitted. The overall design is really rubbish, AJ16 is a much better unit in this respect.

 

[Exiled_Tat_Gatherer]

A LOT better news than worn cams or tappet messing...... excellent news. Best of luck it sorts it all and leads to a quieter monster under control of your right foot. 

Looking forward to the repair.....

[Guest Hooli]

Lucky you found it as I think the chains slip & lunch the engine if they get bad enough.

[barefoot]

Re exhaust leak/noise.

Mine suffered a blow from the drivers side cylinder bank and specialist diagnosed it as failed catalyst.

He sold me a used one for £90

David Marks in Wilford, Nottingham http://www.davidmarksgarages.co.uk

[Broadsword]

Ordered the new secondary timing chain tensioners today from Britishparts. The two tensioners plus new bolts to attach them came in at £99. Not bad. Jaguar direct wanted about twice that and couldn't even find the parts in their own catalogue in the first instance! I'm leaning towards doing this the risky way, which involves lifting the exhaust cam up enough to slide the old tensioner out and new one in. I will cable tie up the sprocket to the chain in several places to avoid movement of the timing. The workshop manual specifies very low torque for the cam shaft cap bolts (10 Nm). Does anyone with experience of taking engines to part have any advice on the sequence of doing up cam shaft caps?

[Guest Hooli]

If you want 'owt direct from Jag you're better off trying their classic side https://www.jaguarclassicparts.com/uk/jaguar-xj-x308-parts

[Broadsword]

Today I changed the secondary timing chain tensioners on both cylinder banks. This is probably the most ambitious automotive repair I have tacked given that I was messing with the engine. All in the job took 4 hours and 3 cups of tea, and went surprisingly smoothly, working swiftly but with style. It helped a lot having the experience of taking the cam covers off. Other than that the trick was to cable tie up the timing chain to the sprocket, make lost of marks to ensure I tightened up the cam cap bolts exactly as they came off, then it was off with all the exhaust cam caps and lever the cam itself up. The tensioner held with just two bolts and the new one has revised bolts. All in all a doable job on a good day. Pictures below show the extent of the damage on the old tensioners and you also see the revised new parts.

 

Here is a video of the engine running after initial startup. Boy was I nervous.

 

 

Sounds pretty good. Went for a drive but a loud noise soon appeared when the engine was hot. More poking with the stethoscope followed. There is a loud noise coming from the passenger side air bellows box thing on the supercharger. Sounds like a bag of bolts. Car drives very well though and goes like a rocket. Strange. No noise from the cams anymore so this noise is different for sure.

 

[HMC]

Well done on the tensioner mission, bullet dodged if it had been left like that! My neighbour has an x308 xjr sat on his drive for a few years (weeds now growing up through the alloys) with a question over the tensioner although it’s a non runner for other unfathomed reasons.