Soggy Jaaaaag XJ X308

[Minimad5]

So i posted a few weeks back about hankering after a XJ and a portion of you good folk tagged me in various threads and posts, after deeming one or two beyond my budget, and not wanting to take on a big project the rest were deemed beyond my current 'tinkering / free time'.
Then this popped up:
Now Sold - Shite For Sale or Wanted - Autoshite

It peeked my interest as on the face of it, it appeared to be a solid example with a honest description. 
Thankfully @straightSix was a true champ and offered to go view this for me, reporting it started straight up and idled brilliantly (more importantly with no cam chain rattle), internally it had a bit of water in the carpets due to a damaged drivers door seal BUT on the whole it didn't appear to require much tickling with the welding stick - maybe a bit on a Sill, but it passed a finger prod test . On the whole then it seemed reasonable for the price.
As i work random hours, i was ultimately grateful that anyone would take time to go view and report back on 'a shitter' , so thank you Straightsix 😎

One or two messages to @dean36014's friend who owned the XJ (who also works many hours), we came up with a plan that would work for both of us.
Using the services of a local chap to pick this up, granted not the cheapest but he's safe and fully legal, this happened:

It was tucked up in the drive and keys posted.
The next day took an age to come round so i could properly view what had landed.

With work just around the corner, i stole a few minutes to have a look at the Jaaaaaaggg

Externally the sills don't look that* bad, bit soft at the front of the drivers side but passed a quick prod  (Just like StraightSix said)

 

A few error messages after starting it up, all of which appear to be related, could it be due to the water ingress ??
The catalytic converter rattled like a frozen pea in a pringles tube followed by the Reduced engine performance message , which was mentioned in the sales advert.

Locked her up and off to work.

The plan for this:
Get this old girl back on the road whilst keeping costs as little a possibly. I normally go a bit mad and throw a few quid at things and never really get the funds back (like the V6 406, Outback and the current daily for instance).
So i'm reaching out to the Autoshite collective, if you or anyone you know has any parts to get this back on the road whilst keeping the spend down, then i'd massively appreciate the help & assistance, as no doubt it'll pay off for everyone when i advertise it back on here for £less£ 

More to come !

[Minimad5]

So a few days passed and before another shift at work, i decided to sacrifice an hour of sleep to look at this a bit more.

Tried the TopDon and computer says 'no', so lets get the Wet and dry Vac' out and mop up some of that water ingress.
Didn't take any pictures at this point as we all know what water looks like, but it filled the small drum on the vacuum, estimating this to be at-least 5 or so liters (Which shows the floor is intact and doesn't have any holes 😅) 

Spent 2 hours on this today, firstly being the Diagnostic tool - Managed to get it to communicate and show the errors:
 

The above shows O2 faults and a Knock sensor fault, i'm finding it hard to believe both O2 sensors have failed at the same time, SO i'm going to look into shared earths / cable faults (If anyone has an electrical diagram that would be ace)
Knock sensor - If i can tap into live data, i'll investigate further.
Also :

Which i believe is a common thing in the X300 / X308 platform, as the PCB has solder joins that dry / crack so i'm hoping a quick re-flow will sort this out.

Required parts list so far:
R.H catalytic converter - Willing to purchase a used,IF you guys have one. 
Possibly a pair of O2 sensors (Once i've checked power, gnds and resistance values of sensors)

[2flags]

Looks a lovely thing that, and old enough not to suffer from the OMGHFM? tax bracket. Be great to see it up and running.

[Minimad5]

11 minutes ago, 2flags said:

Looks a lovely thing that, and old enough not to suffer from the OMGHFM? tax bracket. Be great to see it up and running.

It runs and sounds like a healthy engine (knocking cat' aside)
Once i figure out how to add a video, i'll include it .

[Schaefft]

As mentioned before, it's probably best to get a used exhaust section from someone breaking one on FB. These cars get scrapped/broken for rust issues so frequently (often by banger racers who don't even care about making the most profit) that it should be fairly cost effective to sort. The more parts you get from the same guy the cheaper things will be in total.

[Minimad5]

5 minutes ago, Schaefft said:

As mentioned before, it's probably best to get a used exhaust section from someone breaking one on FB. These cars get scrapped/broken for rust issues so frequently (often by banger racers who don't even care about making the most profit) that it should be fairly cost effective to sort. The more parts you get from the same guy the cheaper things will be in total.

Sterling advice 👍, hoping someone on here may have a few bits or even have a mate who does, before i trawl Marketplace / ebay etc.
Hows the XJr coming along ?

[Lord Sterling]

Nice, I have been following this. Glad you bought it and welcome to X308 ownership club. Yours is the older post-X300 X308, so one of the early cars.

Generally for parts your best off joining some of the Facebook groups X308 owners group. I'll link you to them if you are not on there already.

Breakers on eBay are a bit hit and miss, often they won't bother getting back to you unless it's a significant part that hasn't already been sold.

@Captain Slow works on the Jaguar world magazine and has contacts in the Jaguar scene. Although his knowledge is more X300 than 308.

Things to look out for on the 308:

• Check that the Nikasil liners have been changed, the then-new V8 engines in 1997 featured Nikasil coating on the aluminium cylinder bores. The coating had a bad reputation due to rapid erosion of the coating leading to a loss of compression etc... it was then substituted with steel liners.

• Gearbox - These are sadly a weak point of the 308. The Mercedes box is very susceptible to failure if the gearbox fluid and filter isn't changed regularly, day once every couple of years or so. Otherwise the A-cylinder can come out of place and you'll be stuck only with higher gears. A new box is VERY pricey. I've heard of prices ranging from £500 if you can do it yourself to £3500 supply and fit new.

• Underside of the car. As already established, these can rot for fun underneath. My old red X308 had a rear subframe that was about to break on one side after going very weetabixy. Then it needed some minor welding on the sills.

• Drivers door check strap. These can go badly and click very loudly. On my old red X308, I simply removed it completely as part of it has actually destroyed and ripped the inside of the doors frame where it usually held onto. My current X308 appears to have it removed. 

• Headliners always go on these. These are fairly easy to change although it requires a LOT of patience but can be done easily.

[Minimad5]

10 minutes ago, Lord Sterling said:

Nice, I have been following this. Glad you bought it and welcome to X308 ownership club. Yours is the older post-X300 X308, so one of the early cars.

Generally for parts your best off joining some of the Facebook groups X308 owners group. I'll link you to them if you are not on there already.

Breakers on eBay are a bit hit and miss, often they won't bother getting back to you unless it's a significant part that hasn't already been sold.

@Captain Slow works on the Jaguar world magazine and has contacts in the Jaguar scene. Although his knowledge is more X300 than 308.

If you could add / invite me to the F.B groups that would be brilliant.

Yeah I'm already finding that most breakers don't seem to hold onto much for these, or quickly frag the lot (from the 5 I've contacted on eBay)

I knew we had some Jaguar folk onboard, but wasn't aware of who or how 'involved' they are within Jag' circles. I won't badger the member mentioned, but if they reach out or get in touch then brilliant.

Thanks Mo' 😎👍

Today I had planned to clean the earth points and do some multimeter prodding, but still trying to find a wiring diagram that shows all the earth / grounding points.

[Volksy]

A lot of your warning errors can be from having a weak battery. My old 308 used to cycle through all sorts of messages when it had been stood for a while. They are really sensitive to having a decent battery. 

Gearbox failure wrote mine off. The drums in the box crack, be cautious when changing between drive and reverse, tell tale that my box was failing was a pause when selecting reverse. It would take a couple of seconds before it would drop into gear, so if you rushed it, it would drop in with a bang. 

We ended up having to chase the rot up the inner sill with mine. They seem to go at the join between the floor pan and the inner sill, even if the outers are solid.

 

I'm not sure where you are based, but there is a decent Jag Breakers near Pontefract who may have the bits you need. 

Its an old school place called Jagcats. The owner is quite the character. 

[Schaefft]

17 hours ago, Minimad5 said:

Sterling advice 👍, hoping someone on here may have a few bits or even have a mate who does, before i trawl Marketplace / ebay etc.
Hows the XJr coming along ?

On the road and already seeing a few improvements, you can check my progress in the Bargain Barge thread.

[horriblemercedes]

7 hours ago, Lord Sterling said:

Nice, I have been following this. Glad you bought it and welcome to X308 ownership club. Yours is the older post-X300 X308, so one of the early cars.

Generally for parts your best off joining some of the Facebook groups X308 owners group. I'll link you to them if you are not on there already.

Breakers on eBay are a bit hit and miss, often they won't bother getting back to you unless it's a significant part that hasn't already been sold.

@Captain Slow works on the Jaguar world magazine and has contacts in the Jaguar scene. Although his knowledge is more X300 than 308.

Things to look out for on the 308:

• Check that the Nikasil liners have been changed, the then-new V8 engines in 1997 featured Nikasil coating on the aluminium cylinder bores. The coating had a bad reputation due to rapid erosion of the coating leading to a loss of compression etc... it was then substituted with steel liners.

• Gearbox - These are sadly a weak point of the 308. The Mercedes box is very susceptible to failure if the gearbox fluid and filter isn't changed regularly, day once every couple of years or so. Otherwise the A-cylinder can come out of place and you'll be stuck only with higher gears. A new box is VERY pricey. I've heard of prices ranging from £500 if you can do it yourself to £3500 supply and fit new.

• Underside of the car. As already established, these can rot for fun underneath. My old red X308 had a rear subframe that was about to break on one side after going very weetabixy. Then it needed some minor welding on the sills.

• Drivers door check strap. These can go badly and click very loudly. On my old red X308, I simply removed it completely as part of it has actually destroyed and ripped the inside of the doors frame where it usually held onto. My current X308 appears to have it removed. 

• Headliners always go on these. These are fairly easy to change although it requires a LOT of patience but can be done easily.

One thing to mention - this isn't an XJR so doesn't have the Mercedes gearbox. It has a ZF gearbox. 

 

Both are pretty good, but the Mercedes is the stronger of the two (hence it was used on supercharged versions) 

[Minimad5]

Checked all earth points i could find, nearly everyone was like this top one or worse:

The bottom one showing what a quick going over with a fibreglass pen looked like, emory for the more pitted posts & terminals, couldn't find my dialect grease so they went back together dry (may cover them in copper grease at a later date) which seems to have resulted in the ABS light no longer illuminated. Result.

Also had a reply from a chap on a X308 page, he might have a Cat with sensors IF he can find it🤞

[Lord Sterling]

6 hours ago, horriblemercedes said:

One thing to mention - this isn't an XJR so doesn't have the Mercedes gearbox. It has a ZF gearbox. 

Both are pretty good, but the Mercedes is the stronger of the two (hence it was used on supercharged versions) 

Yes, I saw its not an XJR but wasn't sure on gearboxes. I see now it's a standard early XJ8 with the ZF 5HP24 gearboxes which are pretty poor and very sensitive to oil not being changed.

[Lord Sterling]

13 hours ago, Minimad5 said:

If you could add / invite me to the F.B groups that would be brilliant.

Had a look today, you are on all the pages I'm on. As I said, finding parts for these that aren't stupidly expensive or from someone who maintains communication will be difficult.