1992 Jaguar XJR-S

[CharlesdeGaulle]

They rarely come onto the market, but here's one, albeit mis-described. £15k, but looks good.

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/2016...

[craigjm]

The values of classic Jaguars seem to be all over the place

[anonymous-user]

CharlesdeGaulle said:

They rarely come onto the market, but here's one, albeit mis-described. £15k, but looks good.

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/2016...

I'm 99% sure that's a standard 5.3 with the bodykit. DVLA show it as a 5.3, it has the badging of the standard car, doesn't have the XJR-S quad exhausts, doesn't have the contrast stitching on the seats, has the wrong sort of wood, I'm pretty sure the dash should be black, it doesn't have the JaguarSport treadplates on the sills either.

In related news the car has developed some sort of exhaust related blow around cylinder 6B. Started off as a sort of ticking/fluttery sort of sound when cold that went away, then became a ticking/fluttery sort of noise but only under acceleration, and has now become a ticking noise. Pulling the lead off the plug from 6B causes the noise to go away and I'm 99.9% sure it's not valve or piston related noise. I'll try and get it up in the air tomorrow and see if the manifold is cracked or the gasket is leaking. Oddly it sounds a bit like it's coming from inside the V of the engine but I think that is just acoustics, unless anyone has a better explanation?

I took the plug out to look at it, and then put it back in again to make sure there wasn't a problem with it sealing too.

I believe the car is punishing me for unfaithful thoughts I had when looking at the red Daimler/XJ12 that featured on another thread.

Quite right about Jaguar values though. You see XJSs all over the shop, I wonder how many actually sell at the price they are advertised at, you see the same cars for sale forever. Take this nice looking late 6.0 coupe:

http://www.carandclassic.co.uk/car/C784882

That was up for £11k or so when I bought this car. Now it's open to offers and I reckon £9k might do it after all this time, an absolute bargain. Then you see others that are much the same up for £25k. Who is buying them at these exaggerated prices? Late facelift convertibles are up at absolutely crazy money.

Edited by dme123 on Tuesday 7th March 18:56

[melhookv12]

Could be inlet manifold gaskets, do you have air injection? As the air is injected into the exhaust, if the gasket fails you essentially get exhaust leaking into the V and causing the noisa you've described.

[LewG]

Dme, I had a very similar sound to what you describe on mine, sure enough it was the rear RH exhaust manifold gaskets. You need double jointed wrists and patience but it is doable.

[anonymous-user]

melhookv12 said:

Could be inlet manifold gaskets, do you have air injection? As the air is injected into the exhaust, if the gasket fails you essentially get exhaust leaking into the V and causing the noisa you've described.

No air injection on here (thankfully). I've been out and poking about again tonight and I can smell exhaust in the engine bay. I have a video from a couple of days ago of me provoking it into making the noise here

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWIz2gAQLog&fe...

I'm over the other side of the engine from the noise here, as I was arsing about trying to find it. Before I get told of for revving a cold engine I had been out for a drive and it was thoroughly warmed up.

[melhookv12]

Pretty sure the v12 still has the small port in the head anyway. You see the yellow bungs, I'm fairly sure these go into the exhaust port.

Your noise does sound like an exhaust leak. Do you have a sthoscope ( spelling ) , or some things rubber hose, then you can trace to either inlet or exhaust gaskets.

I'd rather do inlets ! So be sure to correctly diagnose! Good luck, keep posted.

Edited by melhookv12 on Wednesday 8th March 20:47

[anonymous-user]

melhookv12 said:

Pretty sure the v12 still has the small port in the head anyway. You see the yellow bungs, I'm fairly sure these go into the exhaust port.

Your noise does sound like an exhaust leak. Do you have a sthoscope ( spelling ) , or some things rubber hose, then you can trace to either inlet or exhaust gaskets.

I'd rather do inlets ! So be sure to correctly diagnose! Good luck, keep posted.

Edited by melhookv12 on Wednesday 8th March 20:47

That certainly would explain why it sounds like it's coming from inside the V. I'll make sure I'm certain of what it is. Thanks very much for that.

[anonymous-user]

Being extremely short on time and space I took it to a Cardiff based Jaguar "specialist" to sort it out. He's had it a week and been fussing around thinking it's injector noise (why does it stop when you pull a lead then), but has now decided it's a dropped valve seat and said he doesn't want to touch it. I can't see how it can be a dropped valve seat if

a - it goes away when the plug lead is pulled
and
b - me driving it around quite a bit (and not exactly like Miss Lightfoot) since it started has not destroyed the engine
and
c - it's running fine and has no emissions problems
and
d - it doesn't sound like a dropped valve seat really
also
e - you can smell the leaking exhaust from under the bonnet

Anyone here agree with him or see faults in my logic?

More to the point why did they agree to look at it if they aren't competent to actually do any work! Turns out they are more of the "changing oil in diesel X Types" sort of Jaguar specialist.

I'm going to fetch it tomorrow but it looks like it might be driveway surgery to get this fixed, if I ever get the time. First thing will be to take of the inlet manifold as I'm 99% sure Mel is right about it coming from there, otherwise there are some odd acoustics going on.

Edited by dme123 on Thursday 16th March 18:25

[LewG]

Oh dear! If I were you I'd be doing a compression test and get yourself one of those little borescopes for a closer look

[anonymous-user]

LewG said:

Oh dear! If I were you I'd be doing a compression test and get yourself one of those little borescopes for a closer look

I actually have a little borescope, so I'll drop that down the spark plug hole tomorrow for a look.

[craigjm]

Surely you could feel a dropped valve seat and certainly hear it. Good classic Jaguar specialists are hard to find

[anonymous-user]

craigjm said:

Surely you could feel a dropped valve seat and certainly hear it. Good classic Jaguar specialists are hard to find

Yes I think it's pretty obvious when one drops. They haven't even done a compression test so I think they are just scared of it. "specialists" my arse

[CharlesdeGaulle]

There are lots of unique bits on yours, and this is the wrong engine, but any parts from this needed?

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Jaguar-XJS-4-0-Celebrati...sMAAOSwol5Yw8PW

[J4CKO]

CharlesdeGaulle said:

There are lots of unique bits on yours, and this is the wrong engine, but any parts from this needed?

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Jaguar-XJS-4-0-Celebrati...sMAAOSwol5Yw8PW

That reminds me of the toy XJS I bought and cherished when I was seven, same colour, they were the car for 1970s/80s kids,like this, can remember buying it in Torquay on holiday and getting it out of the box on the steps of the toy shop.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CeA7_I0xChA

[anonymous-user]

CharlesdeGaulle said:

There are lots of unique bits on yours, and this is the wrong engine, but any parts from this needed?

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Jaguar-XJS-4-0-Celebrati...sMAAOSwol5Yw8PW

I'll be interested to see where that ends up, I think the late 4.0 cars are a usable daily driver myself.

Tell you something that has struck me; one of the reasons the XJR-S looks so much better than the standard car is because it doesn't have a pin stripe. They really do look crap, and the early cars didn't have them. Part of the Geoff Lawson school of "add tat" design that manifested itself in rubbing strips and other such crap details on the 90s/00s models?

[craigjm]

Bet that goes for about 8k

[anonymous-user]

£4,950 in the end. Absolute bargain, and proves the point about values being all over the place. Perhaps that one isn't rare enough and has too many miles to be interesting to the classic car brigade, and the number of people looking to run an XJS as a daily driver is low.

[craigjm]

dme123 said:

£4,950 in the end. Absolute bargain, and proves the point about values being all over the place. Perhaps that one isn't rare enough and has too many miles to be interesting to the classic car brigade, and the number of people looking to run an XJS as a daily driver is low.

Im not sure there is as much value in the 4.0

[CharlesdeGaulle]

craigjm said:

dme123 said:

£4,950 in the end. Absolute bargain, and proves the point about values being all over the place. Perhaps that one isn't rare enough and has too many miles to be interesting to the classic car brigade, and the number of people looking to run an XJS as a daily driver is low.

Im not sure there is as much value in the 4.0

Agree - I'm not so sure that price is especially low for the market. Notwithstanding, sounds like a decent buy at 5K to me.