Jaguar F-Pace Non Runner

[Escy]

This was the advert I'd seen on the engine. I ignored loads of red flags and probably come across naïve. It did seem too good to be true.

Screenshot_20240423-171143

He'd confirmed it came as shown in the photos, he sent me a video of it running. He gave me a reg number for the car he said it came out of. I was weary right from the start as it was a Facebook profile with no picture (although did have 120 friends). My main concern was he'd be looking to do a deposit scam or something similar. I could clearly see the engine was removed at a proper garage but he said it was a private sale so I put a lot of the red flags down to him trying to cut little Rishi out of the action, he had asked if I could pay cash (I said I can't).

I wanted to get it collected pretty quick so sent someone to get it. For the collection I was passed onto a different phone number for his brother who'd organise it all. The one thing that stuck out was he kept ignoring me asking for his bank details (so I could set it up on my phone the day before). The collection place was a 24/7 storage facility, B7 5DR.

The guy collecting said he thought it was dodgy (stolen) and messaged me this video (click on it to open). He later told me that the guy just walked in like he owned the place and all the staff there didn't speak English well. Having searched now, I can't find a storage business listed at this postcode.

Messenger_creation_417367da-890e-4355-851b-2bae8041611b

I saw that video the same time I got messages from both the seller and the guy collecting showing the engine loaded up on the back of the truck and asking me for payment. I also had my boss moaning at me so didn't really have time to process it all.

The seller gave me payment details for Hamza Khan who was a whole new name. The Facebook profile I'd initially contacted was Hamid Khan. I paid the money but didn't realise I had a 2k limit on the bank transfer so needed a Paypal address for the rest. He gave me one that had SJ Autosport in the name. I knew this company from years ago

The engine arrived, I got it in the garage, noticed it was different and then started looking into it all a bit more.

When I was into Toyota's, SJ Autosport were the go to engine supplier for 2ZZ's. It was run by 2 Asian brothers, Sam and Jam. Everyone loved them and their reputation was bullet proof, if anyone ever complained (on forums or Facebook groups) there was an army of friends who'd shout that person down. I wasn't so sure about them, they had a ever present listing on Ebay for a 2ZZ-GE engine swap, the listing said 60k miles and it all looked nice and shiny.

I'd often see them buying cars for stock that were high mileage, 150k,180k, etc. Their business model was to list one thing and sell whatever they had sitting on the shelf which is exactly how I'd been done over with this engine. I knew people fell for it as you'd often see adverts of 2ZZ swapped MR2's where they'd say the car had an engine that had done 60k miles, it was like the magic number, it was a running joke between me and my brother. They'd also done me over on a cylinder head. I initially thought I was dealing with these 2 brothers using different aliases but I'm not totally sure. I know that Hamza Khan who took the money is their mate as I asked someone who knew them.

I knew instantly there would be no come back. My boss said call my bank about it. I did and said it's fraud as I was purposely mis sold something but they said as I'd had received an engine is was a civil matter. I called 101 for the Police to ask if they I gave them an engine number, could they tell me it was from a stolen car, the person I talked to said no. I'm sure they must be able to so but they were no help. I asked Jaguar if they could give me a reg or chassis number based off an engine number, they said no.

I tried to play their game of seeing if I could swap the engine for the F-Pace one they'd advertised (knowing it doesn't exist). I expected to be ghosted by them both but they did reply but I knew I was being strung along. I thought they were going to do nothing but I did eventually get a video walk around of a different engine they had in a container. This was also an XE engine but with a manual gearbox. That was Thursday evening. After that they have ignored me.

I did some looking into it it all, I know this should have been done before I paid but I was working in the garage until 12pm removing the engine the night before so I was busy. This is the reg they gave me for the F-Pace, it's a car that's currently for sale so it proves they were lying right from the start and me getting the engine I got wasn't an honest mistake.

Screenshot_20240423-164948

I didn't have much info to go off but I googled the phone number of the guy who arranged the collection and it came up with an Ebay business account. I could see on their listings they are breaking a blue I-Pace so that boot lid in the video is probably theirs and suggests they own that whole storage yard as it's nowhere near the unit the engine came from. I also looked on the SJ Autosport ebay page and he's got some Jaguar parts listed that look like they are from the same cars.

Screenshot_20240424-082922

Looking on their Ebay listings I found this front end. I thought maybe that's the car the engine was from.

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A search of that reg came up with this, a white XE that's currently on the road.

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I called SJ Autosport on Thursday to ask about it all. He tried to be helpful whilst at the same time not being helpful, he made out he didn't really know the guys he accepted £1000 on behalf of but said they owed him money from work he'd done for them. I said what's their company called and then he suddenly wasn't sure, I asked what their name was and he said he only knows them by a nick name. All clearly bks but I didn't expect him to drop his mates in it.

He said he'd contact them about it. A couple of minutes later I had some WhatsApp messages saying "I'm sorting the issue, I'm going to get pictures to you but if you keep phoning SJ Autosport I'm not going to bother, he has nothing to do with this transaction so pick which route you want to take". I'd tried to phone him 5 minutes before I called Jam at SJ Autosport and he'd not replied to my last message for 2 hours.

I'm not sure if it's all Jam gaslighting me or they are 2 different people. When I asked to pay the last £1000 via PayPal he provided the Paypal address quickly while it took ages to get a bank account from him. If you run a business surely you wouldn't accept £1000 on behalf of someone else as you'd need to account for it. I wouldn't accept £1000 for a mate on a business account. I did send a few photos to the guy who collected to see who he delt with, he thought it was Jam on the forklift who loaded it up but he wasn't sure.

All very dodgy.

The XE engine will work in my car, I need to change the sump over and I'm going to swap the chains also. I'm just hoping it's a decent engine.

[Escy]

Megaflow said:

Given that the injector on cylinder one was running to lean, which does not affect diesels at all, they run lean by design. I suspect this failure is related to the original failure and the repair work to replace the liners. IIRC it had 2 cylinders done, give number 1 has dropped and number 2 has rotated, I am going to say those are the ones that were done. I also suspect we have got to the bottom of why it has also sounded noisy.

Yeah, it would make sense.

M4cruiser said:

but with your skills, .... 3 hours!

It's taking me 3 hours to walk from the sofa to the garage, I just can be arsed anymore. Totally deflated.

[normalbloke]

So many warning signs. You just need to stop for a minute, and take a considered route forward.Take stock, stop rushing into decisions and take the pressure off yourself just slightly, especially as you have another vehicle to use. I’m sorry for you that it’s got to this.

[chrisch77]

Making the ‘new’ engine work in your car is one thing, but the likelihood of trouble down the line from an engine that (probably) came from a stolen car in a Birmingham chop shop is quite another!

[agent006]

Escy said:

It's taking me 3 hours to walk from the sofa to the garage, I just can be arsed anymore. Totally deflated.

Have a break from it. Go do something else for the weekend, have a week at work, watch the telly, just ignore it all for a while. You've got a replacement stopgap BMW, you don't need to tear into this full pelt like it's part 4 of this week's car sos.

[leglessAlex]

agent006 said:

Escy said:

It's taking me 3 hours to walk from the sofa to the garage, I just can be arsed anymore. Totally deflated.

Have a break from it. Go do something else for the weekend, have a week at work, watch the telly, just ignore it all for a while. You've got a replacement stopgap BMW, you don't need to tear into this full pelt like it's part 4 of this week's car sos.

I agree with this, Escy.

That's absolutely rubbish news about the engine, I hope what you've ended up with can be used. It may well be stolen, but you've at least tried to check that, I'm not sure you can do more.

Have a weekend trying not to think about it, if possible. Or are you worried that if you lose momentum now that'll be it for the whole thing?

[LunarOne]

Those guys are obviously con artists. It's obvious that the law is not going to do anything about them, but they could do with being conned themselves. There must be a way as these guys can't be too clever. I can think of a few ways but won't mention them here as it might be against some PH rule.

[Monkeylegend]

Well for a start OP could put the old engine "back together" and ask to return the one he bought for a refund.

He just needs to make sure he sends the right one back.

[Mikebentley]

All those warning signs and buying anything from Nechells. I echo others sentiments, take time and don’t do anything hasty.

[Escy]

leglessAlex said:

agent006 said:

Escy said:

It's taking me 3 hours to walk from the sofa to the garage, I just can be arsed anymore. Totally deflated.

Have a break from it. Go do something else for the weekend, have a week at work, watch the telly, just ignore it all for a while. You've got a replacement stopgap BMW, you don't need to tear into this full pelt like it's part 4 of this week's car sos.

I agree with this, Escy.

That's absolutely rubbish news about the engine, I hope what you've ended up with can be used. It may well be stolen, but you've at least tried to check that, I'm not sure you can do more.

Have a weekend trying not to think about it, if possible. Or are you worried that if you lose momentum now that'll be it for the whole thing?

I won't lose momentum, the car cant stay where it is long term so I need to get it fixed fairly quickly. Providing this new engine is alright, it'll be running by next weekend. The BMW isn't all roses, the brake servo seems to have an issue so the response isn't always what you expect it, I want to get the girls out of that as quick as I can.

Monkeylegend said:

Well for a start OP could put the old engine "back together" and ask to return the one he bought for a refund.

He just needs to make sure he sends the right one back.

There's no chance of returning it. If the new engine runs alright I don't need to seek any re-dress as it is still a decent price for an engine and gearbox. I'm just disappointed they've purposely misled me. If this new engine is a turd, any negations would probably need to be conducted with a baseball bat.

Mikebentley said:

All those warning signs and buying anything from Nechells. I echo others sentiments, take time and don’t do anything hasty.

I'm not aware of the area so that didn't flag up as a warning but I'll be honest, just being in Birmingham was a bit of red flag.

[Shinyfings]

I’m not clear if the engine came via eBay or that’s just you tracking them down. If it did then at least there is some comeback I’d think.

[Escy]

That's just me tracking them down afterwards. They didn't mention they had stuff on ebay.

[-Cappo-]

Magnum 475 said:

This was the engine bay of the car I first owned / worked on (designed in 1959):



Everything simple, accessible, and easy to work on. I can't even bleed the brakes on my cars now without pluging a computer in - changing half of the components requires something to be coded....

Add emissions tech, forced induction, assorted electronics, and diagnosing a problem becomes much more complex, fixing it another thing entirely. Complexity has increased to the point that far fewer people today will attempt to fix issues with their own cars than was the case in the 80s / 90s.

Personally, I really admire the OP for the work he's managed to do to this Jag, although it has convinced me to not buy anything made by JLR.

Is the rocker cover on back to front?

[Mikebentley]

I’m going to get a flaming but that area and others nearby are notorious for chop shops and stripped stolen cars. Anywhere that doesn’t have even a hint of legitimacy as regards a traceable business is clearly a front. These sort of low life hide behind lies and multiple identities to avoid everything from trading standards to HMRC and everything else. The streets are often littered with auction purchased cars stripped of identification and waiting for a clone. Last week I was almost t boned by a car being driven by an Asian lad in Nechells. It had no glass, doors, wings or interior and no seats, he was sat on a crate. It then steered into a non descriptive unit and the shutters were hastily pulled down. It’s like the lawless Wild West.

[Shinyfings]

Escy said:

That's just me tracking them down afterwards. They didn't mention they had stuff on ebay.

Whilst you didn’t buy via eBay you can make yourself a pain to them by reporting their listings I think. If you can be bothered of course.

[remedy]

Mikebentley said:

I’m going to get a flaming but that area and others nearby are notorious for chop shops and stripped stolen cars. Anywhere that doesn’t have even a hint of legitimacy as regards a traceable business is clearly a front. These sort of low life hide behind lies and multiple identities to avoid everything from trading standards to HMRC and everything else. The streets are often littered with auction purchased cars stripped of identification and waiting for a clone. Last week I was almost t boned by a car being driven by an Asian lad in Nechells. It had no glass, doors, wings or interior and no seats, he was sat on a crate. It then steered into a non descriptive unit and the shutters were hastily pulled down. It’s like the lawless Wild West.

It is infested by utter scum. Sad that the police probably know full well what is going on, but can't do anything about it.

[I-am-the-reverend]

They certainly know all the tricks. One is to steal a car, strip it, put all the bits somewhere safe and wait for the car to make an appearance at Copart. Then buy it cheap, reassemble and hey presto, a fully legitimate car innit.

The absolute junk that gets fired through Copart Wolverhampton - half of it is category U (basically non running/knackered scrap). For example a lightly damaged 2013 car like an A4, engine removed and exchanged for a shagged one in a 2017 car which is sold on and then the remains thrown back together and sold at Copart.

[Magnum 475]

-Cappo- said:

Magnum 475 said:

This was the engine bay of the car I first owned / worked on (designed in 1959):



Everything simple, accessible, and easy to work on. I can't even bleed the brakes on my cars now without pluging a computer in - changing half of the components requires something to be coded....

Add emissions tech, forced induction, assorted electronics, and diagnosing a problem becomes much more complex, fixing it another thing entirely. Complexity has increased to the point that far fewer people today will attempt to fix issues with their own cars than was the case in the 80s / 90s.

Personally, I really admire the OP for the work he's managed to do to this Jag, although it has convinced me to not buy anything made by JLR.

Is the rocker cover on back to front?

Sorry Escy, OT….

Nope, the oil filler was at the front on the 948 & 1147 engines, to the rear on the later versions.

[-Cappo-]

Magnum 475 said:

-Cappo- said:

Magnum 475 said:

This was the engine bay of the car I first owned / worked on (designed in 1959):



Everything simple, accessible, and easy to work on. I can't even bleed the brakes on my cars now without pluging a computer in - changing half of the components requires something to be coded....

Add emissions tech, forced induction, assorted electronics, and diagnosing a problem becomes much more complex, fixing it another thing entirely. Complexity has increased to the point that far fewer people today will attempt to fix issues with their own cars than was the case in the 80s / 90s.

Personally, I really admire the OP for the work he's managed to do to this Jag, although it has convinced me to not buy anything made by JLR.

Is the rocker cover on back to front?

Sorry Escy, OT….

Nope, the oil filler was at the front on the 948 & 1147 engines, to the rear on the later versions.

Cheers, and yes, sorry for the OT, I was miles away.

[Cambs_Stuart]

Man alive. This must be the most dramatic thread in reader's cars history.
Ecsy, please sell this car and have a holiday. You absolutely deserve it.