Discussion
I'm glad someone has asked this and hopefully someone more knowledgeable will come along shortly and confirm that they are utterly ruinous to run... Otherwise I'm finding it increasingly difficult to resist the temptation to go for something like this:
http://www.pistonheads.com/sales/2133963.htm
http://www.pistonheads.com/sales/2133963.htm
I bought a 2003 4.2 SE (Running on LPG) for £9500 last March with 42k on it, to replace an X300 I had owned for 8 years.
So my thoughts are,
Great car, very quick .. don't know about the smaller engined ones, but great on fuel. I know I'm on LPG but I can get 30 MPG on Petrol.
Lots of annoying niggles, which reminds me of driving an old Citroen !. So far .. rear door actuator failed, locking the door shut for about 3 months, then suddenly worked again. Cost £250 to sort. Airbag light comes on occasionally, which is connector under the passenger seat .. can't reach it !. Expansion tank leak .. very common, but only £60. Had a gearbox issue, where when cold at 50 mph .. contraflow speed .. the engine would fluctuate up and down by 200 rpm. Again common, same 6 speed box fitted to these cars, and S types. MIne was fixed with a software re-flash (£35). But it could be torque convertor issues. Had it been on mine I could have lived with it.
Air suspension .. I get random fault codes .. but all down to same thing. ECU is expecting suspension reservoir to be certain pressure, within certain time. I forget values. So if its cold, or I start car and sit fiddling sat NAV with lights and wipers on .. less power to air pump, and usually a light. I will replace the pump .. very common problem. Pumps now £200, probably a 2 hour labour job if you get it done.
They do corrode .. oh yes, lots of stuff on the net about this.
Found it noisier & the ride much firmer than my old Jag, and I'm on smallest wheels. If you find one with 20" drive it over a rough road to see if it is for you.
Summary, think a later car 2005/6 would be better .. but loads more dosh & more expensive tax. XJR's are best value, and must be ridiculously quick ! .. the car is still lighter than an X type due to Aluminium panels, so still (relatively) economical.
Lots of electrics/computer things to fail ..and not much of a DIY car. Find a good independent Jag place.
Last thing, I specifically wanted the inbuilt Sat-Nav .. in hindsight would't have bothered. It looks good, but is very dated can't upgrade to TMC or anything useful, also can't operate when the car is moving .. even by the passenger.
My car also has the Jaguar built in Handsfree kit.. which is unusable, unless crawling in traffic shouting at the mic.
Would suggest a car that has most of the above carried out under a dealer warranty.
I'll be keeping it, but often wish I'd kept looking for a late example of the old shape Daimler Super, which is what I originally intended to buy.
Good luck, hope some of this helps
So my thoughts are,
Great car, very quick .. don't know about the smaller engined ones, but great on fuel. I know I'm on LPG but I can get 30 MPG on Petrol.
Lots of annoying niggles, which reminds me of driving an old Citroen !. So far .. rear door actuator failed, locking the door shut for about 3 months, then suddenly worked again. Cost £250 to sort. Airbag light comes on occasionally, which is connector under the passenger seat .. can't reach it !. Expansion tank leak .. very common, but only £60. Had a gearbox issue, where when cold at 50 mph .. contraflow speed .. the engine would fluctuate up and down by 200 rpm. Again common, same 6 speed box fitted to these cars, and S types. MIne was fixed with a software re-flash (£35). But it could be torque convertor issues. Had it been on mine I could have lived with it.
Air suspension .. I get random fault codes .. but all down to same thing. ECU is expecting suspension reservoir to be certain pressure, within certain time. I forget values. So if its cold, or I start car and sit fiddling sat NAV with lights and wipers on .. less power to air pump, and usually a light. I will replace the pump .. very common problem. Pumps now £200, probably a 2 hour labour job if you get it done.
They do corrode .. oh yes, lots of stuff on the net about this.
Found it noisier & the ride much firmer than my old Jag, and I'm on smallest wheels. If you find one with 20" drive it over a rough road to see if it is for you.
Summary, think a later car 2005/6 would be better .. but loads more dosh & more expensive tax. XJR's are best value, and must be ridiculously quick ! .. the car is still lighter than an X type due to Aluminium panels, so still (relatively) economical.
Lots of electrics/computer things to fail ..and not much of a DIY car. Find a good independent Jag place.
Last thing, I specifically wanted the inbuilt Sat-Nav .. in hindsight would't have bothered. It looks good, but is very dated can't upgrade to TMC or anything useful, also can't operate when the car is moving .. even by the passenger.
My car also has the Jaguar built in Handsfree kit.. which is unusable, unless crawling in traffic shouting at the mic.
Would suggest a car that has most of the above carried out under a dealer warranty.
I'll be keeping it, but often wish I'd kept looking for a late example of the old shape Daimler Super, which is what I originally intended to buy.
Good luck, hope some of this helps
Nothing major, but more than 8 years of my X300.
The £8.5k at the Jag dealer sounds good, especially with the warranty. I bought privately. Just make sure you use it enough to break all the small breakable/wearable things in the 12 months .. and even if they won't budge much on price see if you can get the next service/MOT thrown in as well.
I also have a cracked windscreen ... last one replaced in October, and this happened whilst it was parked over winter... oh yes they don't go in Snow, I bought a grands worth of Shogun. Not only do they not go in Snow, if you spin the wheels too much the electronic handbrake sticks on !..not a problem as all you have to do is disconnect the batter for 10 minutes (!).
To be fair a software upgrade should sort this, and as a car sold at a main dealer you should insist all software patches are bang up to date. Check the corrosion warranty, I think Jaguar is 6 years.
I am being a bit negative I know, but I still have it .. and not looking to change so can't be that bad !!
The £8.5k at the Jag dealer sounds good, especially with the warranty. I bought privately. Just make sure you use it enough to break all the small breakable/wearable things in the 12 months .. and even if they won't budge much on price see if you can get the next service/MOT thrown in as well.
I also have a cracked windscreen ... last one replaced in October, and this happened whilst it was parked over winter... oh yes they don't go in Snow, I bought a grands worth of Shogun. Not only do they not go in Snow, if you spin the wheels too much the electronic handbrake sticks on !..not a problem as all you have to do is disconnect the batter for 10 minutes (!).
To be fair a software upgrade should sort this, and as a car sold at a main dealer you should insist all software patches are bang up to date. Check the corrosion warranty, I think Jaguar is 6 years.
I am being a bit negative I know, but I still have it .. and not looking to change so can't be that bad !!
My '05 XJR has been a total, complete and utter disaster.
Its under warranty, but the time spent in the garage would have (If I were paying) added up to about £3-4000 in 9 months. It has also been pretty f
g inconvenient.
What's more, it seems that Jaguar are not telling me the entire truth. There is a problem between their diagnosis machine, SDD, and my car. They are claiming that it is just a computer software blip that will be sorted, in time, by a system update. In the meantime they use an older system to check it.
Fine. But it's more than that. A recent broken wire to the ABS module gave my local Jaguar dealer a severe headache because the wiring diagrams on file do not match the car. All of this would be horribly expensive if it were not under warranty, as it took them ages to manually check which wire was broken.
So, do try to ascertain as much about the car's history as possible. I'm totally fed up with mine (ex-engineering car... rather co-incidental that, don't you think?), and very annoyed with Jaguar, who appear to be just letting the dealerships deal with the problem. It's not fair on the dealers, and ridiculous for the customer!
Sorry, I'm a little pissed off with them at the moment. Advice based on my experiences? Avoid like the fking plague. More level headed advice - Do check the history if you can. They aren't known as unreliable, but even today, the Friday night clocking off specials do seem to exist.
Its under warranty, but the time spent in the garage would have (If I were paying) added up to about £3-4000 in 9 months. It has also been pretty f
g inconvenient.What's more, it seems that Jaguar are not telling me the entire truth. There is a problem between their diagnosis machine, SDD, and my car. They are claiming that it is just a computer software blip that will be sorted, in time, by a system update. In the meantime they use an older system to check it.
Fine. But it's more than that. A recent broken wire to the ABS module gave my local Jaguar dealer a severe headache because the wiring diagrams on file do not match the car. All of this would be horribly expensive if it were not under warranty, as it took them ages to manually check which wire was broken.
So, do try to ascertain as much about the car's history as possible. I'm totally fed up with mine (ex-engineering car... rather co-incidental that, don't you think?), and very annoyed with Jaguar, who appear to be just letting the dealerships deal with the problem. It's not fair on the dealers, and ridiculous for the customer!
Sorry, I'm a little pissed off with them at the moment. Advice based on my experiences? Avoid like the f
king plague. More level headed advice - Do check the history if you can. They aren't known as unreliable, but even today, the Friday night clocking off specials do seem to exist.Edited by Dimski on Sunday 23 January 10:09
There's more then enough evidence to convince me there's a serious corrosion problem with the aluminium bodied cars, dispite a firm denial from a salesman in the franchise network - who claimed that it's impossible for aluminium to corrode and in any case he's never seen any XJ suffering.
Just a couple of weeks later I saw a 04 car for sale at an independent that was riddled with corrosion in all the usual places - boot lid, door bottoms and wheel arches. Although that's not the only one I've seen it was by far the worst. There's more than 12 pages of postings regarding the problem on the Jaguar Forum, and it's come up more then once here on PH too. Many posters also have had significant difficulty in having repairs done under warranty as Jaguar seem to repeatedly claim the corrosion is down to paint damage such as a stone chip and as such is not covered.
Worth a browse and see what you think.
Just a couple of weeks later I saw a 04 car for sale at an independent that was riddled with corrosion in all the usual places - boot lid, door bottoms and wheel arches. Although that's not the only one I've seen it was by far the worst. There's more than 12 pages of postings regarding the problem on the Jaguar Forum, and it's come up more then once here on PH too. Many posters also have had significant difficulty in having repairs done under warranty as Jaguar seem to repeatedly claim the corrosion is down to paint damage such as a stone chip and as such is not covered.
Worth a browse and see what you think.
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