XKR - Worthless warranty

[Widjit]

2007 XKR blistering paint on the A frame and around the aerial.

Guess what the accountant friendly man said from the garage...
stone chips - not covered under the warranty.

I have to admit he has a point, there are stone chips on the plastic bumper, one or two on the bonnet and wings even.

I guess that's enough for money grubbing accountants to renage on their warranty.

Moral of the story - buy a jag and enjoy it, but sell after it's 3 years old or it WILL corode and plumet in value.

I have a number of other stories of jaguar garages non-performance but this nails it for me - I will never buy another.

I haven't posted on this car before becauase I've been waiting 4 years (four!) for them to correctly identify a fault with the ride and then replace a warped wheel - not even under warranty! so i have reserved my judgement until now.

[xkrGiles]

Alternatively

Buy a Jag and dont buy the warranty - then go to a specialist who knows what he's doing.

The cost of a warranty would of resprayed the whole car

[jas xjr]

Have you contacted jaguar direct ?

[darky32]

"Stone chips not covered under warranty".... I think you would have an impossible job trying to find a manufacture that would cover what is actualy damage under a warranty?

[Dimski]

Surely the blistering around the A pillar is nothing to do with the stone chips and so should be under warranty?

I assume they're trying to claim it was a stone chip that caused the blistering? How close is the blistering to the nearest chip?

Just to add, I bought an XJR with full Jag used warranty, and had a problem. Diagnosis turned out to be tricky, and landed me with a £600 bill as the warranty company would not pay more than the expected diagnosis time associated with a particular fault. They changed their minds after a call to the dealer, but I wasn't impressed...

[Craig]

I had a 2006 XKR which had the same/ similar issues - I had blistering around the aerial, at the bottom of the rear window (B pillar), at the seam just ahead of the rear wheels (all one panel) and just below the rear spoiler on the tailgate. They agreed to do all the items on the one panel but not the tailgate - go figure. However, I have heard numerous other owners with similar stories so it seems the paint quality/ prep quality from the factory is poor on these cars.

This all put me off keeping the car and in fact just before I sold it I found more corrosion on the rear wheelarch lip!

Pity they couldn't get this right in the first place - especially as being aluminium bodied you don't expect this

[BOF]

I have had a totally different experience...with Warranty Direct.

I took their 3 year warranty when the 2001 JAG warranty expired - it was HALF the price of the extended Jag renewal...and every bit as comprehensive.

Gearbox failed 4 years ago - £2200 rebuild - WD paid up no problem...since then 3 oxygen sensors replaced all by Jag main dealer - paid by WD...last month ABS sensor followed by Transmission Control Module - covered by Warranty Direct.

This is on a 2001 X Type - I have had nothing but good service from WD - for around £400 per year it has been a great deal for me.

BOF

[a8hex]

Craig said:

Pity they couldn't get this right in the first place - especially as being aluminium bodied you don't expect this

Aluminium does corrode, it just does it differently. Try cutting a piece of ali and then watch it, how long does it remain a brilliant shiny silver before it goes slightly matt?
The big difference here is they iron oxide is weak and doesn't form a stable layer, ali oxide is several times harder than nails and does form a largely stable layer. But that doesn't mean that a coating like paint on top of it is going to be completely stable. You wouldn't want an layer of un-corroded ali exposed to the air, it reacts quite well with oxygen, it reacts strongly enough to rip the oxygen from water molecules and free up the hydrogen.

I guess they are having problems because the process is new. I have no idea what it causing the problem, but there have been reports here for a number of years of corrosion forming under the paint of the ali bodied cars.

[Craig]

a8hex said:

Aluminium does corrode, it just does it differently. Try cutting a piece of ali and then watch it, how long does it remain a brilliant shiny silver before it goes slightly matt?
The big difference here is they iron oxide is weak and doesn't form a stable layer, ali oxide is several times harder than nails and does form a largely stable layer. But that doesn't mean that a coating like paint on top of it is going to be completely stable. You wouldn't want an layer of un-corroded ali exposed to the air, it reacts quite well with oxygen, it reacts strongly enough to rip the oxygen from water molecules and free up the hydrogen.

I guess they are having problems because the process is new. I have no idea what it causing the problem, but there have been reports here for a number of years of corrosion forming under the paint of the ali bodied cars.

OK - you got me

I suppose I mean of all the ally cars I've owned I've never seen corrosion as bad as on the XKR

[Jaguar steve]

a8hex said:

Craig said:

Pity they couldn't get this right in the first place - especially as being aluminium bodied you don't expect this

Aluminium does corrode, it just does it differently. Try cutting a piece of ali and then watch it, how long does it remain a brilliant shiny silver before it goes slightly matt?
The big difference here is they iron oxide is weak and doesn't form a stable layer, ali oxide is several times harder than nails and does form a largely stable layer. But that doesn't mean that a coating like paint on top of it is going to be completely stable. You wouldn't want an layer of un-corroded ali exposed to the air, it reacts quite well with oxygen, it reacts strongly enough to rip the oxygen from water molecules and free up the hydrogen.

I guess they are having problems because the process is new. I have no idea what it causing the problem, but there have been reports here for a number of years of corrosion forming under the paint of the ali bodied cars.

One explanation I've heard is there has been particles of steel forced into the alumnium panels from the body presses. The presence of steel with aluminium has set up elecrolytic corrosion and this is what causes the paint failure. Jaguar's attempts to repair under warranty have not always been sucessfull as although the area concerned has been prepared and repainted correctly the steel particles remain and the whole process starts again. One poster on another forum details a saga of no less than 4 seperate repairs on exactly the same area on his X350 as the problem repeatedly returned within a few months of being repaired. In this case I'd suspect the only permanent cure would be replacing the entire panel - which is hardly likley to be authorised due to the costs involved.

[a8hex]

Jaguar steve said:

One explanation I've heard is there has been particles of steel forced into the alumnium panels from the body presses. The presence of steel with aluminium has set up elecrolytic corrosion and this is what causes the paint failure. Jaguar's attempts to repair under warranty have not always been sucessfull as although the area concerned has been prepared and repainted correctly the steel particles remain and the whole process starts again. One poster on another forum details a saga of no less than 4 seperate repairs on exactly the same area on his X350 as the problem repeatedly returned within a few months of being repaired. In this case I'd suspect the only permanent cure would be replacing the entire panel - which is hardly likley to be authorised due to the costs involved.

Many years ago I was involved in testing parts of silicon chips. One of the things we were interested in was their life. Amongst the tests we rigged up one involved putting racks of chips in a steam oven for months on end. We had special stainless steal racks built at a fairly significant cost. When we eventually opened the ovens up, the racks were covered in rust. This turned out to be steal from the rolling process contaminating the surface of the stainless. It is hard to keep all traces of it away.

I didn't think there had been many mass produced ali bodied cars. Audi have played with it, who else? Obviously the specialist car industry have used ali for years, but I suspect their painting process is totally different. The move to "greener" paints might have contributed too.

[XKRacer]

I had this prob with my disco when I bought it, they did fix it a few times but it always came back, the rear door was the worst.

It is why I don't rate aluminium cars, at least with steal it is relatively easy to fix, but aluminium is a whole 'nother ball game.

I am sure most companies will go over to resin based panels, Aston have been using them for years with a mixture of aluminium panels, time will tell.