My daily driver is a 96 x300 Sovereign, which I like very much, but recently, my eye has been taken by the xf. If, and it's a big if, I was considering one, which is the best model? I like petrol as opposed to diesel,( but not totally against diesel ) around 3 litre and I would be looking at model year 2010 at best. Any thoughts or suggestions most welcome as well as known issues and things to look out for.

Thanks in advance.

 

I'm biased of course but I'd drive the 3.0 deisel or 3.0D S to see what you think.
Lovely engine with plenty of power. Very economical too.
The only problem would be if you do short runs to the shops or commute in traffic only. They need a good run to keep them clean.

A 5 litre supercharged will pull your socks off. Very evocative engine, buy thirsty.

Known issues tend to be minor niggles.

You'll find a lot of great info browsing through here but if you are interested in diesels for instance you'd be better served on the English Jaginfo site.
The US didn't get the diesels

 

I've driven a few in the past month (overdue for an upgrade and was hoping to stay with Jaguar but...). Unfortunately, the ride is not anything like you are accustomed to. Its a sport sedan and not a luxury cruiser like your 300. A Jaguar tuner called Spires sells an aftermarket "comfort suspension" setup that they claim is supposed to soften it up to the standard of an S-type ride quality (XF intended to replace the S-type in the lineup), but if you've driven one of those, you know that even an S-type is considerably stiffer than your 300. Be sure to take an XF for an extended test drive on roads like you normally travel every day before you commit. On the other hand, beyond Mercedes with optional air suspension, I haven't found any late-model mid-sized sedans that ride near as smooth as your old Jaguar.

 

If you are looking at 2010 or earlier, aren't you limited to the diesel platform? I didn't think that the XF was available in less than a 8 Cyl (4.2L and then 5.0L) in the petrol version.

 

The OP is in Ireland, where several smaller gasoline engines were available.

 

Not quite right, the earlier XF was available in the UK with a 3.0 V6 NA petrol motor, but it's quite rare. A Duratech (ie Ford) motor, totally different to the later supercharged V6 AJ126 which is based on the 5.0 V8 AJ133.
If you are after a petrol early XF then IMHO the best value for money is the NA 5.0 V8, but again that is fairly rare in the UK.
For a bit more money there are plenty of XFRs to choose from, it's a great car and you won't go wrong getting one of those (but of course I'm a tad biased!).

 

Many thanks for the responses. As mentioned, here in Ireland we do have petrol engine xf's and I would lean towards the 3.0 litre. I do a bit of short runs, with occasional longer runs, so that might not suit the diesel engine.

If it happens, it would be near the end of summer, as my current car will fall due for tax, insurance etc. and that might be a good time to make a change. At almost €2,000.00 per annum road tax, with no refund, I'll certainly use the x300 until it expires!

Thanks again.

 

Hi sogood, I'm in Ireland too and bought a nice XF S 3.0D portfolio last year and love it.

Only problem i've encountered so far was that the DPF full warning was coming on every week - previous owner must have been doing a lot of short journey's. I sent the DPF to DPFclean.ie and they sorted the problem out for me.

I do mostly town journey's but bring it for a blast every weekend.

Would have been tempted to get a petrol but there are very few around and like you said, the tax is a lot.

 

I am not a big fan of our 13XF awd. It just feels big, tall and heavy compared to the X308. Honestly, I enjoyed driving our beater X type more. Then there are all the electrical gizmos that freak me out. Make sure you drive it good before letting the 300 go!

 

Thanks for the responses. I do really like my X300 and it has given me trouble free motoring since buying it 6 years ago, apart from the usual wear and tear repairs. This year the only issue on its annual inspection (NCT) was some rust underneath, which I sorted and it sailed through after that.

While underneath, I did some in depth poking around and came across some "future rust issues", primarily beneath the sills. I'm not afraid of tackling these myself, in preparation of next years inspection and am even considering a full respray. Just a number of shopping trolley dings, small rust bubbles here and there, but all do-able. I have a donor car with very clean body panels, so replacing them would be an easier option than repairing them.

Maybe it would be better to invest time and money into my x300 and keep it on the road. In 9 years time, when it's 30 years old, it will qualify for €56 annual road tax, as opposed to the current €2,000.00. I know, I'll have spent €18,000.00 in tax just to get to that point, but it's not just about money. These cars aren't so common here in Ireland and that's one of the things I like about it. Time for some serious thinking..............

Thanks again for the input!

 

> €18,000.00 in tax

Oh my freek'n god. I had NO idea that vehicle taxes were sooooooo painful over there, wow...

OBTW, my excise tax in the state of Massachusetts ~€133/year and that is heading downwards.

How does the tax in Ireland compare to similar ones in Oz?

Interesting note, the tax on my 9 year old S-Type is 50% larger than that on my wife's 4 year old Lexus!

Wonder if the tax on an Lincoln LS would be that much more than that for a Toyota Avalon?
================================================== =
You dreamed of a big star -
He played a mean guitar -
He loved to drive his Jaguar...

So welcome to the machine

 

We don't pay "road tax" as such in Oz, instead we pay "vehicle registration", which varies quite a lot from State to State.
It includes a whole raft of Government charges and add-ons, some of them absolutely nothing to do with motors vehicles or roads etc, and all of them really taxes in disguise. Some of these charges increase with vehicle value and/or engine size, some don't. My last rego bill for the XFR was $938 p.a. made up as follows:

Rego charge: $351
Admin fee: $7
Emergency Services Levy: $32
Lifetime Support Fund: $110
Stamp Duty on Insurance: $60
CTP* Insurance Premium ex GST: $347
GST on CTP Ins Premium: $31

*CTP = Compulsory Third Party, which we all have to pay even if we already have/pay comprehensive car insurance.

The whole thing is nothing but a Government cash cow and a complete and utter rip off for the "privilege" of owning a motor vehicle.

 

That sort of delusion pops into my brain once in a while too but I try to shake those thoughts and come back to reality. My hobby is restoring vintage cars and I have done several to the extent of quite literally disassembling and reassembling every last nut and bolt and spending twice what the finished car is worth. But even on American muscle cars where I can order a plethora of brand new reproduction parts from Taiwan, its still never a new car again. There's always still a lot of the car left that is 40-50 years old.

Just from a practical and economical standpoint on a vintage car restoration, whatever parts still work, you just clean it up, lubricate it, repaint/re-plate, etc so it looks good and put it back on the car. But whatever is not brand new, is not very far from being worn out and could fail without notice.

That's not a big deal on a classic that's only going to be driven on weekends for recreation but is very much so on a car that has to get me to an important business meeting. If I didn't have a Honda for backup, I wouldn't even have bought such an old Jaguar when I did, but now my Honda is ten years old so I need to think about a new or late model car.

While it would be way too cool to keep driving the X300 (308 in my case), due to parts availability, it is far less restorable than the vintage Corvette I am working on now. Even if I made a tremendous effort and spent a fortune, it would continue to be mostly a collection of increasingly aged parts. After I purchase a new daily driver, I plan to pull the engine to fix all the oil leaks, replace the suicide hoses and just sort of preserve the 308 as best I can but its just not practical to try to restore it. I'll keep it and take it to a couple of car shows each season until another collector comes along and promises to give it a good home in retirement.

Don't know if your tax situation there will let you keep multiple cars, but despite whatever you might have heard lately, you're welcome to move to Texas and keep a whole fleet of cars if you like.