Im gonna be nosey now....how nice of a car is this? If it has a burnt valve, or dropped valve seat, that is bad.....but if the car needs interior work, paint, etc,,,,,,,..........

 

Depends on your perspective but I think it's in pretty good shape. The only interior work it needs is the center console- not sure what happened to it but it looks like someone took a heat gun to it. The rest of the interior is not showroom perfect but it's fine for me.

The pain looks pretty good- there is some adhesive on some of it from what I think was the car cover sitting on it for years. I hope that buffs out but I won't know anytime soon because I can't get it out to wash it!

When I was in veterinary school one of my favorite internal medicine professors had a saying- "sometimes you have to just ask people- do you want A dog, or do you want THIS dog? If you want A dog- you can go get another one. If you want THIS dog- then here's how we can try to make it better. Make your decision and let's move forward." Bear in mind I went to Texas A&M for veterinary school.

But the gist is the same- this may not be the best car, fixing it may not even be worth the base value of the car when it runs someday, but it's MY car. His name is Sterling and he's in my garage for me to get him running one way or another.

My actual baby is our 2007 sl550 and we have a dog car that is a 2002 S6 wagon. So Sterling can sit in the garage as long as he needs to- he's my project and we are in it together.

In the end I just think it's a cool car. I was talking about it last night to one of my friends and he said "well- if you can get that running then you should be able to build a submarine next!"

The closest thing I have to a hobby right now is playing computer games- so my wife is actually all for me getting out and trying something new.

And hey- it's a hell of a lot cheaper than cocaine or hookers!! I could spend a lot more money on far more worthless stuff!

 

I had Pauls Jag in Ft Lauderdale redo my console. You send the glovebox wood, and the console wood, and they send back a matching console to all the other wood. Nice alternative, especially on a connvertible, where the rest of the wood has aged about the same.
Hard to go wrong with red as far a body color, and from the pics, the interior does look pretty decent.
I'm just not in the best of judgement right now about these cars. I bought the current 89 as a non-running car, that had been misdiagnosed, then kinda butchered by a shop that appears to know very little of Jags. I have owned many of these. This one is a beautiful convertible, but after a year of work, and the second tank of fuel put in, it dropped a valve seat sitting in the driveway. Very very frustrating. I now have a 6.0 to go in, and am converting it to a 5 speed now. These cars are a never ending pit for passion, hope, and lots of money, not always in that order, lol.

 

Something else I noticed in the pics. Isn't this a 89? It has the shifter that I thought came out in the 90 model

 

I think it's technically an 89.5.

Last 6 of the vin is 164101.

For a lot of parts listings that seems to matter in the 89s.

 

Is this something I would be better off taking to a local shop to have tested? I don't really know how I would be able to test it since there are three outs/ ins on the rail.

There is a jaguar shop relatively close by that I could call. Or I have heard of people sending the injectors off to be tested and reconditioned.

 

Thats up to you. No fuel should come through the individual injectors, until you apply power. As I said, I used a AA battery, and a spare efi connector to trigger them, once I had put carb cleaner to the rail. I plan on sending mine to JaguarInjectionServices? before putting mine back on the road, as I want to make sure I am getting the proper mount of fuel through them. For now, watch a couple of YouTube videos on cleaning injectors. One guy does his, using a syringe, and a battery. Extremely simple, yet effective. The problem with the later cars, is the orings at the top. Yours has them too, at the bottom, and by now, I bet they are hard, brittle? Can be a source for vacuum leaks I would guess.

 

I cut all of my hoses off on my 89. Literally ALL of them. Supply, return, ALL of them. I put them back, with the correct hose, as well as used fuel injection clamps, although I have read that clamps really aren't needed with the style barb that is on the injectors. I feel better about it though...

As far as VIN, my car is 160310. Shows March of 89 production date in the door, and is a Marelli car.

 

Are these adequate photos for the front of the engine?

 

The A.I.R. pump is still there. Right next to the accordian radiator hose. There is no belt on it. You may have taken it off, but most times, the belt breaks about the time the pump seizes up. If it is inoperative, it isn't doing much good, so may as well get rid of it. And if you get rid of it, may as well do away with all of the lines it feeds.

There will be a small hole on each intake port that needs to be filled. I don't know what others have done, but I found a small allen head SS screw, that barely fit it the hole, about a half inch long. I put some black RTV on each one, then threaded it down into the hole. I let it set overnight, and my guess is they are still there....

 

I think I put too many posts back to back but if anyone has thoughts on post 79 or 80 please let me know.

If the connector in 79 needs to be connected I want to try to get it back to it's mate.

And I don't want to break anything in 80 trying to disconnect it if it's the wrong thing!

 

I took the fuel rail to a local British car specialist who pronounced it good. Got it back today and figured I would put everything back together and hope for magic- and-

as my wife put it- "It's a Christmas miracle!"

He started on the first try. There is definitely a put put cadence from the drivers side exhaust pipe and the engine sounds klickety klackety to me but what do I know?

Any thoughts? My thought was change the oil and coolant and brake fluid and drive it a little and see how it responds?

I have a couple of videos but I am having trouble linking them- is it ok to put them online and post a link in a forum reply?

I also took a pic of the dash if anyone has thoughts about anything being amiss- ran for a couple of minutes and then noticed the left gauge (coolant temp?- need to check the manual) was high so I shut it off.

and- thank you all for your help so far!

 

Dorschman,
congrats on getting it running, hats off to you on your determination and resolve. I'm just a couple of months into ownership of a v12 myself, but that temp reading looks suspect to me. These engines take a while to get to temperature and lm hard pressed to see how a couple of minutes of idling would do that unless the engine was running real lean. When you stand near the engine and feel the upper and lower radiator hoses, is it circulating hot water? Is the water pump actually being driven by the fan belts?

If the thermostat is stuck closed, then the radiator will be bypassed - this mode is used during cold engine warm up.

 

My car is pre marelli, and it has a feedback disable plug going to the ecu, if you want the car to run in open loop. It looks like the plug youve shown

 

fwiw I tried to post a couple of videos to utube. Links below- hopefully they work-




these are my first, second, and third posts ever to utube so bear with me if they are not accessible-

 

Pull wire to terminal 85 of fuel pump relay and then crank engine for few seconds. But i like your method better

 

Many congratulations. I think your plan to run it a bit and then see what is what is 100% right. BUT, you must check and fix that temp problem, if it is a problem, first. Check that the water pump V belt is tight and that the engine driven fan is not freewheeling.

Then, I suggest that you

• Blow air through the tube that goes from the wing tank overflow spout to the atmospheric bottle in the rear of the driver's side front wheelarch, behind the baffle. This makes sure that excess pressure can escape from the coolant system. If it is blocked, disconnect it from the wing tank overflow, for now.
• Undo the central spout cap and the wing spout cap, and pour coolant into the centre spout until it comes out of the wing one.
• Then replace the wing one and undo the little brass plug on the top of the rad (US driver's side) accessible though a hole in the top panel.
• Then pour coolant into the spout until it runs clear and bubble free from the plug hole.
• Replace plug, replace spout cap
• If possible park car on an uphill incline, or raise the front somehow
• Turn RH heater knob to DEFROST (12 o clock) and start car (this opens up the heater matrix to hot water)
• Start engine and warm up until thermostats open (top hoses get warm) revving from time to time. Cabin should get warm too
• Let it cool for 15 mins and open central spout carefully. Ttop up spout again and open radtop plug and repeat top-up until clear and bubble free. Close plug, top up spout and close that.

You should be fine now for coolant. If (eg) the rad hoses do NOT get hot, then the thermostats are toast and need replacing. If they hoses do get hot, and all seems OK and water circulating OK, and the gauge still reads high, check the top hose temps with a thermometer/infra red gun. If they re OK, change the gauge sender (US passenger side thermostat housing) easy to unscrew and replace.

Very good idea to change the oil and coolant.


Congrats again
Greg

 

thanks Greg- I will get on this as soon as the holiday travel settles down a bit. I am assuming you would recommend doing what you lined out before I change the coolant? Or would it be better to change the coolant to make sure it is up to standard and then do the checking you recommended?

 

Yes, change the coolant and the oil, and then go through the topping up / purging procedure afterwards. You should find a rod with a right angled top on the RHS of the rad, engine side of the rad. Turn it 1/4 turn (it will go one way, not the other) and the coolant will drain out of an invisible tap! use a glycol based good quality antifreeze.

Greg

 

went out to start him again last night to sit and listen-

right after I started it the red coolant light came on. The engine was idling at about 2000 rpm.

I sat and watched and waited and after a few minutes the engine idle dropped to about 700, the red coolant light went off, and almost immediately the coolant temp gauge began to climb. I shut it off just after it passed midway.

After I shut it off I heard a hissing noise coming from the front of the car-

this is what I found if anyone has specific ideas-


makes me think maybe something is blocked or not being allowed to flow as rapidly as it wants-

or it's trying to boil was my other thought.

And as far as I can tell the coolant reservoir stayed steady the entire time.