Well, my wife [of all people] convinced me to keep my F Type. We just built a home on the SW coast of Nicaragua and will be spending a good deal of time down there, so since there is no way I could have the car there, I figured it would be a waste having it sit here...but with the resale values plummeting by the day [and I am sure the current market "adjustment" is not going to help out on that front], I figured I'd keep the car and find somebody to drive it now and again.

Anyway, I've been following the coolant pipe replacement drama over the past several years and have gone back and forth over whether it would make sense to do this "upgrade" but I still find the most important data pieces missing, that is, what is the failure rate of the original plastic design and the revised plastic design v. the leak or failure rate with the aluminum pipes? It would also be nice to know the average miles at failure and whether driving style figures in at all.

Being a retired physician, it is imperative that you present a patient with the most accurate data possible when you are presenting treatment options. If you tell a patient that there is a 1%, 25%, 50%, etc. chance of a successful outcome with a particular procedure, then you are obviously going to receive very different reactions. One of my pet peeves has been that although car manufacturers keep this data [failure rates for various systems and parts], they will not share it with the public unless there is a recall. If Jaguar would make this information public, we could all make rational decisions based on actual data. If the failure rate is 1% and only happens with very aggressive drivers, that's one thing, but if it's 10% at 5 years and 50K miles, and 25% at 10 years and 100K miles, that's another. Why should we have to guess? How would these same automotive executives feel if their physician told them that they recommend a certain procedure but have absolutely no idea what the success rate would be [or worse, refused to tell them].

Withholding this information from your customers is an egregious abrogation of corporate responsibility designed only to insulate them from potential liability and is another of the many, many reasons why the automotive industry [as a whole] is not held in very high esteem by the motoring public.

 

Empirical data from the MFG will be a waiting game until they outlast you, I'm afraid. JLR carried over numerous features of the Ford Production System. Industry tests to warranty +20% as bare minimum. 100k endurance mileage tests are very common in domestic production, and 150k mileage simulations are very rare for all components. I could list more, and though my NDAs have expired, automakers just won't tell the consumers this stuff as it lends a competitive market advantage to others who read it.

Driving styles will impact how much heat you put through a thermoplastic, so sure it will impact leak rates over time.
Prepare to replace the pipes at some point before you decide to sell the car. When it leaks, or when you notice minor symptoms, take the time to do it all.

 

Got a 2014 V8S. 35000 miles. No replacement as of yet.
I note the following to the above that was excellently written....
One of the largest failure modes of plastics is temperature differential. I rarely drive my car in the winter. I just store it. I pull it out at 70 degrees. I am sure there is more stress on very cold engine parts at freezing and then getting heated up to operating temperature.

I noticed that you are in Central America, therefore your temperature issue should be substantially less than others. I would expect a longer period of viability accordingly. It will be interesting to see who has the highest mileage F Type without a coolant problem. You will be able to gauge more accurately.

 

Actually the car is in Southern California but a similar rationale might apply. Since mine is basically a garage queen, it generally only sees moderate temperatures [60's to low 90's]. Your theory makes a lot of sense though.

As an aside, it's really difficult to import cars to Nicaragua plus there are few roads where you could drive a sports car like this. As well, I'm not sure it would be a great idea to display this kind of wealth [although an F Type is cheaper than a run of the mill used Toyota Hilux here]. It is much better suited to pick-ups and other 4wd vehicles with hardy suspensions to handle the not-so-great roads. There are a ton of Toyota's all over Central America as they are reliable, parts are widely available, and mechanics are familiar with their maintenance and issues. Although most things are quite reasonable in Nicaragua, vehicles are not one of them. Most locals have motorcycles, take buses [or walk].

 

73,xxx km (45,xxx miles) on my 2014 V6 S and still on the original crappy seamed plastic pipes.
No leaks (yet!) other than the infamous expansion tank overflow tube.
The heat cycle theory makes sense to me, my car never sees truly cold temps, it is garaged at all times when not being driven, the climate is warm to hot, and these days it's almost a garage queen.
I have been tossing up for years whether to go ahead with the full plastic to metal pipe replacement deal but I now feel a little happier about letting this go for now.

 

As a counterpoint to the cold climate speculation, my 2014 has spent all its life in California, has always been garaged, and still developed a leak after 6 years and only 17k miles. IMO the plastic pipes will eventually degrade no matter what you do, but usage patterns can certainly be a factor.

 

I concur there may be some correlation between the pipe's reliability and cold climate. While my vehicle (V6S) has been parked at an indoor garage most of the time, it has seen its share of winters as it is my daily driver. My pipe broke at around 25K miles and was replaced. Just another datapoint for your consideration.

 

I think the failures could be due to a combination of heat cycles and duty cycle. I don't believe there is any way to monitor water pressure on these engines, but I have to believe that pressure rises with more spirited driving. The Y-pipe on my 2016 failed at about 30k miles, right at the end of a 1/4-mile drag strip pass. I had noticed a slight loss of coolant a couple of months before the failure, and it seems the high RPM and high load running pushed it over the edge. This might also support the choice some have made to change to a lower psi radiator cap to reduce the total system pressure and the stress applied to the seams.

I don't believe we will ever have an accurate count of the failure rate since many (most?) of the failures have occurred after the warranty period, and many of the repairs are done at independent shops or DIY, so not reported to Jaguar.

 

Hi members, this has been discussed many times on this forum. I appreciate members who have described their issues including miles and model years. Because of their experiences I check my coolant system regularly and I thank the members for that. When you look at JLR sales figures for Jaguar and Land Rover world wide over a ten year period; millions sold; you can have a better understanding of the coolant issues. Between the USA and UK forums you will see complaints and issues stated. I submit that not everyone who had issues are on these forums so IMHO if you look at the total figures for these motors sold; millions; and the number of failures reported the percentage is extremely small. Everyone can pull up the sales figures and see for themselves. My experience is 60.000+ miles my16S no issues but had a coolant leak on my 2010 Subaru Outback 100k+ miles. So to put a final point to this issue, I check my oil level and air pressures whenever I start my car and check my coolant system regularly. I look at this and the UK forum frequently and it’s a tremendous resource for problem solving from knowledgeable members, thank you. Cheers Frank

 

I've mentioned this before, but I'd bet physical stresses could play a role. I don't believe the pipes are rigidly coupled with anything else other than the engine block itself, but they are still anchored to other hoses. Combined with usual factors that degrade plastic and make it brittle, I'm wondering if movement plays a role as well as we see many of these fail at the flange. Aggressive driving styles and worn engine mounts could lead to enough movement of the engine itself to eventually put stress on where the Y pipe is mounted to the motor and accelerate failure (in combination with other wear factors).

 

While I had my OE flanged plastics replaced under warranty on the 2017 (built late 2016), the dealer put in the current JLR offering which was still plastic. I have a set of the metal ones on the shelf ready to go as needed (hope not!!) I'm glad there are still owners who have not had to replace the pipes, but I think those are the outliers. Age and heat are the enemy of plastic. If you like your car and even if you don't plan to keep it, IMO replace the pipes. I would like to think having the metal ones in place would be a selling point, as much "forum time" as the topic has generated.

 

100% agree - I tend to think of these pipes like belts, bushings, and other 'wear' items that we know will degrade over time. Really, it's nothing new at all - any cooling system, even with all metal parts, will have hose failures eventually. These parts tend to fail a little more erratically, when they do it's not easy to get to them, and sometimes they fail big and cause a catastrophic overheat (our motors are also more sensitive to that than some) - that's the thing that separates them from your 'normal' coolant system maintenance. The reality is, we own beautiful and somewhat quirky British sports/GT cars, and we have to change our maintenance mentality a bit.

I see the plastic pipes as an "every 50k miles or 6 years" type of cycle for preventative maintenance.

Or you could go with the aluminum JLR parts, but even then - those rubber o-rings won't last forever (but they'll last a lot longer and probably not fail as spectacularly as some of the plastic pipe failures we've seen).

 

Metal pipes are the way to go. Change coolant as recommended.

But, there is one thing I wish we could do, change the temperature gauge to be "real time" and not what I think is an average of say 10 minutes or something. The current thing is so damped as to be useless....by the time it moves over the horizontal I bet the engine is pretty toasted....if there was just a way to make it real time, people might be able to save their engines...my 2c. Anyone have a solution...? Ideally with the factory dash gauge....

 

I'm old enough to remember owners of cars PANICKING when the temp gauge would rise in stop-n-go traffic.

It was the 1980s when manufacturers started 'dampening' the needles in the normal operating range, for peace of mind. But then as now, that resulted in the needles suddenly pegging if something happened. (Stuck thermostat, hose failure, etc)

So, I can't offer this as a solution, unless manufacturers could offer a psychic, to ride around with you?

 

Guage?

Yeah I imagine the factory readout buffering is somewhere in the dash control firmware. Haven't read about anyone messing with that stuff, and not sure if SDD will update things like that. More trouble than it's worth to get the factory gauge behavior changed.

Best option is to use something like torque + wireless OBD2 (one of the ones that properly handshakes and disconnects from the car). If you have android auto that could be one solution, or have a separqte standalone (your phone or an old 2nd phone). If you want a really fancy project, run torque on a raspberry pi, and get something like a 4" screen to mount somewhere tidy to display what you need. Could even have audible alarms.

 

I have a not-very-sophisticated OBD reader, BlueDriver. While I bought it to use with my 2013 Golf who throws CELs occasionally, I can tell you that you can set it up to provide temp readings. Now if this particular unit would do this on an F, can't say at this point. I'm still a bit concerned about the battery drain issue that may occur if the 'session' with an OBD is not ended properly. A friend has the Blue Driver for his older Land-Rover and used it to check oil temp while hauling a trailer.

https://us.bluedriver.com/pages/bluedriver

 

When the vast majority of the population is not interested in becoming engaged with much of anything, corporations [and governments] try to find the lowest common denominator, that is, assume that people would rather "feel safe" by having information withheld instead of having to deal with the truth of the matter and having critical information available when absolutely needed. Driving a liquid cooled vehicle that does not accurately show the real-time operating temperature of the coolant [considering the potential dire consequences of system failure] aptly demonstrates why JLR is on the ropes once again. At the very least [once they knew of the issue], they should have manufactured high quality aluminum replacement pipes and retrofitted every vehicle they sold with this potential defect. This would have been a great investment to make in customer loyalty as paying six figures [+/-] for these cars should have come with the peace of mind that you are not going to fry your engine due to poor engineering and poorer customer care.

 

2014 F-Type with 130000+ miles and original plastic coolant tubes. No problem with the tubes.
However:
1. The expansion tank cracked and was replaced.
2. The overflow tube has popped out of the coolant tube a couple of times. Thankfully I saw the steam both times and pulled over immediately. I finally zip tied it place to prevent another occurrence.

 

"Average reading", "engine's toast by the time it moves over horizontal" are these statements backed by any documentation or is this an educated guess only? I understand the gauge is slow to react compared to other vehicles but why would JLR give you an average reading of something so important like your coolant temperature?

Also, I have not seen a single case where the pipes would just burst and drop all the coolant. It's always a case of driver's lack of attention to steam coming off the hood and not checking the coolant level often. I check it twice a week from March to October when I use to drive it harder.
​

 

Uh, don't know if you have enough empirical data to assume the engine failures due to overheating are mostly due to driver lack of attention.... I imagine there are plenty of cases where that does happen - or folks who don't know better see the steam but keep going anyways - but there certainly are cases where these pipes fail pretty spectacularly and pump out a good amount of coolant in a pretty short time before you see much of anything. They often disintegrate badly at the bottom flange where it attaches to the block.