Back in 1951 there was a gentleman who was a fan of the finest cars from the British Isles. He rewarded himself with the purchase of a shiny new Jaguar Mark VII. He kept and drove this car as his daily and family vehicle until 1991. That's forty years of service! This is the car that was used for family vacations, he taught his three sons to drive in it. He continued to drive it until the physical impairments of age made it too uncomfortable to operate the clutch and heavy brakes. Then it was removed from service. He replaced it with an automatic transmission equipped Bentley. But the Mark was retained in his family's ownership. It was stored in various locations around the property, judging by it's condition. It probably spent some of the following twenty six years in the garage, the driveway, parked at the curb, ( the tires had been marked by the parking patrol) and ultimately under multiple covers, in the back forty of the backyard. It had been running when parked. The car spent sixty six years in the original owner's and family's possession.





































When the gentleman passed away the Mark and several other vehicles (including a rather worn Series One E-Type FHC) became part of his estate. He also had a Morris Minor and another Mark VII parts car. I never saw the Bentley. The Marks had to be removed as the house was going up for sale. As you can imagine there was not a stampede of buyers for the two Marks that were offered as a package deal. When I found the cars advertised on Craig's List they had been offered for almost a month. When I saw the cars I was interested, but I really didn't have a place to put them since I have other projects at home.

One of the things that was most attractive was that it was a complete running car that had just been parked. It wasn't picked over or molested. The car is equipped with a four speed and bucket seats. The original head had been replaced by one from a '54 XK140. The four speed is what really caught my attention. The original tool kit and some of the original spares kit were still with the car. Most Marks are found with the Borg Warner auto box, and most cheap Marks are usually rust buckets missing all kinds of trim parts as well as their engine and transmission. The seller, the original owner's son, is a British car fan also. He told me that he knew the value of the cars was in the tool kit and XK140 head, and the original tri-bar headlights. He knew that these cars are usually the donors for XK 120/140 restorations and replica builds. I didn't want to discuss price yet, I would have taken the parts car also, if I just had space. It had a (once) running motor with a '63 E-Type four speed gearbox! I told him that I didn't want the parts car, and I would be willing to let him keep the tools, spares and head lights, for a reduction in price. He said that the cars had to go by the end of the month, if not sold, they were both going to the scrapyard.

Complicating matters was that I was going out of town on vacation in a couple of weeks. I was mulling over what to do and checking CL. A week later I saw that he had reduced the asking price by one third, but was not including the other items. Long story short, I went back and put down a deposit. The seller agreed to give me a week after I returned from vacation to pick up the car. I think that I got a fair deal, I guess that I could have low balled him and driven a dirt cheap price since he was just going to scrap the cars anyway. I guess he could have even given me the cars for free. But I wanted to fair to another car enthusiast. A couple of days ago I pulled the plugs, and added a bit of Marvel Mystery Oil to the cylinders. Yesterday I hooked up a battery and the motor spun over easily! For 900.00 I feel I got a pretty good deal.

 

Last of the 50s Jaguars !

A lot of work to restore, but worth it if only for the satisfaction of saving another of these cars that are becoming fashionable again. Whether that is enough to get your money back after restoring, I can't say. These cars can be made easier to drive by putting in some of the Mark IX mods like power steering and disc brakes and a servo. Apart from these items the cars are pretty much the same, although the Mark IX had a single piece windscreen.

 

A full restoration is not under consideration at this time. My plan is to refurbish the fuel, brake and cooling systems, fit some new tires and get the engine running. From there I'll evaluate the rest of the running gear. The body will be stripped and reprayed, but all the brightwork will just get polished up. The interior is not too bad, the front seat bottoms have some damage but there's no hurry to fix them. The wood trim has suffered greatly, I hope to save the veneer on the instrument panel. The visible rust on the body is just surface rust, I haven't seen too much underneath. It's probably hiding!

While I don't plan on a restoration I'm also not going to preserve the "patina" and then slam it and flame it. One thing at a time. It looked so much better just after a good washing and cleaning out the interior. I do have both rear wheel spats. I know that I'm not going to make any money off this car unless I part it out, and that's not going to happen on my watch. More pictures as things progress.

 

Just an update. I found that the front carb had a stuck throttle butterfly. I pulled the carbs to investigate and clean them up. I found that the throttle shaft was stuck, not the butterfly as I had thought. Freed it and cleaned the carbs up. A piece fell off the bottom of the front carb. It looks like it had been cracked for a while, at least 26 years! This part is called the needle jet bush, i believe. I was pretty bummed because I thought it might be hard to locate. I went to the SU carb website and found the part reasonably priced. Will order it today.










I checked out the distributor and as you would expect, the vacuum advance canister was inop. The cap and rotor looked okay. Will order that too. Got messy changing the oil and filter. Interestingly enough the original owner had added an additional canister oil filter. It looked like the one on my '56 Cadillac. It was plumbed from a fitting at the back of the motor and drained into the cam cover near the oil fill cap. Not a bad idea. It was mounted with on small bolt and a bent nail! I will clean this up and reuse it. (Not the nail, though)





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Look what I found inside! I know folks used to believe that toilet paper was a great filtering element. Check out the pictures.

The original owner was an engineer and as he got older I guess he had his own ideas. I may own it now, but this will always be his car. Wait to you see pictures of the radio cassette fitment. This gentleman reminds me of my Dad and his approach to cars.

While I wait for the carb parts I'll tackle the brake system. I've found a good source of radial tires for my car, and I'll have to save a bit to get them. They will cost me more than what I paid for the car!

I was fortunate to find a copy of the actual original workshop manual, the exact kind used by the mechanics in the shop. It is very thorough and clearly written. Just a delight to read.

I also found a copy of the Brooklands Books Mark VII road test anthology. Lots of good reading. Interesting to read about the development of the line as it was updated and refined into the Mark IX. The Mark X and 420G are also included in the volume.








This car is just a few years older than me, but I think that there is still a lot of life left in both of us.

 

Looking forward to seeing this develop!

 

I ran into a real problem when trying to disassemble the wheel cylinders. There are two in each front brake, a double leading shoe design. They have been sitting for twenty five years and the pistons were stuck solid in the bore. I tried using different penetrating fluids such as Liquid Wrench and finally what supposed to be the best, Kroil. No luck.

I tried compressing the piston in my hydraulic press. I figured to press the piston in a bit, braking the hold and hopefully allowing some penetrate to seep in. It finally yield about a quarter inch with a loud POP, but the piston was still stuck. I then tried to "shock" it using temperature change to break loose the bond. I thought about using a propane torch but decided to take it out to the patio grill and heat it up a bit on a burner. My Wife would not have appreciated finding me grilling a wheel cylinder over our stove!

I heated the wheel cylinder until spit on it would sizzle then dropped it in a bucket of water. Did it a couple of times. Then put it back in the press with no luck.

What about air pressure? Well I started up my compressor and directed about 150 psi into the cylinder. One of my cylinders responded to this. I put it in a vice and combined a shot of air, followed by an application of Kroil, then worked it back and forth with a wrench. The piston slowly emerged. The other wheel cylinder though remained obstinate. I could observe that it wasn't rust that was causing the sticking, it was more like dried mucilage. That crusty glue I used when I was kid. What was I to do now?

I investigated and found that rebuilt wheel cylinders were available on an exchange basis from Worcester Classic Spares in England. The cost was 400 pounds British with a 200 hundred pound core charge, so it could easily run 600 pounds! That is almost 800.00 American. WoW.

Coopercraft offers this very nice, complete, disc brake conversion for around two grand. A very useful upgrade, but I can't afford it right now.





Back to the drawing board. I had read a web post that suggested that I hook up a grease fitting to either the bleeder or hose port and pump it full of grease. Grease is delivered at over 1,000 psi and should do the trick. Also the grease just results in the piston oozing out, instead of flying across the room like using air pressure. It wasn't as easy as just screwing in a fitting, or cobbling together some pipes and fittings. I determined that I would have to drill out an appropriate bolt, tap one end for the grease fitting and block the opposite port with another bolt. This seemed like a lot of work so I set the project aside for several months.

I finally tackled the problem on Friday and yesterday. Using my rather crude methods I drilled the bolt using a vice and my two Makita drills, one rechargeable, the other a heavy duty plug in. Everything was done by eyeball, kneeling on the garage floor. Of course a drill press would have made it easier but I was successful none the less, only breaking one 1/16 in. drill bit inside the bolt. Drilling from the top of the bolt I was able to force the broken bit out. I tapped the top of the bolt with an 1/4 in X 20 tap and fitted the grease fitting. My first success of the evening.





















Well, success at last! Now I can move forward. Only three more brakes to rebuild.

 

10/10 for effort, but I think you should think about the Coopercraft disc brakes.These are very heavy cars, with brakes the same as the XK120, and fade was a serious problem with these lighter cars. Of course, owners of the saloons didn't race them about so much so maybe you'll be OK.

 

My goal is to get the car up and running and then go from there. The Coopercraft conversion is actually a good deal since it replaces all the old components. The drums and linings etc. need to be evaluated as well. Unfortunately tight finances are a problem.

 

All of my projects have been sitting while I've had to turn my attention in another direction. Yesterday I wanted to measure the wheel lug bolt pattern on the Mark. The seller had given me a couple of XJ6 wheels which I wondered could be used as a spare. As it turns out the lug pattern of the Mark is 5 on 5 inch, while the pattern of the XJ6 wheels are 5 on 4 3/4 inches, so the rims are of no use to me. This pattern is the same as used on full size Buick and Cadillac cars. I don't know if I could find a set of wheels that fit the Mark, keeping in mind wheel setback and suspension clearance.

As it turns out, the wheel that is used as my avatar is a Buick Riviera wheel. I had painted the whitewall on the tire using white spray primer. I had read of this in a British custom car magazine Rolls and Pleats. I left the wheel in the ivy after photographing it, and it has laid face down in the ivy for around ten years! I had forgotten about it.

I decided to dig it out and see how the paint has fared. Not too bad. A little cracking and only a small patch that lost color.




pretty dirty nut I had knocked most of the clods off.






A little cracking but not bad.






It cleaned up pretty well.

I'm thinking of using some 215/70 16 inch SUV tires on the Mark. I might just paint some whitewalls on since the primer seems to hold up pretty well.




Just thinking at this point more homework to do.

 

Is that Mark VII on the road yet ?

Here in the UK we've had a winter rather colder than of late, and blow me the heater decided to not give out much heat, OR last winter we didn't notice. So now car has a new heater matrix and we're warm again, or would be if the seat heater for the driver hadn't packed up !

 

Not yet. I've been involved in extensive yard work and preparing it to receive a new shed that we had constructed. Then we had to clear out a packed public storage unit and everything has gone into the garage. Can't blame it on the weather it has been clear and 60s to 70 degrees for most of January. Like lots of car guys I've got too many projects stacked up.

 

Hi, I'm working on a similar MK VII project and trying a conversion I read about to put Riviera front disc brakes on and it looks very promising. I'm also trying to make a 70's Ford drum setup work for the rear. So far I have spent less on everything than the cost of one Jaguar wheel cylinder alone. I redid the original brakes once and they left quite a bit to be desired.

 

Thanks for the info and keep me advised. I was looking at some used E type brake assemblies and wondered if something like that could be adapted. The spindle looks kind of similar, As i mentioned before, I saw a disc kit from Coopercraft that looked really nice but was more than I can afford right now.




This kit shows a completely new hub, I wonder if there is a universal kit from somewhere like Speedway motors that could be adapted. Of course a good racing or hot rod fabricator shop could probably adapt something, but that wouldn't be cheap either. Either way there's lot's more to do first. Thanks again.

.

 

See this thread: https://forums.jag-lovers.com/t/salo...nversion/17290. I used some Speedway Motors brackets that I modified and everything looks pretty good. I have one side installed and everything seems good. I have a XJ6 parts car and tried them first, but too many complications, not sure about an E type. The complication I ran into was the fact that the MK is a front steer and the XJ6 is rear steer. The rear I am trying are Ford 11" rear drums, so far drilling new holes in the backing plate and moving a metal plate and seal carrier and it all looks pretty good. The Ford drums will need a touch of machining. Big plus is the overall braking area is about the same and parts are all off the shelf stuff available anywhere, plus self adjusting. I figure the big GM front discs, used on all the 70's land yachts and rear brakes from the Ford/Mercury/Lincoln barges from the same era should stop the MK with ease.

 

It has been a long time since I posted any updates. I've been busy with my other daily driver vehicles as well as house stuff. I'm waiting for another shed to be built in my backyard and then finally I'll be able to empty out the garage and finally have a place to work on my cars. This second shed will be built by the end of the month. So things look good. I bought a set of wheels and tires off a '67 Buick Wildcat. They are 15 inch rims with 225/15 radial tires on them. The backspacing is only 3 inches. less than that on my avatar painted whitewall. I think that came from a '78 disc brake Riviera. That wheel had more backspacing to it. Either way i have a set of tires on the car that are not going to crumble into dust if I try to move the car after I get it running, well enough to move it.

These Wildcat wheels aren't deep enough to allow the rear skirts to fit but that's not a problem for now. The original wheels had approx. 3 3/4 inches of backspacing. I got the set for a hundred bucks so it was a good buy. Hopefully I can start to move forward with this car.

I have been maintaining a blog site for the last four years and tend to document my progress every week. These posts are a real priority for me, and many times i just don't have the time and motivation to provide duplicated information on this forum. I've seen many sites that haven't been updated in years and I'm not going down that path. If you're curious click on the link. Here's a pic of the Mark I took a couple of weeks ago.

 

Work has been in progress but it is sporadic at times. I have removed all the hydraulic components. Using my grease gun system I disassembled all the wheel cylinders and master cylinders pistons without problem. Except that both the brake and clutch masters have a screw in cap that extends about an inch and a half into the cylinder. The rear seal is mounted in that cap. I secured the clutch master to a piece of steel then clamped that in my vise. Trying to unscrew the cap with a ratchet was futile. I bought a electric impact wrench from Harbor Freight that was rated at 230 lbs. ft. of torque. It just sat there clacking away without loosening it. I tried a three ft. breaker bar with negative results. With the brake cylinder I was able to remove the hydraulic brake light switch first. Instead of bolting the cylinder to s piece of steel I just used two long bolts through the body, then clamped those in the vise. The impact wrench was unsuccessful. The breaker bat came in play. Unfortunately it caused the cylinder to twist (bolts bent!) causing some damage to the mounting bosses.

I don't know what is in that old British brake fluid, but it hardens like superglue! I had tried 8,000 lbs. of pressure in a small HF press and was unable to budge the wheel cylinder pistons. I can imagine how much torque will be needed to break free an inch and a half of threaded connections. Perhaps heating then body with a torch might help. I started looking online and have found some universal master cylinders at ABS Power brake and Willwood. Willwood has a nice one that retails at less than 60 bucks.

I think that it's time to put the Mark on the back burner for awhile. My XJS and XJ6 both run fine but need the front suspension to be rebuilt. My energy could go to better use with these cars for now.. It's about time to move the Mark to the sideyard, for now. I'm not giving up, just regroupng! More to come.


This just about says it all.

 

Just going out as a general request. Has anyone had success removing that threaded cap on the end of the brake and clutch master cylinders? Has anyone had any success using a torch to heat up the cylinder body? Perhaps I could stand the cylinder on end and fill it Kroil. Then let it sit for several weeks. I knew that this was going to be an uncommon car and parts would be hard to find. When I rebuilt my old Mustang it was easy. I just threw away the old stuff and replaced it with new parts. Not so easy here.

 

Here's a poor picture from the shop manual. Without removing the cap I can't replace the recuperating seal. Since I used grease to remove the piston there is still some grease hidden back there that will be difficult to clean out. I'm sure the seal will swell due to the contact with grease. If worse comes to worse I might just clean out everything the bast I can, replace the front seal and reassemble. If it works for a while then I could move the car much more easily under it's own power.

 

I personally would be tempted to send the unit off to White Post Restorations and have it gone over; I am sure they have run across your problem before and have a solution that does not require brute force and the potential destruction of the part.

If the bore is less than stellar, they can sleeve it to spec and offer a lifetime warranty. Their website is:

https://whitepost.com/brake-sleeving...ding-services/

Good luck...

 

White Post restorations has been advertising this service for a long time. I probably should contact them and inquire about this process. Sometimes I think that I take this DIY ethos too far.