Fortunately the long stroke XK engine has a very broad & flat torque curve from low RPM. I can pull away smoothly in 3rd gear in my car not that I would particularly want to.

That said ~ if you want peak performance under all circumstances then you want more gears & the right gears & axle ratio. I like 7 ~ now you know my daily driver.

If you are just going to drive the car normally I would go for a longer axle ratio.

 

"Normal" would be nice. Getting passed by more than half the drivers on the road in Oregon is a bit insulting to me. Usually it's a much lower percentage. I have read a lot about Jaguars in the last few years. I know what an XK engine is capable of

Thanks for the advice gentlemen. I always take your thoughts into consideration. Please forgive me if my results vary from your input. My #1 priority with our car is to make her a vehicle comfortable enough for my wife and beautiful enough to show in public and preserved enough to outlive me. Hmm, is that 3 priorities?

 

People are idiots when they drive, they automatically assume when they see a vintage car that it's going slow, so they pass not realizing that they have to do 80mph to do so.
Here in Canada that's well above the posted speed limit in most cases.

 

Gene:

How about a nice long drive to Victoria, BC for Jaguars -on-the-Ilsand on the weekend of July 26-28? Lots of nice roads here...my Mk 2 will be on the field. PM me if you need information.

 

Gregory, a drive to BC would be awesome. Especially with all that beautiful company! We are not ready for a trip like that. And when I say "we" our car may be fine, but I need to test her out more before I commit to a road trip of that magnitude. Y'all have fun, and know that I am there in spirit.

Cheers!

 

I was away all last week on family business. Right up to the time I had to drive out to the airport I was rebuilding/reupholstering the front seats.

I don't know if readers of this thread remember, but one of my biggest gripes was not feeling like I had gauges that I could trust. A couple of weeks ago I got my freshly-calibrated tachometer back from West Valley Instrument Specialists. Last night I replaced the tach generator (sort-of like a sending unit to the tach) so I should have reliable rev counts for the car now.

I promise to post pics soon!

 

So this is what we're going away from. Deteriorating, stinky, possibly rat-eaten, with springs sticking through. Ick


So, beginning...


Sewing in stays


Extremely fortunate "Ebay score". Thank you Pat!


Pinned, ready for sewing


All pieces (springs, foam, cover) put together for one side


And finally installed in the car. Not perfect, put tons better than what was in the car

 

The tach generator is at the bottom of the pic, with 2 wires leading from it.


The bolts that hold this in are Allen heads? What? I was expecting more slot heads (And I would have replaced them)


This is the old one out


And putting the new one in. This was complicated because I could not see the bolts, and lining up the drive shaft was a bit of a pain.

And this is the new one in. I was surprised at how quickly I was able to do this(only about 1.5 hours)

 

Those Rev Counter Generators are getting expensive!

 

I keep hearing that "Jag parts are expensive", so maybe that's just the lot we've drawn, eh? It does seem like parts for my '66 F100 are significantly cheaper, with tons more after-market support.

Still, at 300 USD (shipped) plus 200 to get the tach calibrated, not too bad IMO. I installed both so I saved that labor expense. I consider it engine insurance.

 

Try restoring a Benz or Aston & the spares prices are in a different realm. Jag spares are not bad. Just the odd item (no doubt slow moving) seem poor value or have escalated out of line with others.

 

Or a Bentley, I paid around 250.00$ Canadian dollars for a used thermostat.
That's one of the new aftermarket ones with the modern wax pellet core.
Works very well.

 

My mechanic said the same thing. Once when I visited they had been working on Bentley.

I didn't get a project car to save money. I'm bringing a beauty back from the past. I presume that is your motivation as well. Cheers!

 

I took off my driver side door, then:
- Removed as much active rust as I could reach(including swishing some chemicals in unreachable spots)
- Covered with primer (POR-15)
- Removed all components, gave them a good clean
- Removed/Replaced hardware that had lost their threads
- Lubricated just about every moving part
- Added some Hush-Mat for noise reduction
- Reassembled all

Here's my problem - When I hung the door back on, it doesn't close correctly. I have to lift the rear end of the door so it will latch. Are there any "door whisperers" out there who can advise me how to adjust this thing? Or is it just a fiddly mess that I'm going to have to take my time with?

PS: I know, "Pics or it didn't happen". Soon, my droogs

 

Gene,

there are sometimes packers that fit between the door and the hinge, did you have any on there when you took it off, if you have cleaned up to hinge side of the door, you may have inadvertently adjusted the door down.

You will need a packer or 2 on the lower hinge to lift the door up at the rear, or remove packers from the top hinge to pull the door up. The packers also equal out the shut lines, you will know by now that hanging the door is not an easy job, if you need to add or take out packers you can loosen off all but 1 bolt and then put a packer in (rotated slightly) put in bolt number 2 loosely and then remove bolt 1 , rotate the packer and put the bolt back in without trying to hold the packer, door and bolt at the same time !

Firstly though, make sure you have tightened the top hinge fully, as you should not be able to lift the door much at all if the hinge pins are not worn.

 

Thank you Jon. I believe Americans say "shims" instead of "packers" so if I say shims that's what I mean. I have been very good about tracking down every "TING-Ting-ting" that I hear falling from the car when I work on it. I have 3 of those "shims". I put them on but obviously I didn't do it right. I am not sure whether they fell out of just the bottom hinge or both hinges.

I have to work on the Wife's project for the next day or 2 but I will use your technique when I get back to "Ms Verity"

 

Gene,
If it helps, the shims or packers on my car we’re on the upper hinges only. Three on one side, two on the other. No shims on the lower hinges. The shims on the lower hinges would, obviously, be a different shape. Your car may be different, but perhaps this will help.
Lin

 

Hi Lin, hope you are well, we are talking about the front door, so the shims are both the same shape, the rear door does have a different shape shim for the top hinge which adjusts the door in and out as it is on the inner face of the door.

Gene, I called it a "packer" as sometimes people don't use "shim", but shim is actually the correct term so apologies for that.

 

Good to see you sir. Thanks for your interest
Unfortunately I did not realize there would be shims until I heard them hitting the driveway (bad me), so I reckon I will have to experiment with the best configuration. I'll pay better attention with the other 3 doors. Shims I have are square, but U-shaped, if that makes sense. No pics, and they are installed. Maybe later.

No worries. I apologize if I seemed pedantic about language. I used to be a perfectionist, but I never got anything done, and I insulted people. Now I'm a "continual improvement" person who drives my imperfect car around... and most people love it!

 

Pics of the take-down. I felt it would be redundant to show reassembly, but I'll take a pic of the installed door when I get it sorted. Every nut and bolt had to be replaced except for the 8 bolts holding the window winder in place. I had to re-tap 3 holes in the top of the window frame too:

Kind-of a "before" shot. Note the old "tar-paper" sound dampener

Bolt that held the post at the rear of the window frame. It and the bolt that held it have been replaced, as most of the threads were solid rust

This held the front post of the window frame. Not sure what the wood was for - sound dampener?

The 3 main components of the front door

Part-way through cleaning the junk off with industrial cleaner.

Almost all of the rust and old adhesive removed.

Hey Lin & Jon, check out what's in the plastic baggy in the last pic - It's the shims we've been talking about! Haha