I finally found a car. Here's the story:

I'd been looking for a couple of months for an XK8 as a donor for my Aston project (Don't hate me lol). I'd found a '99 convertible local with a blown motor(chain tensioners and he had no clue) for $2800. Ah, but I wanted a coupe. I kept looking and no others showed up for cheap so I called they guy back and offered him $2500. He said yes and a couple of days later, I get ready to come get the car. Now this clown won't answer the phone, texts, or emails. And, he really needed the money too. I figure he is back in jail since his life story was one looonnngg rap sheet. That car had a title loan against it anyway so I wasn't sweating the potential drama with that... Back to ground zero.
I get back to searching and look on Craigslist again and lo-and-behold there's a '97 coupe w/ 132K miles for sale/auction in Richmond, Va. I call them up and the car is only 10-15 minutes from being up for auction. I wait (impatiently) and hear the car did not sell. Woo hoo! I offer $4000 since I'm told it has a transmission problem. No problem for me as I was planning a GM LS1 engine & 6 speed manual transplant. I settle for $4200 and agree to come get it. Now, I admit, I got a little nervous after realizing I hadn't even seen the cars interior or heard it run (just a few exterior pictures). Regardless, I show up and fall in love with it. My first experience with an XK8 besides the one or two convertibles I've seen in passing around here. This car sits so low and I literally fell into the seat. I felt like the king of the world behind that steering wheel! All the lights and sounds when you turn the key; I can't resist. I crank it up and it's idling a little rough (first time ever hearing one run too). The car misses under acceleration and shifts weird. Anyway, even with all the problems I see, I drive the car up on the hauler, give them their money & take her home.
Get the car home and start looking into the engine. I'd done some research here on this models problems (many!) and started with the main culprits. I see "Poor Engine Performance" & Check Engine on. MAF & Throttle body are gunked up so I clean them like I'm OCD. Air filter is genuine Jaguar but yellowed. Lord, I hope this wasn't the original filter! Part load breather was clogged so I get my lil 3/32" drill bit and clear it out. That part load hose is the flimsiest looking plastic hose I've ever seen (what were these Jaguar design fools thinking!?). Spark plugs.. I hardly want to address the subject, but some dummy installed cheap azz copper Bosch plugs w/ .050-.055 gaps. Goober! I put some NGK platinums in and checked the impedence of all the coils. Plugs did have some carbon and oil fouling (Hard start Nikasil fix by adding oil to the cylinders). Ugh, I hope not. So, with all these fixes, I'm hopeful Good to go & moment of truth. Fires up like a champ, cleared the Check engine codes with my scanner, & took her for a spin. I'm impressed with the 4.0 liter and it's running perfectly. No codes and lumpy shifts anymore either! I'm stoked! I believe the car was in "Limp" mode and that's the reason the dealer said it had transmission issues. I'm impressed with the drivetrain enough to now wait on the Lump engine swap.... (Still don't hate me, Mr/Mrs. Jag devotee :P) Enough talking; here's some pics.

 

Nice car! Really like the wheels.

 

Very nice and a great story too!
Vector

 

Looks good, and a bargain too!

 

Welcome to the forum. Great that you have gotten her running!

Enjoy all the site has to offer!

 

Thanks, y'all. I don't care much for those wheels actually, ipurr. They're just a little too "Pimpin" for me; they gotta go.... Don't know if you can see it in the pics, but somebody did a horrible front fender roll job. I guess those wheels were rubbing and they rolled the fender lip out and it's all rippled and the paint is chipped. Pathetic! Good thing I don't need the fenders.

 

Welcome!

I know I'm preaching to the wrong person, but that car looks pretty good as is. The decklid and taillights from a 2001+ model would give it a newer look, and you could preserve an XK8, and not cut the resale value by coverting-- plus the BRG is a great colour.

I agree about the wheels, they don't suit the car. Plus, they screwed up the front fenders trying to fit them!

I don't know, a legit Jag seems like it trumps any replica. Anyway, good luck with the conversion and happy motoring!

 

Welcome to the board, congrats on the car. The wheels to me are ok only if you can bring the rear down some more but its always personal preferance when it comes to wheels. So Ronnie, whats the Mopar your redoing in the garage ?

 

Welcome to the forum Ronnie.

Before you change the wheels, please take it out in a rain storm and take a video of the rooster tails. Those rears should be a hoot.

+1 on the car in the garage, we need some info.

 

Y'all are a funny bunch! The car in the garage is a '70 Plymouth Roadrunner. I'm thoroughly impressed that you guessed it's a Mopar just by the radiator support! I've had that car for 9 years now, probably driven it the first 9 months. Sad, yes, but soon enough, I'll get her done and tear up the streets.... My daily drive is a smaller mopar - '71 Dodge Demon six cylinder w/ 4 spd. overdrive. It's fun and gets 26 mpg

 

Haha at the rooster tails.. I've never done a Youtube video but love watching them. I've watched probably every XK8 exhaust sound video and I'm not really impressed with the sound of the high dollar systems.... I don't want a burble either. They make headers for the 4.0? 180 degree headers would give it a lil more exotic sound but don't see much space for all that plumbing. Any ideas?

Ok, it's official. These wheels are getting on my nerves. Well, the previous owner is! What a dork.. I had a sense that the back tires just didn't look right, like they didn't fill the wheel well enough.. Turns out, the fronts are 245/35/20 & the rears are 275/30/20. So the sidewall is taller on the front. No wonder, it's bassackwards!

I picked up the Aston body kit yesterday. Came in a huge azz crate (could've fit a lamborghini in this thing!) . It's called "Ash Mart" by the company that made it down in good ole Alabama.. It's a Vanquish body but I scored some DB9/Vantage "better" looking tail lights on Ebay last week to help with my race car theme. Good quality fiberglass but putting this thing together is definitely going to make a body guy out of me! What do you think of these paint themes? These are sticking out to me so far...




I can't help but love the Gulf livery!





Can't go wrong with the racing green (and I wouldn't have to paint my door jambs, etc either)!

 

Gulf Racing Colours IMO

 

+1, but the green is nice too.

 

Nice Demon, I should have pegged the support as a B body, I had 2 69 RR's and 2 70RR's and a 70 Super Bee so I know them well.

So your putting a full bodykit on your XK8 ? Where did ya buy it ? got alink ?

 

Company name/website is www.carkitinc.com They mostly deal with Lambo stuff but they're the only Aston replica place I've found stateside. They'll build a completed car for ya starting at $31500 . Luckily, they had a couple of kits ready to go and crated so it only took a week to get. Apparently, there's a fair share of shady kitcar companies out there, but these guys are legit. I did see a Vanquish James bond replica made from a newer Mustang . It had neat guns in the hood vents and missiles in the grille. I'm still impressed that you ID'd the car as a Mopar... And, do you have any in your stable nowadays?

 

Thanks for the link. I checked them out. Its funny, they really need someone to proof read that website. Considering what they charge and how nice the site is you would think someone would learn proper english or at least have someone, as I said, proof read it. In numerious places they state, we SALE whatever. Just makes me wonder how good there stuff really is.

I have owned a large bodyshop and actually built a Kelmark GT kit cars 30 years ago I think it was and what I dont like about there site is it really doesnt explain in detail whats involved. The, cut some off the trunk and attach our panel or the you have to do a little fiberglass work to make the Sebring taillights work doesnt say much either.

Ron, Please keep us dated and let us know the good and the bad about the kit. I was planning on cutting a XJ8 and making a 2 door out of it, just to do it. Already have the donor car but I do like the look of the kit so I might wait and see what you have to say about it before I do anything.

 

Thanks for the interest, John... That site has cracked me up a few times. I just hoped they compensated in other ways i.e.. made a good kit. I'm from Mississippi so I better watch out joking about spelling references and them being in Alabama. haha They sure do hinge on the profit potential of this kit and assume it'll be done by a body shop vice a DIY'er. I've only had two issues with my kit. One, all the pieces came unwrapped and a few of the pieces were sitting on top of each other. So now I have a few surface scratches to fix. Their site shows an example kit shrink wrapped and that's what I expected. Whatever, I'll deal with it no problem. Two, there are some "mold" lines at the seams of the front clip in critical areas (headlight area and grille "mouth"). It's just more body work to do; more chances for the amateur DIY like me to mess up.... Regardless of the mold lines, all panels themselves are smooth and don't look likey then need block sanding. I haven't fitted any of the pieces to see how much alignment work they'll need but I'll keep ya posted. There's another site I forgot to include and may have led to your comment about not providing much instruction on how to fit the kit. And, they don't include instructions either so it's definitely a legitimate comment. It's Car Kit which is located in the same city as Carkitinc. It's a local body shop that did a white "DBS" replica - though to any trained eye it ain't even close, and definitely still a Vanquish. Filling in and smoothing the fog lights/ "solstice lights", clear DBS/Vantage rear lenses ($1800 on ebay), & smoothing the door/rear fender humps and charging $4-5000 more for it is silly. So, Carkitinc only fabricates and sells the kits. It's up to us to make it all come together by looking at the progress pictures.. I'll say it's going to be big challenge for me as I'm much better building engines/transmissions. I'm up for it though.... My idea is to get the kit mounted to the body and farm out the final body work & paint if the budget allows. I'm cringing on how much an estimate would be for that Gulf paint job!

P.S. I found another site that did the Ash Mart kit on a Coupe. SHmotorsny Weblog Lots of progress pics and I saw a couple that had those mold lines I referenced.

 

Ronnie, How soon you plan on starting the build ? I really am interested to hear and see your progress. Having owned a bodyshop and still doing light hit rebuilds Im really intrigued about this build and the kit. Thanks for posting that link to the one guys build, showed me more of what I wanted to see.

Did you decide if your making a working hood or just going to keep the tilt front end ? I see from his pictures after paint he still had not mounted the wheels and spacers which I think will make that car pop. If I decide to build on I will probably paint the bodykit the same color as the starter car since I have painting door, trunk and hood jams, LOL.

If I decide to go this way I think I would have to start with an XKR just for the zoom zoom factor. Please keep up posted and im sure the guys in the XK8/XKR sub forum would be more an happy to follow this also.

 

I've already taken the whole front clip off of the Jag. Not very hard to take apart.... I'll take some pics and post 'em. And, I haven't decided on the hood yet. I'll probably steer clear of cutting the hood out and hinge the entire front clip and pin it down at the back of the hood and lower sides. Since I'm keeping the original drivetrain, I've been researching the transmission and rear differential oil change this weekend. I'll say it: Jaguar, BMW, & I think Mercedes too are dumb for using that silly ZF transmission. No dipstick and "filled for life"? And, is it really a huge deal to over/underfill it by a centimeter or exceed the 50 degrees temp while measuring? I'm just doing a partial changeout at room temp! However much comes out is how much new stuff is going back in. Well, unless that high dollar Esso stuff comes out rough looking. I must've wasted two hours reading opinions on suitable/cheaper substitutes. Afterwards, I felt like I should be given an honorary doctorate in oil science! I contemplated an XKR but I wouldn't hack up a car like that. Not that I found a decent priced one anyway... I do have a M112 supercharger already and it's just waiting to blow something up. lol I just think a well built GM LT1 or LS1 engine could easily match the XKR's 370hp/390tq. I'm tempted to go ahead and buy this complete Tremec T56 6spd setup for a steal ($900) and build an GM engine for it around the 400hp/tq range. I saw the other day that Jaguar Specialties offers a LS1/XK8 conversion kit for $1200. But, I wonder what beyond motor/tranny mounts does the kit address? The electronics and wiring in my XK8 scares the bejesus outta me! So, I'd hope for that kind of money, their kit would be plug-n-play vice plug-n-pray. :P

 

Thats right, I forgot you wanna go with that whole "engine swap" thing which a true Jaguar lover hates to hear but its your ride to do whatever you want. Cant wait to see some update pics.