I would not have expected this:

I used the OE S-Type car jack from the boot to refresh my wife's memory of how to change a tyre, it case it is flat. It was the first time I used it (at home I normally use a 3-tonne hydraulic jack). When she used the car jack to lift the car, she mentioned already that she would not trust that car jack. I replied: Well it is made for the S-Type... When the car was elevated, we removed the wheel, rolled it towards the boot and I explained the gadgets in the boot, including the obvious that the tool provided to open the wheel-nuts is utterly useless and I replaced it with a proper tool (the one, which looks like a cross). Oh, and I also mentioned that she should not use the battery on the right to rest any tools on, as this is kind of tempting, and a metal tool in the right (or better: wrong!) position would create a short between battery-plus and –minus. She thought, that that is good advice. I then cleaned the rim, while the wheel was off, and put it back on. I tightened the wheel-nuts hand-tight, and then did just 1 turn back with the lever on the jack to let it down. SWOOOOSSSSHHH! As if I had released a hydraulic car jack way too fast, the car came crashing down. Obviously, as the wheel nuts were already all tightened hand fast, nothing happened. Had this happened just minute earlier I would have seriously injured myself and the S-Type would have been very seriously damaged, had it crashed down onto the rotor (brake disk) without wheel attached...


I obviously checked out the jack: The remains of the thread of the "nut" of the jack was stuck in the spindle of the car-jack: The tread had simply disintegrated! There was no more threat in the "nut"! Pulling the jack now up and pushing it down was like playing an accordion...


Also: there is no possibility that a previous owner had swapped the S-Type jack with a jack from e.g. a Mini-Cooper, because I have two identical S-Types (2004 and 2005), and the jack in the other S-Type looked identical, plus, the failed jack even had a sticker that said "S-Type".

For the moment being I placed the jack from the other S-Type into the boot of the one, which we are using at the moment, but I hope I soon find the small hydraulic jack, which is floating around somewhere in my garage, and then I would try to fit that into the boot, or I try to find a small hydraulic jack in a shop...

 

Thanks for the heads up. I will check mine and lube if necesaary with white lithium. Thank goodness you are fleet of hands and passed the reflex test peter

 

so, call roadside assist instead. Cheers, Peter

 

I’ve had this once before on another car. The scissor jacks are only really meant for emergencies and must be greased well. Unfortunately, an S-type is a heavy car and puts a lot of pressure on a tiddly scissor jack. Lucky no-one was hurt!
Moral of story: always use an axle stand. In an emergency, use the spare wheel as a substitute.

 

Exactly the same thing happened to mine, in a similar position on the thread as well!
I'd lubed it up a few times prior as well...
I managed to get one from the Jaguar wreckers and so far its doing well, after several lifts. Came out of a Japanese delivered V6 X204.
I put it down to mine being an early X202 but yours are both X204's. Must have been a poor batch of jacks made to modern standards!

Good to see you educating the wife as well. My battery as well had no cover over the positive terminal.

 

@ jya: It's certainly worrying, but after what I experienced - not unexpected that you had the same problem with a failing S-Type jack. At which moment did it happen? At a good moment so that damage could be averted? Yes, I taught my wife already long ago, how to swap a tyre and she needed to do it on the Ford Fairlane '97 a couple of times, but she wanted a refresher for the S-Type...

@ Sportston: putting the spare with the rubber section under a solid point of the car near the flat tyre before using a jack sounds like a good idea. I have to check, if the car would come to rest on the rubber before the rotor hits a tarmac, though. And when you removed the flat tyre you would swap the spare under the car with the flat one - not sure though, how much a flat tyre could support the car before the rotor hits the ground...

A greased jack might also help - but then again - maybe not enough, as jya wrote...

 

You put the whole WHEEL under the car, not just the tyre. Doing this saved me from serious injury once. The jack slipped and the car fell onto the rotor, trapping my foot between it and the ground. Luckily, it had very little pressure because the weight was borne by the wheel underneath the chassis. I was able to wriggle my foot out, with no injury, not even bruising. It scratched the alloy wheel a bit, but that’s not as painful as broken bones.

 

OK, makes sense. I have an idea to improve on that:
At your local hardware-shop you should be able to buy something like a pack of 4 foam mats (mine even have interlock, i.e. they can be put together to a 2x2m mat), each 500mm x 500mm x 9.5mm. A pack of those (or at least 3) in the boot (if you can spare the space) would be a good idea: one to kneel on while working on the wheel, two to put on top of the wheel under the car to protect it, if the car hits it...

 

That’s an excellent idea 👍

 

Man, that is scary. Kind of pisses me off too. I would’ve expected that an OEM jack would be stout enough to jack the car up that it came with. I always use a hydraulic jack as well when I’m at the house but imagine being stuck on the side of the road And getting a flat and then having your jack give out? Man I would be pissed even worse is getting trapped under the car because the jack gave out. that’s gotta be a horrifying experience especially, if you couldn’t get the car back off your foot or leg or hand

 

Yes, I guess Jaguar has indeed build the "better mouse trap" there...

 

Yikes. Glad you weren't hurt. Thanks for the heads up.

 

That's truly scary. Cost cutting on a critical but seldom used component, or perhaps a bad batch of chinesium nuts on the assembly lines that day.
Good tip, thanks for posting. Keep the original jack for concours points only, otherwise call roadside assist.
And double thumbs up on the battery posts. I shudder to think what a nice short like that would do to the electrics on the car!

 

Luckily my factory jack stopped raising the car any further of the double threaded point of its shaft because it likely would've fallen if it'd managed to go beyond that point.
Due to never expecting this to happen, I was just ignorant of what was going on. I didn't even realise that it had double threaded until years later when I had a very close look to see why it wouldn't extend any further.
I would have probably used it many times as well but not to the point of the shaft where the threads were fu*ked. The jury's out on which country has to be blamed for that..
Surprising no recall as far as I'm aware.
I saw a mechanic chuck the tyre/rim he'd removed under a car he jacked up over 40 years ago and I've been doing the same ever since, with safety stands as well of course.
I look after my hydraulic jacks but never get under unless the stand's in first.

 

There may be a limit to the number of years they'd issue a recall - if they even know about this.

 

I think most factory jacks are made to get by some government inspector. Truth is they ain't all that good on their best day. Be careful and NEVER get under a car without Jack stands. The rod is a 12mm rod. Unless you replace it with a harden steel rod, the extreme pressure on the that small rod will eventually fail. You don't hear about it much because most folks don't get a flat or change their own tires. In the manual kits for bushing removal and re-install, the 12mm rod always is the first casualty. The threads strip out or it buckles under pressure.

 

I had one literally bend sideways on me back in the day. Id never use one again except in an emergency and even then you have to be very cautious. The stype is way too heavy for such a flimsy jack imo