Update:

I saw the car this afternoon for the first time since I dropped it off at the body shop two weeks ago. It is waiting its turn in the paint room. I have to say that thus far, the exterior and under-the-hood repairs look immaculate. The new welds around the radiator brackets are dead-on perfect. The new hood fits better with tighter seams than the original hood did. The front bumper, grill, and headlight assemblies are off the car and will not be installed until after the painting process is completed. If all goes as planned, the car should be ready to be trucked to my Jaguar dealer by the early part of next week so they can diagnose and resolve the airbag lights and red priority lights that are illuminated on the dashboard. So I'm relatively happy at this point, but there's still much to be done....



Joycesjag,

My old under-hood insulation pad (I say "old", but it was just installed back in mid-May) looked much better than I expected. There are a couple of wrinkles here and there, and one of the mounting holes is torn completely through. But I'll bet this pad is in far better shape than your original, saggy, worn-out pad. So I grabbed it, put it in the back of my truck, brought it home, and it is now tucked away in my garage. If we can figure out how to safely ship this thing to you, it's yours. But it cannot be folded, and you know how long and wide it is. I'm not sure if I can find a cardboard box big enough and flat enough and safe enough to ship it in. What we need is an extra-large pizza box that is about ten times larger than normal that can hold the underhood pad as well as a bunch of styrofoam shipping peanuts to protect the pad while it is in transit. If you have any ideas, let me know....

 

Hi Jon,

Glad to hear things are progressing fairly well to your satisfaction so far. I hope that lights go as smoothly.

Regarding shipping the insulation pad, would it be possible to get some large boxes that are still folded and some bubble wrap? I was thinking of putting the pad in between the bubble wrap and two boxes and then taping the whole thing together. Just a thought.

Mike

 

Mike,

Thanks for the kind words. So far so good. We'll see how it goes at Jaguar....

I've asked the guys at the body shop to save any large, flat cardboard boxes that arrive over the next week or so with other parts for other cars they are working on. They are expecting some door parts that usually arrive in large, flat boxes. Perhaps that will work....

Unless I can find a pizza chain that delivers XXXXXXXXXXL pizzas....

 

Hi Jon,

Another possibility is getting with a moving company and seeing if they have some oversize picture boxes that might work if the body shop parts boxes don't pan out.

Mike

 

Update:

I dropped in unannounced this morning and saw the car after it was painted yesterday. The color match is near-perfect for a 4-year-old vehicle and the finish is glassy and clear. I'm going to have to keep the original parts of the car waxed frequently so that the new paint isn't so obvious. I hope that Father Time will resolve this difference within 6 months or so. I'm planning to let the new paint cure for at least 60 days before I do anything to it other than wash it and buff it dry....

The front bumper, headlight assemblies, grill, and chrome ornamentation all go back on the car this afternoon and then it will sit through the weekend inside one of the garage bays as the paint cures a bit more. Then on Monday, the car will be trucked to our Jaguar dealership so they can diagnose and repair the electronics issues....

If all goes well, our S-Type should be back in our possession by this time next week....

 

in re: box for shipping the pad

Did the new pad not come in a box? Maybe this is salvageable at the body shop.

Eric

 

I am a new member to the JF but have been reading the posts for a week or so.
I have been reading this saga from start to finish today. Man what a journey. I came upon my Jag due to my other vehicle being TOTALED from being hit while I was out of town and the truck was in my DRIVEWAY. Long story short I end up with our 2001 S-Type. Love it too!
Hope all is well with you Jon. By the way, I am in Hickory, NC and have numerous friends in the Raleigh area. Maybe we can PM each other and schedule a get together for some coffee or something. Take Care and Good Luck.

 

Toller,

The original shipping box was broken down and recycled long before Joycesjag indicated that he would like to have my "old" pad if it was still mostly functional. That was the first question I asked the body shop when I contacted them about saving the "old" pad for me. By the way, the pad was shipped to Joycesjag yesterday via UPS so this matter is now resolved....



FunJag,

Thanks for your interest in this saga and sorry about your vehicle being totaled in your own driveway. It doesn't get much more unfortunate than that. But if it led to the acquisition of your S-Type, I hope that you are happy with the results....

 

I would love to see pics of the repair....

 

Update:

The body shop finished reassembling the car and getting it cleaned up yesterday afternoon. It was then flatbedded to our Jaguar dealership so diagnosis and repair of the airbag system warning light and priority red warning light could begin. I expect our Jaguar dealership to have the car for a couple of days if nothing out of the ordinary turns up (other than replacing sensors or possibly even just clearing codes thrown upon impact). Hope to get the car back in our possession by Friday or Monday at the latest. We'll see....

 

Update:

We've lost the last two days while our Jaguar dealership has been attempting to figure out why our car's A/C won't function properly. Leak checks performed with dye added, system evacuated and recharged twice, checks on the condensor, compressor, and all other typically suspected parts of any A/C system....

Lo and behold, the Jag tech just discovered that when the body shop reassembled the front end of our car this past Monday, they neglected to plug in the harnesses for the cooling fans. Harnesses now plugged in and A/C system working normally.

While this may sound like no big deal, it makes me wonder what else the body shop neglected to plug in during the reassembly process. Checking your work in a logical and methodical manner is a very important part of ANY reassembly. I'm not very happy right now, and the body shop manager knows that he is going to get a reaming from me at final inspection time. Their carelessness has blown two days at the Jag dealership, possibly prevented me from getting the car back in my possession today as promised so I can begin my shakedown process over the weekend, and made me wonder what else they missed during reassembly.

Okay, rant over. But in a nearly month-long repair that will probably exceed $12,000 once all the subs are totaled up, there is no excuse for this....

 

Sorry to hear about your delays. Sounds like you are getting very close though. With a job this size I don't think it's uncommon to have these types of issues come up. I'd be a little upset with the dealer too. Two days of work without checking the electrical connections? And nobody noticed the fans weren't coming on?

 

Update:

We finally got the car back in our possession around 5:00 pm on Friday. Haven't had as much time to shake it down yet as I would like because our home PC crashed Friday (it was nearly 6 years old so I guess I can't complain too much since desktop PCs are nothing more than commodities these days) and we had to spend most of yesterday and last night purchasing a new one and then setting it up. So bear with me, guys - new keyboard, new operating system, icons and symbols I don't recognize, and my eyes and fingers are still trying to adjust to typing on a very different feeling keyboard....

Visually, the car's exterior is beautiful. Great paint match to our now 4 year-old original paint. The hood, front bumper, and front quarterpanels were all painted.

Under the hood, the car appears as if nothing ever happened. New radiator, plastic coolant tank, condensor, etc. New headlight assembles even though our original headlight assemblies did not appear to be damaged, but I'll take new ones any day. The fog lights were transferred over from our original bumper. The new hood fits better with more even seams than the original hood did.

The interior is spotless. These guys took great care and it shows.

The body shop gave me the nearly-full jug of Jaguar coolant that was left over from filling the new radiator ($45 for a 5-litre jug at our Jaguar parts department). They also gave me the unused 1-liter bottle of ZF transmission fluid (the famous Shell mineral oil that was $58 per bottle at our Jaguar parts department when I checked on it back in February) that was ordered just in case a small amount of fluid had to be drained as part of the repair process. My invoice shows that the body shop paid $46 for it, so either they received a discount or the price has dropped. I'm glad to have the coolant and transmission fluid on my garage shelves now.

So we've put perhaps 80 miles on the car at this point, and thus far it drives just as it did prior to me getting plowed back on August 3rd. But yesterday afternoon while on the highway, the yellow priority light illuminated on the dash and the message "left front turn signal lamp failed" was displayed. Within 5 miles of driving, the yellow light went out and the message disappeared. Upon getting home we checked the turn signal operation and it was indeed normal at all four corners of the car, but my wife noticed that the left front running light in the bumper is much dimmer than its counterpart on the right side. Perhaps that is what triggered the message. I've started my punch list and we'll see what else shows up as we drive the car over the next couple of weeks.

Total repair cost at this point comes to $11,451. Next week I'll begin the process of pursuing a diminished value claim against Geico as well. My guess is that they will attempt to push back - we'll see how it goes....

 

Update:

The "Check Engine" light illuminated on the dashboard as my wife was driving on the freeway early this morning. No change in performance characteristics at this point, but obviously some codes have been thrown. Getting the car checked out now has become a bit more urgent since she is rapidly losing confidence and trust in it again....

My biggest fear after our S-Type was plowed was that after it was repaired, electronic module problems would begin to crop up frequently and require constant diagnosis and repair. I hope that we're not witnessing the beginning of that right now....

 

We really need to see some pics here my man.

 

Pics of a check engine light????

I think you mean the details, which he'll no doubt post when he knows them himself!

 

There will be no pictures. I don't really care what the car looks like right now. It is far more important to get to the bottom of what is causing these electronic failures before my wife decides that she's done with the car due to her inability to trust it after the accident....

 

If the MIL (aka check engine light) came on so soon after repair it may be that the repairer didn't complete a full drive cycle and check that all was OK prior to handing the car back to you.

By "OK" I mean that all the (OBD) monitors had run and completed successfully.

It's all too easy to clear codes, drive just a little (or not at all!) and not even bother to check the monitors have completed. ("Hey, the MIL wasn't on.")

Sometimes one or more doesn't complete because ..... of a fault. Not necessarily a fault that has as yet flagged as a DTC (and thus MIL). But it will. Sadly, when the owner has the car back

 

Between our Jaguar service department and the body shop, they put right at 50 miles on the car after repairs were supposedly completed. My wife and I have put more than 100 additional miles on the car since I picked it up late Friday afternoon. The "check engine" light on the dash didn't show up until this morning, nearly 150 miles after repairs were supposedly completed last Friday afternoon.

I hope you're correct and that we're dealing with on-board diagnostics still doing their thing. But after 150 miles plus, one would think that they've had plenty of distance to complete their cycles.

My biggest challenge remains convincing my wife that the car deserves a chance with us to prove whether it can become trustworthy again. She's the primary driver, she's the one being affected by these various dashboard lights that seem to pop up when she's driving alone, and she's got another solo trip to visit her parents in Florida coming up in about 10 days. You can understand why her trust (or lack thereof) overrides everything else about this car right now....