Where was it on the dipstick (if you have one)?

 

There's no dipstick on these cars, it's all electronic.

 

I don't know about your XKR but my 2012 XF Supercharged came with a single page addition to the owners manual with the following information:

"Engine Oil Level

The engine oil level is not monitored when the engine is running and/or the vehicle is in motion.

The engine oil level should be checked frequently and topped up as required using the correct grade for the engine

For additional information on the oil level checking procedure and the correct oil grades please refer to the Owner's Handbook for your vehicle."

 

Changing the oil every 7500 miles will help reduce the low oil issues. 15000 miles without monitoring the oil level is asking for trouble. This has to be the easiest engine to do oil changes on!

 

Hi, Thanks for all the responses. I made a huge fuss at Jaguar UK, who escalated it to Jaguar Global... within 10 minutes I got a call from Jaguar Middle-East North Africa, and within 24 hours of all this the warranty was approved and a new jaguar XF was delivered to me as a loan car while the XKR is being worked on. Ok I had to really kick-off, but they really did put things right in a very impressive way.

 

You have a very reliable way of checking the oil if you care about this $20k engine and like the concept of insurance...

Once every 6 months, vacuum the oil out and put it back in. Or change it.

Even with crazy oil consumption as you would get on a severely worn engine, its impossible to run it dry if you follow that regiment. I have owned cars where I pulled up to the full service pump and would ask 'check the gas and fill the oil'.

If you are doing spirited track style performance, you should do spirited track style maintenance.

Keep in mind something that was not known during the development of our engines, when the passages were narrowed and workload on oil flow/pump was reduced- soot loading from DI. It thickens oil and shears it.

 

I hate that all these motors are blowing. Mine went last year and another member has been messaging me about his XKR that's blown recently. VERY odd - all the same motors too.

 

How many miles and did you rebuild?

 

Interesting these keep popping up. I'm in the middle of rebuilding mine at the moment (must update the thread at some point too!)

 

I completely agree with this. Hindsight is great, and it would've saved my engine.

However, three things that really aren't working in Jaguar's (or the owner's) favour with that are:

1) The decision to remove the dipstick, which was a perfectly acceptable and mostly reliable (e.g. on reasonably flat ground) measurement of how much oil is in the sump and therefore available to the engine, and replacing it with an electronic sensor that's finicky at best and a royal pain in the **** at worst, primarily because of the strict operating parameters it requires in order to give any reading at all (e.g. engine warm, sat not running for 10 minutes for oil to drain into the sump, etc). Most owners were happy to check oil levels if it takes quite literally 30 seconds with a piece of paper towel at a petrol station - I bet a lot of owners have no time for the new system.

2) The decision to not have an oil pressure sender in this engine, and instead rely on catching inconsistencies in timing sensors due to reduced oil pressure on VVTs. Wait, what? Are oil pressure senders too expensive for $20k engines now? As with point 1), if it ain't broke....

3) The decision to never have the information display warn you of a low oil level when the car is running or driving, regardless of how low that level might get. I'll take a false positive telling me to pull over and check the oil even if it's fine, thank you. The ECU has this information available to it from the sensor, and the idea it couldn't have a safety trip of "well, regardless of situation this is a LOW amount of oil, I'll put a warning up" is just remarkable.

I certainly hold my hands up to having not been as vigilant as I should've been with oil level, and at the end of the day as the owner take responsibility of my engine failure. Of course owners should practice good maintenance, and your points all still stand, but I feel that these design decisions are asinine and have not helped people in doing this.

Finally, at the least there's an issue with underestimated oil consumption with these engines.

 

It's ironic that the Jaguar Remote app that connects to the later models has a health page which checks things like brake pad level, fuel and even washer bottle level but no mention at all of oil...

 

Fortunately, there's a usable 1/2" NPT threaded hole towards the back of the block that's tee'd off the feed from the oil pump which is plugged with a threaded hex plug. I plan on installing an oil pressure sender once I've rebuilt it.

 

My 2010 XFR had around 76,000 miles on it and a brand new motor was installed.

 

Dave,
since you've had the engine out you'd be in a position to know. Are you sure there is no oil pressure switch on the engine? My owners manual (2012 XF Supercharged) mentions a low oil pressure warning and the Topix manual list low oil pressure as one of the warnings that the gauges can provide.

Thanks

 

Honestly, in both of my Jags, I do oil changes every 2k-3k miles. I've never had issues with the engine itself or even the car. Just the coolant, but that's what I expected because there is so much plastic in the coolant areas its bound to crack/leak. Lol

 

The AJ133 SC Technical Training manual doesn't mention an oil pressure switch at all, although it does have a comprehensive section on lubrication and the oil level & temperature sensor. I guess this means the AJ 133 SC simply does not have an oil pressure switch or sensor.
You can get the manual from my Dropbox here:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/8y4iax9hm2...%20V8.pdf?dl=0

 

I looked as well and couldn't find anything. The section on the instruments and warnings does say that there is a low oil pressure warning though.

 

Just to note - this thread that was revived is over two years old. So before we all panic that there are lots more engines failing, the thread covers quite a lot of history

 

i can 100% confirm there is no oil pressure switch. If I had to guess, the oil pressure warning is generated by inconsistencies in timing signals due to oil pressure-dependent timing gear, which seems unreliable at best.

 

Been a year now since Jaguar replace my engine after it blew in my 2012 XKR
Speedpack, at that time it had full dealer service history and was at
90,000km. It seems that these engines have a design fault. On hard
acceleration the oil is forced to the back giving low oil pressure to the
engine at this critical time..however the sensor does not pick this up
because the pressure of the supercharger makes the engine management think
that all is well.

This was the arguement I took up with Jaguar Global because at the time
they refused to cover the engine under warranty. I threatened to make a big
media outcry... hence they replaced the engine in warranty.

Good luck to anyone in this position, but my example shows that they will
deal with the situation if they think you will take it to the very top.