Hi. My name is Michael. The other day A friend of mine hooked to my battery in my 03 jagx type incorrectly you put the positive post on the negative post etc etc. Since that happened my I've had major electrical issues car wouldn't start battery died at this point I can get the car started it tells me I have a engine systems fault and a gearbox fault and it was in limp mode so far what do I do what do I check at this point I know it's something minor it's not something with the control modules because those are working fine before he did the battery issue it's got to be something with the relays or fuses right. Please advise.

 

Mike, odds are, you have 1 or more control modules that has suffered a problem. I would say your first step is going to be putting the car on a computer with SDD (Jaguar dealership diagnostic tool) and see what modules are seeing issues. Because of what happened, you may have multiple modules that suffered internal faults, leading to all the other symptoms.

With this being said, SDD is something that some people do own outright (I am one of them) and that will be a good starting point. Because of what happened and the errors that you are getting, I would suspect that you hurt the ECU and the J-Gate module. It may be possible you hurt the GEM module also (leading to the battery being depleted over night).

To just start tossing parts at the car is going to get expensive. Having a plan and knowing what is faulty will save time and a lot of headaches. Unfortunately, if you need to have a shop do the analysis, you are looking at about $125 just for the analysis. Then parts are going to be up and above. Please note, if you replace the ECU, you are going to need to have it programmed to match your car. It is part of the security system for the car and needs to be told what car it is in and to respond appropriately.

 

Seems to be a write-off / total lost.
(Someone who has to ask what should be done now cannot do it himself. So it's going to be very expensive.)

Sorry!

But at least you saved a lot when changed the battery!

catfondler

 

Some of the electronic modules will have some reverse voltage protection incorporated, others may not.
Before you totally freak out thinking all is lost.....spend half an hour checking through every fuse and documenting (by fuse number and current rating) any that have initially failed.
I suggest you disconnect battery, then with a basic multimeter on resistance (Ohms test), pull each fuse one at a time to check their continuity.

If it is easier, you might prefer to take a photo of the power distribution fuse box and passenger compartment fuse box, print them off so you can then tick or cross fuses off as you go (if you don't have a owners book which will also have the fuse box layouts printed which you could simply copy).

Once you have a list of what fuses may have died, you can then replace them and see if any of them immediately fail again upon power re-connection and vehicle operation.
Having a list of what fuse numbers have failed (and also continue to fail) will help chasing down using the electrical schematic possible downstream affected assemblies or sensors that have not taken kindly to the event.

Thermo is absolutely right....you will most likely need a good code scan to pinpoint remaining problems, but you should get as much of the grunt work of fuse verification/replacement out of the way and see what electrics actually come up and running first and what circuits/fuses are persisting on failing.
There are many sub systems that are separately fused, any number could be triggering limp mode.

Sorry to hear of your misadventure.........but hopefully it is a recoverable situation if you take a methodical approach.
Feel free to keep us all updated as to which fuses have failed and what error codes you are getting.
Good luck.

 

The battery is going out in my vehicle ('03 X-Type 3.0) I had the battery supplanted back in December of '09, just as October or November of '08. Batteries ought not be going out that quick. Back in December, I took the vehicle to Autozone and the person snared it to his free analytic machine and let me know the alternator was fine. I will have it twofold checked again today at any rate, yet the thing else could be killing the battery? I realize sweltering climate is awful on batteries, yet the thing is under a year old. It should endure more than one Texas summer before it does what needs to be done!

 

desyudj, batteries are troublesome little critters. There is a lot to making one last a long time. Some of it is simply luck. Being someone that worked around batteries capable of powering a small town (yes, it was that big), I have learned a lot about batteries and what makes them last and what will kill one in no time flat. Some of the things that I have found that promote life are the following:

-not letting the battery set in the car connected for say 2 weeks at a time without starting it. This causes the battery to get depleted and is hard on the cells. A single time, bah, do not worry about it. You do it time after time after time, now we are doing damage.
-letting the battery take a deep discharge to the point that the lights barely turn on. This causes the internal plates of the cells to get very thin and when you recharge the battery, the plates do not always build back right. This can lead to a single discharge killing a battery's performance.
-excessive vibrations: You toss the battery around inside the car, the plates will move and it can cause an internal problem and cause a cell to short out, killing the battery.
-excessive heat/cold: This is hard on any battery and its chemical reactions.
-luck of the draw: In the US, batteries are made on 1 of 2 assembly lines (yes, I know there are 100's of different brands, but look at the plastic cases, only 2 styles exist). You have Johnson Controls and Exide. All batteries come from one of these companies with the "manufacturers sticker" added to the outside. Sometimes you get one that had care taken when it was put together. Sometimes you get one that didn't get that. I have seen batteries dead right on the shelf. The only difference in the batteries is the warrantee. The exception to this is the spiral wound batteries, but that is a different story all in itself.

To make a battery last as long as possible, the only thing I have found to do is to prevent it from undergoing unplanned discharges and to not jump the vehicle (ie, have the wheels of the vehicle leave the ground). With the discharges, note that 10 words ago, I said "unplanned discharges". I do recommend say every 6 months, you turn on the car (engine off) and run the car on the battery with say the radio only going for an hour or so. You want to drain the battery to the point that the car is just able to start itself. After the car is started, take it out for a drive for 20ish minutes to top up the battery. What this does is get rid of what is called "mossing". Mossing is a growth that extends off of one plate and builds towards its opposing plate. The mossing grows enough that it touches a positive and negative plate. BOOM. The battery is dead because a cell just got shorted out. This minor discharge wtih a decent recharge rate by the alternator breaks up this mossing and knocks it back.

If you are suspecting that you have an internal problem with your car, this is what I will tell you to do. Get your hands on a multimeter. You are going to set up the multimeter to measure current (the A scales on the multimeter, make sure to move the leads to the proper ports too). You are then going to disconnect the negative battery terminal. You will then connect the red lead to the battery terminal and the black lead to the battery post (tape it in place). Then get into the car and with all other electronics/electrical stuff turned off, turn the car to the RUN position (DO NOT START!!!!!!!), then back to OFF and get out of the car and lock the doors. Look at the multimeter. In a matter of a minute, you should see the multimeter drop down to something less than 0.020 amps (or 20 mA, depending on the scale you select). If you are up around say 0.1 (or 100 mA), then you have something that is not turning off like it should and that is putting an excessive drain on your battery. Once you get the reading, reattach the negative battery terminal and use your data as appropriate.

 

Hey everyone Mikexfctr here. I just want to thank all of you for your feedback and information. I really appreciate it. So I ended up replacing the throttle control the throttle and both of the electronic components on the sides of it the right and left side. I also replaced all the fuses and relays. And I replaced the mass air flow sensor. Got the car running it accelerates and it drives. It runs really rough however and I'm continuing to show a fouling on plug 3. Now while I was working on the car some rats got into the engine and I believe they chewed a wire on that sector of the car under the manifold and that's why I'm showing the misfire. I don't have any other explanation for it and I didn't have that problem before all this started. I'm going to pull the manifold tomorrow and replace all the coils and spark plugs on that side and hopefully that resolves a problem. What a damn nightmare this has been I'm really lucky that I didn't have to take it in and or spend thousands of dollars on getting this done actually the only money I spent so far was at Pick-A-Part to get the the throttle control and the throttle mechanism. Again thank you for your feedback keep on trucking or keep on JAGGING rather.

 

Mike,

Thanks for posting the outcome to your battery misconnection. Too often a question is asked on the forum, advice is given but we never get to hear the end of the story.

Good luck with resolving the misfire following the 'rat feast'. As this is a separate issue, best pursued in a new thread if you need to post further questions about it.

Graham

 

The moral of this story is to MARK CABLES before disconnecting them from a car that works, and CHECK them before reconnecting.

It may seem obvious that a battery is the right fit, but a closer look can show that terminal polarity is reversed between one battery and another -- this happens with MOST battery sizes! And the battery makers don't always mark them clearly enough to prevent accidents. When buying a new battery, don't just go by the guide at the store, look to see that the "+" and "-" are in the same places on the new one.

 

But, of note, normally the posts are made a different size. So, putting the terminals on backwards is normally something that you have to fight with it some to make it work. The exception to this is the ones that have the flat terminals that you need to send a bolt into the case. But the batteries with the stick up posts, they should be different sizes to prevent just this thing.

 

You can attach the big cable end to the small terminal. If you do, then just touch the other lead even if you can't attach it, you can do a lot of damage.