Hi chaps. My X Type has been standing for about 18 months and battery gone flat. Tried unlocking with key and the small lever on locking system moves in and out but I still cannot open the door.

 

Your Baby is just giving you a bad time for ignoring it for 18 months!

Alas, atlastajag: you have come to the right place.

There are three recommendations usually made:

1) Jack the car up, slide underneath and hook a battery Positve (+) jumper cable to the battery cable post on the starter. Then, hook the Negative (-) jumper cable to a bolt or frame part. Slide back out from under the car, and using a good charged battery, hook the Positive cable to it first, then the Negative cable. Turn the key, the door should open and that will allow you to open the hood (Bonnet) to charge or replace the battery;

2) Reach up under the front of the car on both sides, one at a time, and find the right and left Hook Latch Cables, and slowly pull each one until each side disengages. Having someone push down on the hood just a bit should make the cables operate a bit easier. Search the X-Type forum here for "Hood Won't Open" for specifics on where to wend your arm up through and what to feel for.

3) Pry the top of the door gently open enough to stuff something smooth in it, too keep the gap open (you can bend it out quite a bit without damage). Fish a hooked wire into the car interior and go fishing for the door handle. Crude, as the wire will be slapping around the interior as you do so, but effective enough that thieves use that method most of the time.

Once you gain access to the battery, absolutely resist the temptation to simply jump it and start it, as the electronics on our cars are so finicky and sensitive you may well blow out a computer (or worse) with the extreme current draw that dead battery will take.

Replace the battery, or at the very least slow charge it for a day or two before attempting to turn it over. A "Battery Maintainer" would be an excellent investment, and one might even charge the battery back up in a manner that will allow you to save it (they use a very complicated charging scheme, with high-frequency pulses, de-gassing rituals, "hot & cold" rates, etc).

* If you do not replace that 18-month-dead battery, you will be back here in the forum later, asking questions like these: "My Check Engine Light came on and won't go off", "Why am I getting all these weird trouble codes?", "My X-Type was running fine, and then it lost all power until I turned it off and then back on. I was almost hit on the side of the motorway as I had to pull off the road".

**While you're waiting for it to recharge, run back and forth to the gas station to buy more than a couple of gallons of fresh Grade A High Octane gasoline to pour into the tank. The stale gas in there now could likely cause you some grief if you try driving on it alone, even just to the gas station.

*** CHANGE THE OIL AND FILTER OUT! I'd warm the engine up well before dropping it, just to get any moisture out of the nooks and cranny's.

**** WASH AND WAX YOUR BABY! It is considered a true sin around these parts to drive a dusty or soiled Jaguar in public.

Good luck, and please do come back and let us know what and how you did.

It would be excellent if you photographed each step, and wrote a "How-to" that could be posted here in the forum for the next person with the same question as yours.

Welcome to the forum!

 

Thanks, Bruce.


How is the panel under the engine compartment fixed to the bodywork?
If the locking handle above the interior opening handle moves why does the door not unlock mechanically ? Is there an electrical lock on the door also?

 

The plastic panels are just screwed to the frame and body. Easy to remove.

The door locks are "electric over mechanical", they need juice to make them work, unless you are inside and push the unlock lever.

If you hook that unlock lever with a wire through the door jamb and can move it, you'll be able to enter the car. A jumper to the starter battery bolt is probably 2nd easiest, and unlatching both side of the hood from below the most difficult, methinks.