Has anyone ever tried to make the XF front fender "power vents" or "front fender moulding" or "louvers" (or whatever else they've officially been called by Jaguar) "more" functional like those of the F-Type SVR and F-Pace SVR? I haven't seen them in person, but I've seen a few videos that show the F-Type SVR's plastic wheel well liner heat extraction slats which channel air through the side vent, which on XFs (and probably most other Jags) is mostly cosmetic. I get that it's probably just to help cool the brakes, but they clearly added it for some reason.

I know engineers from Ford had said that they closed the vents before the rear wheels on the older Mustangs because they caused whistling, but I wouldn't think that air flowing out of the XF vents would be too bad? Plus, I'm not sure if I really even believe that answer from Ford. Obviously, there's a lot at play in doing something like that, but I HATE purely/mostly cosmetic vents and I'm half attempted to try it by cutting some slats into the back of my plastic wheel well liners. It looks like on my car that the black plastic pieces inside of the side vents actually have real holes in them, which I can only slightly see through with them still installed, so it seems like some air ends up going through there anyway, even if it's not a huge amount. And, I'd bet that they'd be pretty easy to completely remove from the vents, if needed. In addition to cutting slats into the wheel well liners, one should potentially also cut a few holes into the inner sheet metal of the front fender and behind the vents (which no one would ever see) for much better flow. There's a long foam piece blocking that area on the driver-side of my car (which I removed for the pix below), but it took exactly two seconds to remove. Another possible deterrent for some might be the blockage of air flow due to the washer fluid reservoir on the passenger side, but I'd probably just completely remove that, as I never use my washers anyway, and it seems like air could still easily even go around it, if left in place.

I should probably just worry about everything else on my XFR plate right now, and I'm not saying it would even be worth it, as it could end up causing havoc for a few reasons. But, since everyone was always searching for additional cooling, it wouldn't be too invasive, it would mostly be easily/cheaply reversible, there are already air flow slats on the front part of the XF plastic wheel well liners to channel air to the auxiliary radiators, there are already holes in the side vents, and there's a precedent set by Jaguar on the SVRs, I was just curious if anyone had ever done it. Maybe even just start by removing the long foam pieces on each side to see what happens?

Additional thoughts?


F-Type SVR Wheel Well Heat Extraction


Above Pic: First gen XF side vent black plastic piece


Above Pic: First gen XF side vent black plastic piece


Above Pic: First gen XF side vent black plastic piece


Above Pic: First gen XF front fender


Above Pic: My first gen XFR front fender, driver-side (inside) with foam piece removed


Above Pic: My first gen XFR front fender, passenger-side (inside) with washer fluid reservoir in the way


Above Pic: My first gen XFR front fender vent, passenger-side

 

IIRC, from when I was looking at fender vent compatibility between Jags, the only fenders that were open (kinda) were the ones on the XK and XKR from 2007-2010. The only functional vents from the factory were on the 2006-2007 XJ Portfolio. I don't think there was anything behind them, but maybe a parts search and/or a PM to Herculesuk1/Beavis who converted his XJ or alecescolme (he bought it from him) would help. They're both on this site & the UK one. Hope that helps