Hey all!
I picked up my "new" 2014 XJL last week and am itching to drive her but out of an abundance of caution I did a pressure test on the coolant system and found a leak on the thermostat housing. I ordered the upgrade V3 kit from Euro-Amp as I intend on replacing all the cooling system with the metal design at some point but just want to be able to drive her until I get time to devote to the job.

I Went through and installed the new thermostat in the kit and then realized my XJ had the older thermostat housing without the thermal element / sensor... the unit is otherwise identical..

Does anyone know if I can run this or do I need to buy another thermostat without the sensor? Appreciate your help!
Thanks
James

 

If your car does not have the additional sensor then you can install what you have and just leave the wire dangling.
Just so everyone knows the 3.0L thermostat housing came two ways. With the sensor and without. Looks like the 5.0L came without one. Both engines use the same thermostat housing.
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Awesome! That's what I was hoping... really didn't want to do that again so soon!

 

I think your good to go BUT post some pictures of your car and what your doing? We love to see pictures!
You were wise to just go a head and replace the plastic stuff with metal too. This is the main weakness in these engines.
Did you do the rear water manifold as well?
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I heard back from Euro-Amp and he said the updated housing with sensor would not function as intended on my Jag.. so I bought a sensorless one just to be safe.

My 2014 has the newer Cooling pipes, so not what came with it.. no mention of the job in the carfax, however in 2021 the water pump was replaced by Jaguar, wondering if they did the newer pipes at the same time?

I have used an inspection cam to check the rear for leaks as well as the oil cooler and updated pipes, all seem in good shape although the rear crossover pipe is hard to see. While I will be doing the entire job of replacing all the pipes with the metal ones at some point, I was hoping on holding off for a few weeks and just doing pressure tests once a month... Of course people have horror stories of pipes going and bricking their engine but I wonder how common that is, or if the majority of the time it's a slower leak that goes unchecked until catastrophic failure?

I have the metal crossover for the rear, apparently those tend to leak from the sensor, seems O-Rings can get mashed up when the sensor is installed if theres burs that go unchecked.. only way I can think of ruling that out is to remove the sensor, but doing so will also introduce more chance of reducing effectiveness on the seal...

 

Thermostat with sensor wire zip tied up.

 

Thanks for the feedback but what is different?
Still trying to track that down? Hard to see how a screw in sensor would keep the thermostat from operating properly but who knows?
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I agree, I couldn't determine what was different.. Euro-Amp said to send the unit back for a refund / replacement.. you'd think it'd be in their best interest in this case to say it's fine to leave as is if that were the case... Unless it's just a matter of being safe?

I will take photos of the two units side by side when I remove it... I may as well have the correct unit I guess.

The element's purpose is to open the thermostat determined by the ECU over the purely mechanical method... by which process would that be achieved? What trigger in the housing would cause the thermostat to open outside of it's original design? Maybe the presence of the element when not operating is actually a barrier to water flow somehow?

 

Ok having both side by side I think I can see the issue. I think it would still work but maybe not as optimal as the intended one. The channel has freer flow to the thermostat in the older design, which is probably not a factor in the updated one as the computer can manually open the thermostat.

 

Good pictures and maybe we are getting closer?
How does the sensor act to open or close the thermostat?

Here is my metal version taken apart. This is the no sensor version.







Maybe if I could take apart one with the sensor I could figure it out?
With what you have posted I think I will go back and take mine apart again as it's still on the bench and do some more comparisons to your pictures.
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I'm returning this one so don't want to open it, but I will try to get a better picture or video of the port that flows in past the element. You can see it butt up against the bottom of the thermostat, so I wonder if it's more of a solenoid or actuator that pushes the thermostat open manually when prompted.

Once I get home from work I'll take some more pictures.

That being said, with the thermostat and bleed elbow which were leaking replaced, it looks like I may have a rear crossover pipe leak, so it looks like avoiding the big job for a few weeks is out of the question

 

Good luck and again there are a series of decisions to be made on how you want to do the rear water manifold?

This thread is quite good and I learned a lot when I did mine. I used the two piece version and drilled the passages out to full size and then used the factory seals in place of the O-rings that came with the manifold.
Rear Water Manifold

It conjunction with the rear water manifold is a small cooling hose that goes from the rear water manifold to a heater pipe on the passenger side of the engine. We now have a greatly simplified part for about 1/3 the cost of the original hose setup. Plus it eliminates a terribly hard bolt and bracket on the original expensive part. I think it's a worthwhile replacement.

Here is the stock hose. Note the big bracket and the mutli-piece construction. Complicated for sure. That bolt is a real pain and after doing it twice now I hope to never do it again!




Here is the much simpler and cheaper updated hose. I learned about this from someone on the F-Pace forum I think. As Jaguar never updated the old parts no one even knew about it!





Note it's a bit hard to see but this is the hose on the passenger side that has the heater bleed port if your looking for it in the engine compartment. Both of the above hose do have this port.
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Oh thanks for that! Did you run the metal crossover? Using the original style seals? AJ811600

Looks like the way to go. The pooling coolant could also not be from the rear crossover but from all my messing with the thermostat.. I really need to try and mop / vacuum everything up and then see if it occurs.

I bloody hate plumbing 😂🥴

 

Yes after Bydand got me squared away. I replaced the rear water manifold with the modified metal version using stock seals BUT I did not find out about the better/cheaper hose until I had done this work. I ran across it just by accident too.

So I have the shorter hose and it just has push connections on each end so when I get back to that part of the engine I will swap it out. Should not be too hard? Other than I will need to fight that bolt out one last time!
I have about 1500 miles on things so far without problems.
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As promised, some more close ups of the updated thermostat w/ element

 

Thanks for the good pictures and the "sensor" attaches to the thermostat itself on the pin end. Looks like it might in some way push the thermostat open before the coolant heats up? The sensor is powered and might move?
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