So my wife and I took our 3 month old daughter on a 2900 mile road trip to the Mt. Rushmore area of South Dakota. To those whom haven't been there yet or haven't been there in 25 years or more you need to go.
I was looking forward to this for 2 reasons. First it was my 1st trip to Mt. Rushmore and the 2nd was a long road trip in the Jag.

The car ran flawlessly the entire trip including driving in Custer State Park with where I had the transmission in 3 and even 2 low to both climb and descend the very steep roads in that park. It was a lot of fun driving in that very beautiful park.

That wasn't the only place where I was using the low gears of the tranny to go up and down the mountain roads. Being from Wisconsin we don't have any mountain roads to deal with so these were fun to learn on.

During the 2900 mile trip around 2500 of them were highway miles traveled at mostly either 75 mph or 80 mph. My XJ6 now has 135,000 miles on it and averaged 24.3 mpg for the entire 2900 miles with the average speed coming out to 58.2 mph.
Again the car was awesome the whole trip. And it still looked beautiful even with the BEAR POOP I accidently drove through in Bear Country USA.

Only 2 issues with the car the whole way. It used a qt. of oil during the trip which I won't complain about with that many high speed miles. And the cassette player on the stock radio decided to quit which meant no ipod for the return trip.

Custer State Park, Mt. Rushmore.
The Badlands were neat.
Devils Tower and Crazy Horse were only OK.
I hope this encourages people to visit this area in Jags soon.

 

Nice photos. Thanks for sharing. Bummer 'bout the cassette. That is also my current In_Car_Entertainment / Navigation system!

Took my X300 on a slightly shorter (~2700 mi) trek this summer; I and 3 of the 5 kids from TX to KY to see my parents, then down to the FL panhandle to meet wife and other 2 kids coming from TX in her S-type. About a week between the in-laws and their beach-house then the lads and I (3 kids, again, but I swapped a 9 yr old daughter for 16 yr old son to go with bro's 17 and 12 that made the KY trip) brought the X300 home for other committments while the ladies stayed-on for a couple weeks more.

Only 23 mpg avg for me, also a quart of oil, but I expected that. Kids complained because they are used to the personnel and luggage space of the Excursion on x-country trips. I was quite happy with the change in comfort, ride, handling and noise reduction, however.

 

I too very much enjoyed the ride, quiet and all around comfort in the XJ. I do need to find a new radio. Looking for something that i can connect to my ipod and hopefully still use the 6 disc cd player. Any help guys?

By the way aholbro1 you need to bring the cj7 back to life! My CJ7 is my #1 baby.

 

Do a search, there are a couple of guys here who've gone aftermarket, BT and what-not and have posted pics....just can't remember who off hand. I prefer the look of the OEM, myself..though BT connectivity is a huge plus. Here are some helpful items if you decide to go aftermarket:

Fascia panel:
Autoleads FP-14-00 - Jaguar XJ6, XJ12, Sovereign upto 1997 Fascia Trim Panel

ISO Harness:
Autoleads PC2-55-4 - Jaguar Sovereign, XJ6, XK8, XKR, XJ-V8, XJ12 Wiring Harness

Also, search the "Audio" section of the forum because I believe I recall someone doing one over there that wasn't here in the x300 section. One more, vaguely remember a link to an installation on Crutchfield's website...but it may've been an x308.

If only your cassette has crapped out...assuming your only use for it was for the adapter to connect phone/mp3/iPod..then you may want to consider fitting a Parrot MKI9200. I put one in my daughter's S-type and I really like it. Have toyed with the idea of getting the ISO harness above and cutting the car-side of the radio plugs off one in the wrecking yard to make a jumper.....but my adapter is working 4.0 and I'm not yet ready to give up my auto-volume-increase with speed change!

Yeah, don't I know it!!! One-owner veh...I've had it since new! Original plan was to have it completed by now....when I was 15, in 1976, I started a body-off-frame restoration of a 1946 CJ-2A and completed when I was 16 or 17. So toward the end of my eldest son's 15th yr, I decided he should have the pleasure of restoring a 30 yr old Jeep like dad and then he could drive it during his HS years and we could find him something nice (I mean, "with airconditioning") for college. He jumped right in and started destructing...Body tub is ready to lift off frame, now..front end except grill is off. BUt he ran off to church camp, I got busy with work, and got moved to the main office that is a considerably longer commute, and, and, et al...there she sits. He's 17 and a Sr. now...so maybe I can execute the plan with the middle kid, his 16.5 yr old bro.

Nice looking Jeep on your profile page! I got my 360 because I had to buy it to get the exhaust manifolds after the headers rusted out on my 304. (If I only had all the stock parts I took off and threw away or lost.....) Wasn't sure how much room I'd have when moving to TX some years ago and so decided the 360 just always seemed to be a better mill than the 304 so I swapped it in and left the 304 with my indy-jeep-mechanic in Winchester, KY to find a good home / as a tip.

 

Great pics, thanks for sharing. Would love to see that part of the country!

 

Thanks for the pics , good to read you have good times

 

Thanks for the replies guys. It was a great vacation, just hoping others will go and enjoy it to.


Thanks for the links to this stuff aholbro1. Haven't done any car audio stuff myself. But if I can learn to do all the stuff I've learned working on my CJ7 I can probably handle this. Just need to find what I want.
The volume knob is starting to go bad. When attempting to make a small change because of volume differences in songs on an ipod (which I really hate) you never know whether the imediate change will be in the same direction that you turned the knob or the opposite. After a couple more clicks of the knob it will then go in the right direction but I feel it is a sign of things to come.

2 winters ago a friend from my 4 wheeling club helped me rebuild the 360 from an 89 wagoneer. Then in the spring he and another friend helped my do the engine swap in the next early spring. The old 304 was worn out. It badly failed a compression test and the first friend said "It cost just as much to rebuild a 360 as it does a 304. So why not get more power while you're at it?" How could I argue with such wisdom? Once I put a new exhaust on it I couldn't believe the power increase. This winter we should be doing a TBI conversion to get rid of the carb. I hope!

Couple pics, one just wheeling and the other the 360 before going into the jeep. It was clean then!

Time really is the hardest thing to have enough of. Especially with kids. Fun vehicles tend to loose out to the kids.

BTW I could probably find you a buyer if you ever wanted to sell your Excursion. Those motors are awesome! Very coveted.

 

Very appropriate add moderators!

Well there was an add for visiting South Dakota and a pic of Mt Rushmore.

 

A great trick is to buy stereo unit w/ remote and put it under the seat. You'd have your CD inside the cabin and all what else you need including bluetooth.