Hi. I recently acquired my new to me 95 XJ6. 74k miles garage kept one owner car. It is everything I hoped for & I love it. I've straightened out a number of little issues. One thing that needed attention was the alignment. I had it aligned & it only needed a toe-in adjustment & a tire rotation to steer properly but one annoyance remains. When I'm on a rutted road the car wants to climb out of the ruts & I must correct constantly. I've tried different tire pressures but that did not make any noticeable change. I adjusted the toe one flat more "in' on each side & that seemed to help. I hesitate to go further to avoid over doing it. Has anyone conquered this problem?
n_sweeney

 

The XJRs are notorious for their tramlining. The regular XJ6s, not so much. I'm a bit surprised to hear it, to be honest.

What size tires do you have? The lower profile tires often play a big role in tramlining problems and of course tread design and overall tire condition play in as well.

Besides tracking/alignment....which you seem to have a handle on....make sure the wheel bearings don't have any slop. I take mine right down to "zero" rather than the traditional "trace" of free play.

Cheers
DD

 

Doug,
Thanks for the response.
The car has Pirelli P4000 225/60 ZR16s on sport lattice wheels. I know the tires are stock and the wheels are Jaguar wheels so I don't think there is any offset difference in the wheels. The pressures are currently 32 psi in the front & 34 in the rear. I tried 28/30 but it didn't make a noticeable difference. I would guess the tires are 5+ years old because the car was driven so little. The tires look good with regards to wear.

So far I just gave the front suspension a visual check & it all looks OK. Prior to the alignment I put on new Monroe Eurospec shocks up front because the top foam bushings were shot. (It did the same thing with the old shocks) This weekend I'm going to really go over the front end with a fine tooth comb. I'll reset the front wheel bearings & watch the steering & suspension move while it is under load on my ramps. Anything that shows lost motion will get replaced. I'll check toe-in carefully to see if I can go any further with that.
Regards,
Ned

 

I spent some hours this weekend sorting this out. I checked the entire front suspension with the car on ramps running with my wife rocking the steering wheel back & forth. I found everything to be very good but one thing. The rack was floating side to side 1/4" in the rubber support bushings. I made two GFT spacers, 1/8" for each side. After installing these the play was gone. Next I checked the wheel bearings. They were too tight. The right side was actually preloaded & the left was lightly set at 0.000" end-play. I reset both to .0005". Less than the minimum but I'm pretty familiar with these types of things & I'm confident it won't be a problem. I fashioned a precise set of straightedges to check my toe settings & found the car to be set a bit more toe-in than allowed. (I was able to measure the toe in by utilizing my CAD program to schematically lay out the suspension geometry. I converted the minutes of degrees into actual measurements.) In the end, I reset the toe settings to exactly neutral, i.e. dead straight ahead. What I have now rather than trammeling is a small dead spot in the center position. the car doesn't really trammel anymore but it now has a bit of play at steering center. I've searched around & I've found no mention from other x300 owners of play in the rack. Has anyone ever dealt with this problem? Can the pinion backlash be reset in the rack & pinion unit? Should I be looking at a new rack?

 

I had the same problem with my '97 Sport. I bought it with near new Pirelli P6000's on the front and 60% worn ones on the back. On recommendation from someone who seriously knows his tyres I ended up swapping all 4 for new Toyo Teo's and the handling has been perfect ever since, including quieter ride. I don't think Pirelli's are up to the job despite the image the brand seems to have.

Best wishes,
Tony.

 

Jagent,
Did you have trammeling or center play or both?
n_sweeney

 

To clarify, are you talking about actual physical free play, or a more subjective lack of response immediately off-center?

If the latter try dialing in more caster.

I've never been happy with the steering feel on my XJR....and my ownership goes back to 30k miles so I tend to doubt that unusual wear would've been a factor at that point. I wonder if the electronic variable assist enters in to this? I've often meant to unplug it just to see if anything changes.

Anyhow, I always ask that caster be set to the max allowed spec and the steering feels better...but still not like my older Jags

Cheers
DD

 

My problem was tramlining, and it was pretty bad. No signs of play in the rack.

You might be interested in an extensive buyers-guide article on the X300 in the March 2011 issue of "Jaguar World" (British magazine, easy to get back copies - just google..). It gives a heap of info on the characteristics of the model. It specifically mentions (quote) "...the front suspension design is extremely prone to tramlining if all is not in tip top condition and correctly aligned..." further re. tyres (quote) "...don't be disappointed to find Falkens or other less prestigious brands in place of the original Pirelli's, as many owners found them not only excessively hard but also prone to increasing the tram lining effect..."

As I said, the Toyo's have eliminated my tramlining. When fitted I had a professional front alignment done. All cars vary slightly, but mine is running the following settings (we are metric in this country!):

LF Toe in 2.6mm
RF Toe in 2.4mm
LF camber -0 51
RF camber -0 18
Left castor 4 14
Right castor 3 54

 

I read the magazine for years and the x300 series seems to have a "name" in this issue. A lot of people had the same. they changed the brand and took a set of new tyres and gained a much better ride. I myself ride Semperit in winter and rode Dunlops in summer. But still a little tramlining on worn roads is feelable.