lol what you can have a super easy super strong diff swap with 0 fabrication and 0 imagination

8.9 JK gears + trip to the driveshaft shop and you’re ready for double that

 

Ok, so I'm at a decision point here and it will impact how I go about pulling the engine.

The hole in the back side of the engine head, I'm assuming that's where the lifting eyes bolt into. What's the size of that threaded hole?

I'd prefer to pull the engine complete and dismantle on a stand, though it's likely easier to dismantle partially in the car and use the head studs to lift it out. I'm preferring pulling complete so I know how to stab it back in there once it's back together. The downside of pulling complete would be that I'm thinking it would be pretty easy to scratch up the charge air coolers.

What are the pros and cons of doing it either way?

 

Well, I'd opted to pull the blower and charge air coolers, the plumbing and a lot of the wiring today. So far the only thing unintentionally broken was the EGR tube from the manifold to the valve, though the car has always had this exhaust ticking sound and I'm wondering if that wasn't already broken and the source of the sound. It always went away once the engine was warmed up, so perhaps that was the culprit? The hoses were all ready for replacement, with some appearing to perish internally. All of the plastic tubes with the Norma connectors are ready for replacement, with the exception of the one that runs from the PCV to the drivers side cam cover. I'm not sure if that's a replaceable clip on the PCV side, is there anyone that can confirm if it can be replaced? It has a crimp style connector (single ear?) rather than the usual quick connect clamps.

Tomorrow will yield a trip to the local Ace/ Home Depot/ Lowes to try to find a matching large metric bolt for the rear of the heads. There was a bracket on the passenger side that had an 18mm head on it, and as long as I can get two of them that are maybe 1.5-2" long, I should be able to slide some spacers and large chain in and use those as the lift points for the rear of the engine.

In total, I'd estimate about 12 hours in to get to this point, and with any luck could have the engine on a stand tomorrow evening after work.

 

If you’re pulling the blower and intercoolers out while the engine is still in the car, remove the lower intake manifolds as well. Now you have 10 easy to get at holes to choose from in the heads for attaching your chain or other lifting mechanisms to. I’ve used those vs the large bolts on the back of the heads for years and not once did I have a problem with it. I would just make sure the bolts are long enough to go all the way down with having gone through the chain is about the only thing I’d make sure of. Also, you’ll have a lot more clearance for your lifting device using the intake port bolts vs the bolts on the back of the heads.

 

Finally got around to getting the engine out of the car and stripped down. Thankfully the damage was confined to the #1 cylinder, though I've yet to pull the bed plate and connecting rod bearing caps. I certainly didn't see anything beautiful in the oil pans besides big pieces of what used to be a bearing. I'm assuming both #1 and #2 rods are trashed and will likely have to replace the crank, as I can push the #1 piston .25" in either direction.

Big thanks to @Addicted2boost for the tip on using the lower intake bolts once the lower plenums were removed, that gave me a lot of leverage and had the engine out in a matter of minutes!

 

Glad it worked out for you. Saves a lot of time that way.

Did you plan on taking the engine to the machine shop to see if they could repair it? At minimum, I’d take the crank and rod over to them to see if it can be salvaged. 20 years ago when I pulled the engine in my grand national, I spun a rod bearing. They were able to machine the crank and rods 10 thousandths and just install new king engine bearings. Still runs good to this day but, I digress. The Jaguar bearings are ordered by the color. The more I think about it, the more I think you should take it to a reputable machine shop and let them tell you if the engine is salvageable. One thing to take into consideration... just be honest with the services you’ve done and if you just ran it low on oil, overheated it or just ran it hard a lot if/when you see them. It sounds like you’ll need at least one new piston but, I can’t tell over words on a screen.

Assuming your 03’ XJR has the original engine, your primary timing chains will already have the Morse chains in it. I believe the 2 smaller secondary timing chains are the roller style but, maybe someone can chime in with their knowledge about that.

Report back here with anymore information you may have.

 

Plenty of pics to come shortly.

Got the bed plate off and pulled the rod bearings on #1-2 - #1 was non-existent and deep wear into the bearing cap and rod itself. The crank has a good .125" or so worn out of the journal, so I'm going to consider it trashed and pick up a second hand one from car-part.com along with pistons/ rods for #1-2 cylinders. Even though I've got the tools to measure the crank journals and cylinder bores, it seems most prudent at this point to take the remnants to the local shop that used to do all the head and engine jobs for the local Jag dealer. Hopefully the cylinders aren't scored and the block is salvageable. The cylinders, from what I can see at least, look to be in good shape with no grooves or damage, but there are tools that will determine that better than my eyes.

I do recall my '03 had the Morse chains and I'd already planned on replacing those sprockets along with all of the other timing components. Interestingly enough, when the dealer that maintained the car replaced the tensioners a little over 20k miles ago, they only did the secondaries. The primaries actually looked quite good, but the guides were trashed and cracked/ chipped all over the place. I didn't see much evidence of plastic in the pickup screen or pans, but that doesn't mean much to me given that there's an entire disintegrated bearing in there... As long as the block is salvageable, and the replacement crank/ rods are good, I'd think the engine could be back together pretty quickly.

I did notice that the EGR tube was cracked, presumably never repaired under the TSB, and I'd surmise what was leading to the exhaust ticking I was hearing when cold that disappeared when at operating temp. Luckily there are cheap ones available.

Aside from perishables (hoses, tubes, seals, pulley bearings), anything else worth replacing while apart to this extent? Water pump looked good, supercharger is probably ready for some cleaning and an oil change, and most everything else seems in good order.

 

Update - My engine and my donor engine are both completely dismantled and I've got all of the parts to completely rebuild mine. My heads were trashed (metal in cam bearing journals left deep grooves in both cams and bearings), big end bearings on all rods were trash, #1 rod was trashed, as well as the crank and oil pump. With the exception of the oil pump, all other internals were swapped from the donor to my engine, and all parts are out at the machine shop undergoing ultrasonic cleaning and having all tolerances checked. All exterior engine pieces, with the exception of the Eaton and intercoolers, are all at the shop for the same treatment. Some cleaning with an aircraft metal cleaner should do the trick on the intercoolers and blower, with the engine looking nearly perfectly new when reassembly is complete.

A question that I've got for the folks that have done it before - I see that tool JD 229 is used for the removal and installation of the rear main seal. Given that the engine is apart, can I install the seal on the crank at this time without using the tool, as the bedplate and block are not yet joined together? Or will that present sealing issues once the block and bedplate are bolted together and torqued down?

 

I don’t know about that JD tool but, you will most definitely want to wait until after the engine is reassembled until the rear main oil seal is installed. You don’t want anything to affect the torquing of the bed plate.

What are you using for bearings and piston rings?

 

Will know more about bearings and rings once everything comes back from the machine shop.

I saw one of your previous posts on another thread that the Corteco seal includes the install tool, if that's the case then I'll order up one of those as well and just swap the seal with the new genuine one that I found.

 

It’s not quite an install tool but more of a guide. It still needs to be installed straight. And to the proper depth.