The easiest way, and the smartest way, in my opinion, is to get the complete steering column from a salvage yard. You can test the motors before you buy it. They run about 100 bucks to 300 bucks on ebay, and the same on car-parts.com. Disconnect your battery and remove your steering wheel and disconnect your connectors. Uninstall your current column, two front bolts, and two back bolts and all your connectors. Put the new one in and you are good to go, hopefully.

And thanks to Motorcarman for being so patient!

 

 

I need help with diagnosing a similar problem I have when steering column is in "auto" setting. When I turn off ignition, steering column retracts & raises correctly. After doing so, however, I hear a click, click, click sound which I assume is the motor trying to retract or raise the steering wheel beyond the limit. I can then stop the clicking by changing the setting from "auto" to "manual." Would this also be fixed by re-setting the position sensor? If so, is this a repair that a Jaguar dealer could do, or would they try to sell me an entire new column?

 

I have a 2002 XJR the steering column can be pulled in and out by hand, electric motor works but doesn't make wheel telescope. From what I read the gear not cable is broken, my question is I have a 1999 XJR are the steering wheels the same? Can I salvage parts from the
99?

 

All X308 columns with MEMORY POSITION will interchange.

 

Hey Fellas,
I bought the replacement reach cable from Coventry West and got on her today. It took a lot of what you guys posted as well as my own intuition about car repairs to get at this little bugger. One thing to add that may help, I had to use a magnet to extract the broken off piece of reach cable that was stuck in the drive assembly. I did not attempt ohming it out for alignment. I was just happy to get it to move to where I can now enter and exit the vehicle without hitting my knees. Thanks for all of your input everyone!

Broken reach cable

 

Can anyone help me figure out how to "drop steering column onto seat" to get at the reach motor cable? I loosened the two bolts near the bottom of the column that hold it up thinking it would allow the column to drop down to the seat, but it only drops about half an inch, and then is still held up by something, I don't know what (see photo of the bolts I loosened). Since the wheel was fully retracted when the cable broke, there is no access to the top of the column to get at the reach motor and cable without getting more clearance. I did search the forums, yet did not find the answer. Any help would be greatly appreciated! It is a 2001 XJ8 base model, 100K miles.

 

I tried this after buying the cable and never got any further than you. I read all the instructions and posts. I'm even a mechanic but not a pro. Race cars. Used to that is.

 

Thanks! That makes me feel better. I think I may have found the answer to the mystery -- the "upper steering column bracket bolts" may have to be loosened/removed to drop the upper column -- but as the Jag is my daily driver, the convenience of the reach motor is not worth the risk of losing the car unless I know for sure that removing those bolts will not mess things up (that the column won't catastrophically drop, or that the bolts will be impossible to work back into place afterwards, etc.).

Two horizontal bolts, 10mm heads, seem to connect the upper steering column to the upper bracket.

 

Those look like the silver screws like the one above the yellow circle in post #47. I didn't notice those or I would have possibly been successful. I've learned to live w/o it and the car is getting to the point that I don't care. It's tired.

 

To get at the reach motor to replace the cable you have to loosen the two top dashboard bolts then remove the two anchor bolts at the footwell end of the steering column. The steering column will then drop far enough to remove the reach motor. Read through my original article as a guide.

 

Thank you so much! However, my car is an XJ8 rather than an XK8, so the arrangement is a bit different, and other posts have suggested that the XJ8 can be done without removing the air bag or steering wheel, which is what I was hoping to do. Your description is great, though, for the XK!