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The local Jaguar dealer (for sixty years called themselves Checkered Flag Jaguar, now gone to the Lexus naming convention: Jaguar of Virginia Beach) bought 42 brand-new XF P300 R-Dynamic SE units that were stuck on the pier in Southampton. Never driven, delivered two weeks ago via Baltimore. 2024 MSRP varied between $59000 (Fuji White ones) and $42000 (Ebony -- used to be anthracite for our X308s): offered at $38000 to $41000. Five year warranty, five years service (their new every two year oil service plus walk around!).
Like Porsche, Jag has f***ed up with the swing to all electric. Brand is in the toilet and needing Crown assistance to stay in production. Fortunately, the other side of the company is doing well again (all senior UK public servants get the use of their own RR), and the 4cyl petrol Ingenium engine used by JLR appears bullet proof. The P300 has a higher compression ratio to achieve 296 HP on premium (hence the 300 designation).
It would be nice to stick with Jags: but not electric. Nice ride; more room than my base unit (the 'kids' call it the 'Bandaid"), much bigger trunk -- but that crappy start/stop nonsense.
Temporal issue: one side of the brain says this is a onetime good deal; do it! The other side, says "nah," you love Bandaid which is running like brand new . . .
Appreciate letting me think aloud.
I would never have thought about such a comparison.
The XE is for me just a daily. Sure a very nice car, but for me just a car to use four years and replace by the newer model.
^
Agreed... I think the marque lost me with offerings that weren't identifiable without reading the name plates. They're not "bad cars" but they could just as easily be badged as Audi's or Hyundai's or Cadillacs and they wouldn't be perceived any differently.
Decided to keep the Bandaid (F56714): after three years just about all issues have been cared for (still using 3/16 staples to hold the headliner; haven't got around to replacing the inside latch cable on the right rear door -- have to remove the ****ing window!; 50c sized speaker for turn signal intermittent); she's running like new. Why change? X260 too tight in the front seat for my long legs; wife wants an SUV if we buy another . . . Bottom line: I like my X308 more. Wife noted: "You have made this mistake twice before . . ."
I couldn't find an appropriate speaker in the US to fit the column "ding" one. https://www.ebay.com/itm/255421651076
Ended up ordering one of these and soldering the wire from the old speaker to it.
Works fine, clipped straight in. Stupid metric size.
Added a couple ounces of gas to the aircon tonight, which was struggling during the day, particularly at idle. It was just about making 130psi at idle with ambient 84f. It's now back to being chilly cold. One of the flexible pipe to solid line crimps is showing signs of weeping so that'll be the fault. I can deal with a couple ounces lost over a year.
Next issue is to find out which backup sensor has quit. Occasionally it'll work but more often than not it'll just emit a solid beep for a couple seconds.
I had a thought, my spectrum analyzer should be able to pick up the ultrasound clicks. Hopefully the failed one isn't clicking and I can find it that way.
Phil
Update: I went outside, put the car in reverse and the system beeped error. All four transducers are emitting ultrasound pulses so that doesn't help any. Does anybody know if there's a sane method to troubleshoot the Audi system that's in the trunk?
Last edited by Philip_A; Apr 27, 2026 at 09:00 PM.
The local Jaguar dealer (for sixty years called themselves Checkered Flag Jaguar, now gone to the Lexus naming convention: Jaguar of Virginia Beach) bought 42 brand-new XF P300 R-Dynamic SE units that were stuck on the pier in Southampton. Never driven, delivered two weeks ago via Baltimore. 2024 MSRP varied between $59000 (Fuji White ones) and $42000 (Ebony -- used to be anthracite for our X308s): offered at $38000 to $41000. Five year warranty, five years service (their new every two year oil service plus walk around!).
Like Porsche, Jag has f***ed up with the swing to all electric. Brand is in the toilet and needing Crown assistance to stay in production. Fortunately, the other side of the company is doing well again (all senior UK public servants get the use of their own RR), and the 4cyl petrol Ingenium engine used by JLR appears bullet proof. The P300 has a higher compression ratio to achieve 296 HP on premium (hence the 300 designation).
It would be nice to stick with Jags: but not electric. Nice ride; more room than my base unit (the 'kids' call it the 'Bandaid"), much bigger trunk -- but that crappy start/stop nonsense.
Temporal issue: one side of the brain says this is a onetime good deal; do it! The other side, says "nah," you love Bandaid which is running like brand new . . .
Appreciate letting me think aloud.
Stay with what you love... Most modern cars have no soul too...
Appears that I have remedied the sensors. Rear left was causing the beep, so added a spare and that made the system slightly happier. Center left wasn't doing much of anything so that got the old one and now it seems to sort of work properly.
I think fixing the leaks in the cats on my XJR has found some extra MPGs, which is a very nice thing. It's showing 14.9mpg after normal running around on the current tankful & a lot of that was an hour & half in stop start traffic today. It'd have been down at near 11MPG previously. I can only assume too much O2 getting to the post cat sensors was affecting fuel trims, I'll have to stick a scanner on & see what they read out of interest. They were always +5-7% before.
There has been so many other collateral difficulties in this job that I'm amazed that it is in this stage now. In fact it is passed the picture now. But not much.
Interesting, I'd assumed the nearer to zero the better. Maybe it's because I feed it cheap fuel? I keep saying I'll try the posh stuff in it but never have. I know that's worth about 10% MPG in my bikes of varying ages so maybe it'll help here too.
That is really bad gas mileage, still. Imperial gallons are bigger than US gallons and most of us in the Colonies are averaging 18 USmpg around town at 24 mph. You are running way too rich.
That is really bad gas mileage, still. Imperial gallons are bigger than US gallons and most of us in the Colonies are averaging 18 USmpg around town at 24 mph. You are running way too rich.
Yeah, just the 8 in mine but it'll do 17-19 around town and 21-23 highway, and that's not being overly gentle driving it either. Always aircon.
Changing the oxygen sensors helped the mileage by 15% or so.
SIlicon sprayed the side mirrors mechanism. It looks improved but still very noisy and when in the most extreme positions looks the motor has no power. Is it time to change?
