Hi all,
I am going to bare my horrible jaguar abuse for all of you to read. Hopefully you will forgive me and help me undo my indiscretions...

My husband and I have a 1994 Jaguar XJ6 that was sold to us while we were attending university. We were poor college students (and as such really unfit to be jag owners as the dang thing got really expensive...) and one day without warning the motor seized up. A week or two previously I had noticed the oil gauge, and the car was indeed almost out of oil, although no light had gone off. We filled it up and continued on our way. Fast forward two weeks- no warning light, nothing. The car seizes up, and it had run out of oil. The mechanic told us the engine was basically worthless. Heartbroken, my husband had it towed to his parents garage, where it has sat for 5 years....

I cringe thinking about it now. Life has finally settled down enough between graduating, marriage, moving, jobs, etc and I realized that we still had a jaguar sitting in a garage.

I am not a purist, I would just like to get the car running again if possible. My husband loved that car and keeps putting off selling or parting it out, so I figured I might as well try to get the thing fixed up and surprise him with it

so my questions are
1. where would you even start?
2. what type of motor could I easily drop into it if the motor is indeed a fused piece of metal at this point? reliability and good gas mileage is a priority. (I am willing to try to do it myself with the consultation of my mechanical genius father, but simple is better!)
3. best resources for parts that won't break the bank- the door handles are all shot on this thing, towards the end of it's lifespan we had a rope tied to the interior door handle and looped outside....
needless to say it's a pretty ghetto car at this point! (indeed my husband used to get pulled over quite often because apparently he just looked sketchy driving a jag! lol)

specs: 1994 jaguar XJ6 sedan. I can provide more detailed info later once I dig up the title.
thank you for your patience and forgiveness! Please help me resurrect Lazarus!

 

Hi lswindler12,

Welcome to the Jaguar Forums! It's great to have you with us.

I have moved your post from the forum for the X350 to the forum for the XJ40, which is the Jaguar factory project code for your 1994 XJ6.

The engine in your car may be rebuildable by you and your mechanical genius father. These engines are relatively easy to work on, though some parts may be difficult to find. But since it is easiest to rebuild the engine while it is out of the car, you could just as easily swap in another good running 4.0L engine from a wrecked '93-'94 XJ40. These engines rarely fail (unless they are run low on oil ), so there is very little demand for them, which makes them potentially cheap.

Our member Lawrence is parting out a '94. You might check his thread titled Parts Car. Larry may have a good block and head for you:

https://www.jaguarforums.com/forum/x...ts-car-162999/

If Larry doesn't have what you need, search eBay for sellers who are parting out similar '93-'94 cars.

We'll look forward to following your resurrection of this poor neglected Jaguar!

Cheers,

Don

 

Yes indeed I have an engine from a 94 XJ6, however the logistics in getting it from BC to Missouri might be a small challenge ...if you want it though, I'm sure we can figure something out via truck or train ...no air mail for sure!!

Larry

 

Thank you Don and Lawrence!
Lawrence-how much are you thinking for the engine? and do you have any idea why it quit/what's wrong with the motor?

Also if any of the door handles are working decently I would be interested in those as well, as only the front passenger door works on this car!!

 

as an alternative I just found a 1994 XJ6 on ebay that is literally identical to ours (forest green exterior, tan interior) but in way better condition. is $2000 a good price for one of these running? It's very tempting... then maybe we could part out our non-running jag and keep some parts for this one?

Ideas?

as I've said before, I'm not a car person, but I love my husband and he loves this car!

 

Here's the link to the sale... it appears there are some minor title issues but they have been corrected? Jaguar XJ6 | eBay

 

Here is what the seller says in response to my questions...

"CAR CONDITION - on the whole, the car is fine and it is certainly driveable. When I took it out of the garage/storage, all I had to do was to replace the battery. It started right up. I have invested quite a bit in the car after I bought it, so I am not too shocked that it runs. From the top of my head, I replaced the thermostat, coolant tank (was split), coolant temperature sensor, belts, starter, spark plugs, spark plug wires, coil, distributor cap, fuel pump, shocks, struts, wheel bearings. The tires were replaced about 10K miles ago. The car was pointed prior to being stored. All the lights (front/back) work. There are no "Check Engine" or other sensor signals on the dash indicating a problem. In terms of defects, the wiper motor needs to be replaced. The car does drip oil (nothing major). If I recall, I traced the problem to the oil pan gasket, but that may not be the case. It's definitely gasket-related. There is a leak around the fuel tank pipe, so when the reservoir fills with water, it seeps along the pipe into the trunk. I think there is a piece of rubber insulation that goes around the pipe that needs to be replaced. This is a fairly common problem on these cars caused by the fact that the fuel tank cap is on the top and not on the side. In terms of rust, the bottom and sides are clean. There is a little bit of rust in the corners of the water drain when the hood is lifted. Very little though"

 

I haven't really thought about a price for the motor although most of the cost would be the labour involved in removing it plus the shipping to Missouri!

There was nothing wrong with the engine when I decided to part out the car; I needed some relatively expensive/rare parts for my own car and cost-wise it was cheaper to buy the whole car than to try and get the parts I needed piecemeal.

Like yours, most parts car door handles were shot, only the passenger side front and rear worked, so no help there I'm afraid.

You might want to pick up another car and use either it or your own as the project and make "one out of two" ..whatever you do, it will be a major undertaking and you will end up spending either a considerable amount of money or time (same thing really!) before you get rolling again.

If I were in you shoes, I'd strongly consider getting another (running) XJ40 -as low mileage as possible and without a lot of rust issues - I think a Southern or Californian/Floridian car would be my first choice ..the eBay car might be OK but don't forget this is a car from the North East which may have significant winter wear and tear ...

Cheers

Larry