Okay, this is my first time posting on here. I'm currently 18 and I own a 1994 Jag XJ6/40. I saved up and bought it fresh out of the gate at 16. I love this car. I've had it repainted, minor body work done to it, and put a new entertainment system in it. I've tried to keep it as classy as possible and not ghetto it out. Recently, at school some idiot in a crappy merc. cougar backed into my front end. It ruined my grill and bumper. Kinda messed the paint up too. Well this was 3 months ago, and this is what she looks like now.

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My main reason for posting however, was to ask you. Do you believe this looks right? I know the paint is spot on, the guy who painted it in the first place had some leftover, which I kept thankfully. And I believe the bumper isnt bad either. To me its just the grill. Jaguar of Cincy said that they matched vin's and this is correct. They said the first grille I had on wasnt stock. My problem is that this current grill you can fit your fingers underneath it. I'm not sure if I should just ebay another one or what. Please just leave me some ideas on what you think or what have you. Any help is greatly appreciated.

 

sorry, i'm not quite sure how to post pics... maybe these will work..

http://tinypic.com/view.php?pic=ac32w5&s=6

or

 

looks fine from what I can tell in the pic

 

Actually, I haven't tried if my fingers can fit under the grill yet .Looks a decent ride from the pic . Your headlamp washers jets are in their place too

 

The bumper looks to me to be tilted forwards slightly. When you look at the lines where the bumper wraps round, it doesn't quite follow straight. This would give a gap right along the front and from what i can see in the pic, it looks like there is a gap under the headlights too.

 

I took a pic of my ride for you to judge whether it's properly fit or not . Stay tuned ,it's comin in a few minutes

 

Between the grille and the bumper should be a plastic fitment/spacer which fills that gap. This screws to the bottom of the grille and could be this is missing on your car, though I can't really tell from the photo. The part number is BEC5664

If you put this part number into the searchbox on the website below, it will show the part (21 inthe diagram.)

http://www.jaguarclassicparts.com/ht...cationType=JCP

Hope this helps,

David

 

I'm not too familiar with the year model of yours, but it does look slightly turned downward. Look online at similar cars and see if you can see a noticable difference. I don't see the headlamp bezels either. Link above from David is pretty good info!

 

Thank you guys for all your help. David I am assuming it is the bumper being off then, I checked and I do have the plastic moulding underneath the grille. I am having my personal mechanic who owns 3 jags himself look at it this weekend. It should only be a 30 min. job from what I assume. Even though it is really impressive looking having all that new chrome up front, I know my car and I can tell when something doesnt look right.

And to the pic above me that is exactly what my grille to bumper looks like as well. Although yours is a Vandan Plas correct?

 

and guy's my last day of high school was friday. tomorrow I will have time to post multiple detailed pic's showing the entire front area. And I DO have the plastic moulding underneath, and all bezel's. I know I have all the parts, so it's just a matter of fitment if it needs it.

 

Yup, it's Daimler aka VDP as you mentioned .I am sure you are getting great compliments from girls

 

^ oh yeah I do. The funny thing is is that where I live at in rural Ohio, it seems like no one has seen one before! I swear every time i'm at a gas station some guy comes up to me and asks me about it. The most usual is "Dad let you have the Jag for today?" and you should see the look in their eyes when I say that I am the owner. Dad owns a 3.0 S type though, so he still has me beat.

 

Cool! Father and son Jags!

 

Jaguar sell a lot of their cars in the US, but it is a BIG place, and the dealers are mostly in the big cities, so I suppose there aren't too many around where you are. I suppose the Uk equivalent would be the Scottish Highlands and Islands, or rural Wales. Mind you I don't see too many XJ40s around nowadays, I suppose they are now all baked bean tins !

 

Yeah, i've heard that not too many of these things are in very good shape anymore. I am really lucky that an elderly gentleman was the first owner and he had it garaged 90% of the time. From my knowledge, it's never seen snow in its life. There is absolutely no rust anywhere on this car.

In other news my mechanic is looking at re-adjusting my bumper tomorrow. Should be back to brand new. In the meantime however, dad's s type is my ride

 

ok i'm trying to upload some pics now...the grille is still off...i'm not sure what i'm gonna do...maybe take it to jaguar of cincy? what needs to be done to make it look good again? here are some detailed pics...this has really been bugging me and I think my father and I will have a go at fixing it tomorrow...sorry for the periods but really upset now with the whole situation...any input or advice is greatly appreciated, please also let me know where to start as far as brackets and bolts or what not

 

I just removed my front bumper to access the washer reservoir. Very easy to remove; 2 bolts from below using a 19mm, unclip all the wiring plugs, and pull forward. The bumper ends fit into some plastic clips attached to the fenders.
I would check if the bumper mounts are straight, if there is any adjustment, or worse case, if the framework has any damage.
Sometimes a shim or washer placed properly can straigten out things.
Looking at the diagrams on jdht.com, I think if you place a couple shims or washers between the rear of each bumper strut mount and frame, that may level the bumper.
Dave

 

^ thanks for your help. roughly how much time did you spend on doing this? my father is out of town until the 10th now so we will not be able to do it for a couple of days. I really hope this project will work out...if not I suppose I will just have to learn to live with the front end like this

 

I think david's idea to remove the bumper, heck, even loosening it and pulling it forward from the bumper strut mount, and looking at it yourself should make it evident what you need to do to lower that point (via the washers or shims) and get the bumper level, and ultimately closer to your grille and headlamp trim pieces.

I had my rear bumper off a few weeks ago, its not as hard as you think...sounded very similar to david's experience, two bolts on the bumper end, and the 'guides' closer to the body. When I reinstalled it, I adjusted the bumper rests, they just unscrewed (like the adjusters under your desk at home) to extend the level up farther, thereby, raising the bumper up a bit, but only on the one end.

 

ok thank you. sounds like it shouldnt be that big of a deal then. come thursday we will have the whole day to look at it, adjust it etc. i will definantly post pics the 11th to show you guys how it went.