I have a xj40 and since i bought the car, i have to drive down the road by slightly having the stearing slightly right which can not be normal, when driving on a straight road i still have to hold the wheel slightly right. I took the car to two garages and they have said without a test drive their is nothing wrong but i no full well there is something up, can anyone let me know if they have come across this and if they no what it is. Also i find sometimes that when i brake the car goes slanted

 

Its an alignment issue, take all the shims from the upper ball joint were it bolts to the upper arms(theres shims in there) move all even add a couple and put them on in front of the ball joint on the right side, do the opposite on the left ball joint putting all the shims behind the ball joint. This gives more positive caster on the right and less on the left making the car want to go more to the left and less right. Will this totally fix?( insert shrug here) it depends on how much it drifts to the right and how much youre holding it. Past this you can swap the fron tires side to side to see if it goes left afterwards, if it does you have radial tire pull. All this is assuming your suspension is in good shape and youre not just dealing with worn components

 

Thanks for this, i am going to go to another garage and get them to do it, what should i tell them and how much do you think it will cost the garage to do this for me

 

If you take the tires off and the bolts arent seized, about 10 minutes total. You only take 1 bolt out the other 1 (inner loosen enough to get the shimms in.out easily, but dont remove as it makes the job harder, the shims are slotted open on 1 side hense not needing to remove the inner bolt. And you could have them swap tires in front side to side. But this may skew the results, but saves time. If you dont get enough change with the shims, then swap tire. I like to try 1 thing at a time, since the shims may work and swapping tires might make it go more right if you already have some radial pull. Or you can do tires first since it cheaper and easier.

 

I vote for a dragging front caliper. Gets the brakes warned up, and it drifts in one direction until you apply the brakes and feel it pull in the opposite direction.

 

this shim swapping thing. is it a case of all the shims having to be infront/behind or is it more a case of trial and error till you get it right?

 

He's talking about moving the shims to change the caster, which may or may not correct a pull, and the amount of change necessary is an unknown quantity. You will also have to reset the toe after you alter the shim location, since you are changing the angle of inclination of the upright and therefore changing the effective length of the tie rod.

Tire pull or caliper dragging. Caster offset as a bandaid, not the first choice.

 

I've had this on mine fer years always pulls right. its not a sticking caliper nor a duff tyre, All bushes are ok and the ball joints and track rod ends have been changed. nothing is twisted nor broken but still it pulls right. it even brakes in a straight line. Its a known fault on the xj40 and there is a write up on it available from jaguar that tells you how to set up the shims, i did have it then lost it when my computor died before I had a chance to try it out.

 

There is a writeup from Jaguar about installing shims to alter the angle of the front crossmember in the chassis, which is a crude and marginal attempt at helping a car with severe negative camber. Your car is probably bent, ie wishbone, upright or lower throughbolt, from a wheel strike. Changing the caster may help it, just reset the toe after. If you're only going to charge me two minutes of labor time to press output shaft assemblies, I'll start sending them overseas for you to do.

 

it int bent nor has it got anything to do with front x-member, its a genuine jaguar tech bullitin for setting up the castor angles using the information from a comprehensive steering geometry check. once you hav ethe infrmation you apply a formula to yer figures and that tells you what shims you need to change. its far from crude nor is it marginal. I will attempt to obtain it againa nd post it on here.

As for your comment about pressing output shaft bearing on in two minutes, I can only assume you're in the brownie point scoring scheme as most folk would know that the figure of two min is meant to demonstrate thats its not a long job, two minutes ? maybe ..less than five certainly. If you can't press a bearing on in that time maybe you should send them out to be done.

 

I have now found the relevent info, its TSB 60-6 from 1996. due to copyrights and what not I can't cut n paste the whole item but here is the jist of it.

.................................................. ................
60-6
Amended
5/96

DATE 10/95
MODEL
ALL except XJ6 Series III

Front Suspension - Vehicle Pulls to One Side - Check Pull Index
Remove and destroy Bulletin 60-6, Date 10/95.
Replace with this Bulletin.
Revisions are marked with a bar and indicated by asterisks.

ISSUE:
Sedan Range (from 1988 MY) or XJS Range pulls to one side although alignment values are within specification as listed in Service Bulletin 60-5.
This condition can result from a combination of in-specification alignment value tolerances affecting the vehicle Pull Index. The vehicle Pull Index is a numerical indication of the differences between the left and right camber values (camber balance) combined with the differences between left and right caster values (caster balance).
...............................................
It then goes into detail about how to remedy this problem. it has nothing to do with worn or bent parts.

the item can be retrieved from www.alldatadiy.com