Does anyone happen to have a photo of how the washer bottle on the facelift (1990s) XJS fits into the wing (fender) cavity in the front wheelarch?

Greg

 

Hi Greg

This is a picture from the top, the camera is over the middle of the V of the engine looking towards the right hand side inner wing (You can see my right hand air filter in the foreground)



The plastic tube goes into a flexi tube which bends through 90 degrees and goes through a hole in the inner wing



The bottle itself fills the whole of the inner front part of the wing below the headlight unit



Judging from the state mine is in, and the row of holes just above it, I'm guessing there should be a plastic cover over the bottle to protect it from muck and such. What a surprise, yet another part missing from my car. POs, grrrr :-)

Hope the pics are useful. Let me know if you need any more

 

Sarc

Thanks a million Sarc, great pics and exactly what I needed!

Sadly, the pre-facelifts have an extra brake vacuum reservoir in that location, so I will not be able to get it in. So these pics have made me consider putting something on the LHS in the space at the rear of the wheelarch - where on my model (RHD), there was a header tank overflow bottle that I have done away with. I have all the bits from the facelift washer system (15 UKP well spent on ebay) so will use the filler and flexible, and try to find a suitable bottle.

By the way, you are indeed missing a wheel arch protector, there are two bits and you need the bottom piece. Not expensive, and does wonders to keep the rust out of the headlight area, as long as you seal it all round with loads of gunk having screwed it in place.

Thanks again

Greg

 

@Greg

No problem. I have seen your 2 XJS's into 1 rebuild pics and I was nothing short of amazed, so I thought it was respectful to take a few pics for you :-)

Whats the drive to move the bottle out of the engine bay ? Just to neaten it up or ?

Take care

Scott

 

Scott

The real reason is I like fiddling about with things! But in this case, I have always hated the complicated bleed arrangements across the rad top etc.. Inspired by the great Ronbros, who has done this on his pre-HE, I realised that mounting a header tank where the standard HE pre-facelift washer bottle is would allow simple natural bleeding 'uphill'. So I have ordered a header tank to my own custom dimensions (not too dear in the UK) and will plumb in a bleed to it from where the standard LHS radtop plug is; remove the RHS standard radtop banjo and the radtop cross pipe and plug that hole with the LHS plug. I will either plug the engine crosspipe bleed, or plumb it into the new radtop bleed pipe - I'll see if the fill pipe gets full of air or not, when plugged.

The standard feed to the system from the standard header tank (that comes from the LHS thermostat area via a question-mark shaped solid pipe) will be plumbed to the new tank, also slightly uphill. I can then either remove the standard header tank, or use it as an overflow recapture system for the new header tank.

Hence the need to relocate the washer bottle! A great nuisance that it will not go where it does on the facelifts. What I have done so far is to modify the standard radiator overflow bottle that goes in the LHS rear front wheelarch to accept the filler pipe. I will mount the pump remotelyfrom the bottle to reduce vibration on my home-made reservoir plumbing conections, also in the wheelarch.

We'll see if it all works as advertised in due course. I'll post some photos if it does. Seems a lot of work, but at European petrol prices, the whole thing including new header, plumbing bits etc. will cost much less than one tankfull.

Greg

 

@Greg

I have every confidence you will get it to work ! Yes, take and post pics. It's great to see these things rather than just read them.

I hear you about EU fuel prices......... I had to move to the USA before I could afford to run a Jaguar.

I wonder if anyone has done an LPG conversion on a V12 XJS ?? Googling it there seems to be some info there. That could be your next project !

 

Did you get a replacement plastic wheel arch panel ?
I had to get to my washer bottle today, its been leaking for sometime now. After taking the wheel off and removing the plastic covers, (had to grind off the two bottom angle brackets) found that the washer pumps just sit in rubber grommets ...guess what was leaking and guess what's no longer available........?
So looking at lots of silicone unless anyone has access to these grommets.
Just made two new angle brackets out of a piece of Stainless and replaced cut bolts with plastic number plate bolts so wont rust again.
Also had to touch up a small rust patch on wheel arch.
And after having problems getting the rusty screws out, l'm going to change as many rusty screws to SS along the front spoiler l can.
Has anyone seen how rusty the underside of the chrome bumper and nuts get...?

 

@malc

Sorry to hear your troubles. I haven't found a replacement cover yet.

My tank has the same issue as yours. I have 2 pumps as my car had headlight wash originally and both were leaking. Unfortunately, as you are in the UK, you probably can't do the fix I did here in California....... Drain the tank and leave it empty :-)

I never use the washers, or the wipers for that matter. I can imagine about the rust..... Putting things in wheel arches where they get splattered with mud seems to be a less than great idea. At least when they do it on modern cars it's usually a single piece of plastic that just clips in for protection.

Hope you get it sorted out.... Loads of silicone will be fine I think, and no one will see it if it's a bit messy :-)

 

hi greg
you can fit it to a pre-facelift. you simply move the vac tank to the other side and extend the vac pipe via the front of the rad all the fittings for the vac tank are there, I fitted it purely because I had the headlight washer parts new from jaguar inc. the bumpers
so it had to be done one way or the other. next job is fitting bulb access panels and cutting through the closing panel. I have the right side but am still looking for the left side

 

Thanks for this idea, I have not got round to the mod yet, but this will make it much easier to do

Greg

 

as I said I had the cromework, and I was fortunately able to buy everything else from kwe via ebay. all pipework res. and high pressure pump for £22.00 + delivery, I still have the old reservoir to operate the existing h/lamp washers and the windscreen washers.