Stunning wheels!!

 

I went to my local Pep Boys and got a quote on a set of the Ohtsus and it was higher than I would have anticipated. It always surprises me how much extra charges for tax, disposal, balance and valve stems, and installation can add up. I decided to check my usual supplier, Wheel Works. I had researched the Ohtsu, the General Alti Max and the Cooper Ultra Touring. All H rated. They offered me a deal on the Coopers so I went with a set of those. All told it was just under 500.00. These are 225/60/15 inch tires. They fit the wheels well without looking too wide as the prior set of RWL (Raised White Letter) 235s looked. The tread and sidewall look very nice and they have a 70,000 mile treadwear guarantee. I read lots of reviews but they are all so conflicting, although the majority were favorable.
I will report on my impressions after I get some miles down.

 

The Coopers look pretty nice on the wheels. My 40 minute test run around my neighborhood and local Expressways was favorable. They were quiet and smooth riding. Seemed to stick pretty well. Still anything would be an improvement over my old tires. The newest one was ten years old. The oldest was fifteen years old! They look good on the wheels and fill the wheel wells nicely. They aren't expensive tires and even they don't reach the 70,000 mile guarantee they could last for many years.

 

Now that I have a good set of tires I've got to turn my attention to the ABS/brake system. I experienced some pulling to the side when I started my test drive. but it disappeared after several progressively harder brake applications. I was interested enough to do some research on this forum and what I discovered was quite unsettling. Several contributors had experienced serious brake issues and even complete failure. Reading all this can be very scary. Well, I'm not one to panic, so I re- read all the posts on this forum, the appropriate section of Kirby's book, and what I could find on Jag Lovers. Luckily, I haven't suffered any severe problems so maintenance and inspection seems to be the course of action to follow. First off a fluid change and bleeding seems called for. Then I'll rebuild the hand brake system to make it as effective as possible. I think that replacing the accumulator ball will probably be a good idea also. While the car only has a little over one hundred thousand miles on it, it is thirty years old.

 

Yesterday I did a brake fluid replacement using a turkey baster, yes I had to wait until after Thanksgiving! The old fluid was pretty dark and dirty. I plan to let the clean fluid circulate through the brake system and pick up more dirt, than drain again. Then I'll bleed the brakes to clear the old fluid from the caliper pistons and brake lines. One of the good things of using the baster is that you can't remove all the fluid at the bottom crannies of the reservoir so that no air will enter the system once you refill the reservoir..

 

Not sure how much dirty fluid you are going to get out of the reservoir, the fluid doesn't ‘circulate’ around the system, it’s purely a push in and relax out, better off just doing a straight fluid flush and be done with.

 

In most systems it's true that the fluid just sits there. While reading Kirby's book he describes how the fluid kind of makes a circuit from the reservoir to the abs pump, through the distribution block, and back to the master cyclinder and then back to the reservoir. That seems to make sense, so maybe the fluid does move around a bit. Since we're experiencing a break in the rain Today, I took the XJS out to put some miles on it and exercise the brakes. It's not pulling to the side and the brake warning is not staying lit. That's a good sign, but I've still got to bleed the system to remove as much old fluid as possible. On such a beautiful day I pushed the car much harder through tight turns and corners, accelerating out of the turn. The tires just gripped and the car felt very planted with no squealing. It looks like I did okay choosing these tires. It's supposed to start raining again this weekend so I'm going to wait on bleeding the brakes

 

I started daily driving it to work last month. It's been starting and running well. My goal was to put 500 miles of daily use on the car which I've succeeded in doing. Though I've had the car for over four years I really haven't been able to drive it much. This is the first time I've been using it on a daily basis. I've been trying to decide if I'll keep the car and move forward or sell it. There are two major things that need to be addressed. The front suspension and the top. I contacted the top shop that replaced the top on my Mustang convertible. I've been leery that they might try to charge me a big surcharge just because it's a Jag. I was happy when the owner quoted me a price that was very inline with what I paid eight years ago for my Mustang which was 1,000 dollars. This was just for the outer top. The top and headliner for the XJS will run just under two grand. The parts are around 800.00. The shop also does upholstery and the owner told me that he could reupholster the seat bottoms in matching leather though we didn't discuss pricing. The top will come first.

I contacted an independent Jag repair shop in the area about fixing the front suspension. When I had last spoken to them a couple of years back they said that they could perform a complete inspection and then give me an estimate. They would charge and hour or so of labor to make the inspection which seemed fair to me. I guess the shop has undergone a change of management or ownership because when I called them up a couple of days ago I received a different message. I was told that they don't work on cars that are older than a 1996 model. When I asked for an explanation they said that it was too hard to guarantee satisfactory results with old cars as there are "usually layers of unknown problems." Of course that's true, especially with old Jags!

Well, my XJ6 is a '97 so I thought that I might take my it in for a suspension inspection. I called and was told that they would have to perform a complete wheel alignment costing 450 dollars to gain a basis of measurement. Especially since I didn't have any service history for the car. It seemed to me that you don't need a service history to see a worn tire or loose ball joints. It would make more sense to inspect, and replace the worn parts then conduct the alignment. We talked around in circles for a few more minutes and I realized that the shop just didn't want to fuss with a bottom feeder owner like me with some old beater Jag.. I have to admit that I was very disappointed but of course it's their business and choice.

This morning I got online and looked up British car repair in the San Jose area and came up with a list of names. I called one to ask if they worked on old Jags and they told me that they did. I told them what I needed and they told me that they could perform a complete pre purchase type of inspection and give me an estimate the costs of repair. The price was 145 dollars which would be an hour or so of labor. I drove down to check out the shop. I showed the service writer my car and he was very friendly and seemed enthused about working on the car. I spoke with a couple of mechanics who seemed interested in the car also.. I was getting a good vibe.about the place. The service writer showed me a V8 XJR, '90s 300 ZX, and an AMG Hummer that they were working on. There were also a couple of Corvettes in the yard. I'm going to schedule the inspection and go from there. I'll report back with my experience. I'll also name the shop then.

 

Rivguy
Rebuilding the entire front suspension with new parts is not that big a job for a garage. In parts - worst case - we are talking: bottom wishbone bushes and pins, top wishbone bushes, four ball joints, two track rod ends, two sets of ARB drop arm rubbers, two ARB D rubbers, two stub axles and two sets of bearings. The parts cost of renewing all these parts would be under 400 USD.
If your brake calipers are shot, then that would add the cost of remans. Time-wise, assuming the guys know what to do and how to do it everything, apart from the bottom wishbone lower bushes, would take no more than a day (as in I could easily do it in that time).
The lower wishbone bushes (assuming a V12?) are a major pain. If they need doing, then another day - although if they do need doing, then the entire job would be done as one, not the other things and then the lower wishbones.
The job is a pain and makes the job far harder because the springs need removing, the engine supporting by a beam across the wings, and the cage swung down to allow the pins to be extracted rearwards. There is every chance however, that the bottom wishbone bushes are OK!

 

Thanks for the reassurance Greg. I've done this kind of work in the past, actually less than five years ago with my two Mustangs. I've even done some work on the XJS. This time though I'm just too busy and I'm going to be in the middle of a home remodel which is the going to be the priority for this year. I didn't want to have the car immobile and partially disassembled in the garage, as I'm going to be moving household stuff in and out. So I need to keep the car mobile. I had planned on just buying the proper Jag tool, I've got enough experience to know that you can't play with springs! Yeah and worst of all I gotta be careful with my back, I kinda messed it up moving household stuff and I really can't afford to miss any work. Not going to save any money doing that. Getting old is a pain, literally! Still I'm glad to be pushing the project forward. I even found some leather seat cover replacements at Lseat.com for 299.00. I'm pretty excited to see how everything progresses. All this continues to give me content for my blog!

 

has been parked for 10 years until earlier

this year

 

The xix cylinder models are pretty attractive to me. I missed a really nice six with manual coupe a few years back. Right now I'm just going to sit on what I've got. Due the pandemic and it's economic fallout, I predict that low priced, relatively unpopular project cars are going to drop significantly in demand and value. The flip side of this is that it's going to be a buyers market. If you've got the resources it might be the opportunity of a lifetime.

 

V12 GT prices are about to take a bath!

 

I've finally gotten one side of my garage cleaned out. ( again!) Now I can park my XJS in the garage.It has spent over four months parked outside at the curb and driveway. I just did a good cleaning and waxing and it looks great. For now it's going to go back into the garage while I look into the proper spring compressors. I've decided to do the rebuild myself. I've got the engine support bar that I used for the transmission R&R. I'm going to go with the best bushings that I can get. It also time for a steering rack replacement or at least a reseal.

I've decided that if nothing else I'm just going to hold onto the car. It can sit, It starts and runs fine and I'll take it out occasionally warm it up and run it up and down the street. I'm not going to forget about it, and since I decided it was time to completely retire I'll have the time when I'm not working on other projects.

I have a very bad history of getting rid of cars at their lowest value point, then wishing I could get them back. I got my XJS for a song, I know that they'll probably get too expensive for me in the future. (Maybe, fingers crossed!)

 

I had been considering changing my XJS to California Historical Vehicle registration. I did some research and decided that it would be helpful in my efforts to hold on to the car. There was a new Assembly Bill, AB 2225, that recently passed that would exempt historical vehicles that were not yet currently exempt under the current statute. Although my car has passed the last two smog tests, I am always worried about the future. If the car doesn't pass the test then I'd be stuck, I can't license the car, and I can't go back like it never happened. Of course I could always put the car on non-op status, but then I couldn't legally drive the car at all. There are some very serious usage restrictions. The wording of the law states that the car is to be primarily used for hobby and club events. It can also be driven to mechanics and other maintenance related activities. In reading the law it seemed that the car could be taken out for regular "exercise" as an adjunct to regular maintenance. The idea of course is that the car is not supposed to be used as everyday transportation. The wording is "primarily used" as opposed to "exclusively used" which of course will be subject to interpretation.

Luckily I have several other cars registered to me that I can use for transportation. I am also now retired, and nobody could accuse me of using my car to commute, since I don't have a job to go to! There are also savings in license fees. License fees are a cut down to 30.00 a year, a savings of 100.00, but that isn't my priority. Truth be told, I didn't think that the car will be put in reliable driving condition for at least a couple of more years. I don't think that I'm losing anything. I'll report my experience.

 

With the historic plate you can put it on vintage insurance like Hagarty offers and probably save some money there too.

 

 

In case anyone is interested I've just listed my car for sale. 3,800.00 Would like to sell it to a forum member so that's the no nonsense price.

 

I'm giving away the turbo 400 tranny that I swapped out. It's a good core. Free to whoever wants to pick it up.

 

I believe you are talking about Hennie (Jacobs I think). I live in Greenville SC and just last week was driving my XJS to lunch and going down the road I come up on a burgundy 96 XJS (you never see these cars around) and the fellow in the car pulls up beside me and we start chatting. He asks me to pull over, in a thick South African accent that I could barely understand. I did and he tells me he wants me to come to some charity car show he has in May. Says he has about 50 cars etc. I gave him my email address and I receive a flyer invite to the car show. I was telling my friend about it and he says, "It wasn't Hennie was it?" and I replied that indeed it was. He tells me that he used to have a transmission shop in town and has since retired etc. Serendipity indeed!