Well, my first battery issue with the new old Jag.

Took the car to a pressure wash to clean up for the week and brought home to dry and detail.

Spent a few hours cleaning everything and had the car sitting in the garage with smart key in pocket.

Went to start and didn't even try to turn over then dash lit up like a Christmas tree. DSC, Emergency brake fault, you name it and it was there.

Grabbed my volt meter and 9.6V at battery. Ran to NAPA and picked up a 2A smart charger/maintainer by Wirthco called battery doctor. I saw a lot of forums users use the CTek and NAPA was listed as a distributor but didn't have anything.

Guess they stopped carrying them so I got this one. Bought the waterproof version because I plan on giving it to my father to maintain the 97XK8 battery since he's storing it for the winter.

Let you know how it works. Bought the 07 about a month ago and no issues so far, they mentioned it was a new battery and surprised to see this happen. Think I'll give them a call and double check, that was one of the first things I asked them.

 

Left it on the battery doc overnight and light was green this morning so I disconnected the battery doc and the car started right up.

Only issue I apparently have is the active front light fault is blinking on the dash. Looked in the manual and recommends taking it to the dealer.

Is there a reset procedure for this or am I better off disconnecting the battery and resetting the system?

Did multiple searches and couldn't find anything.

Thanks for any help.

 

Do NOTHING until the battery is proven to be producing full voltage. The symptoms of low voltage in the XK are random - they can be in any electrical system. And use that battery minder whenever the car is not actually in use. You will have no problems afterwards.

 

Yeah it fixed itself, gotta love when they do that.

Ran out at halftime (go bears , wow they suck this year but a win today) for a quick errand, started the car and no faults. All is well in the world again.

Guess I'll lock myself in the car when I detail it or leave it running. They should add a button for that, Could call it the clean or wash button to shut down the system.

Being a daily driver for me I wouldn't think I need the minder all the time but I could be wrong.

When mounting the minder do you guys mount it directly to the battery posts because I'd hate to mount it to the jump posts?

Was planning on giving it to my father to put on the 97 because that one is now stored for the winter. Guess I'll have to get him another one.

 

If it is a daily driver you should not need minder. Considering what happened you might want to consider getting an AGM battery now, forget the minder and enjoy your car.

 

DpezXK8,

Although your screen name includes XK8, you stated that you bought an 07 about a month ago. Just wanted to make sure you're in the right forum so the pix in the threads mentioned below are relevant to your car.

There are 2 schools of thought regarding battery maintainer installation in the 4.2L X150 models: (1) attach to the remote battery terminals and (2) attach directly to the terminals on the battery. There are arguments pro and con for both methods.

I prefer to attach mine to the remote terminals. See this thread: https://www.jaguarforums.com/forum/x...lay-ups-73471/ and my post #21 for pictures of my installation.

Others prefer to attach it directly to the battery terminals. See this thread: https://www.jaguarforums.com/forum/x...lation-107738/

Your car, your choice. Hope this helps. If so, please click Thanks on the bottom right of this post.

Stuart

 

Thanks Stuart and I did click the button, Had my 97 for 8 years and at the time seemed like a good screen name.

Who knew it wouldn't work so well in this forum. Have to look to see if I can change it.

 

I've a '07 XK and NEVER use a battery maintainer, and I leave the car in the garage for weeks without starting it. To ME, your problem came from leaving the door(s) open while detailing your car and that ran the battery down.

I had something similar happen to me when I replaced the antenna mast over a year ago. When I tried to start it, it would not start and all sorts of idiot lights lit up. Ones that I didn't even know existed on planet earth. Charging the spent battery restored everything to normal.

Next time you 'detail' things, leave the car idling or start it up every once in a while. The Jag batt can't handle the engine off and key 'on' or even just the doors/trunk open with key off, for any long time. Mercedes SL's have two batterys. One dedicated to starting the car, the other for 'other things'. Works fine.

Jags do something better than Mercedes. Like their version of Adaptive Cruise Control (called Distronic by Mercedes), gets a C- compared to Jaguar. Ohhhh, Jaguar doing electrical things good!!!!......odd.