I plan to replace the front lower control arms on my 2007 XKR. The manual says "Nuts and bolts must be tightened with the weight of the vehicle on the suspension". I could swear I saw a post where someone had a workaround where they marked some position of the nuts or bolts or something before removing the control arms, but I cannot find it. Does anybody know of this workaround? And how difficult is removing and replacing the front lower control arms?

 

I am of no help on your question but since I own a 2007 XKR I am curious as to what's wrong with your control arms that they need replacing.

 

I believe they are marked from the factory. I don't think there is a work around for that. But you can easily replicate the weight by just jacking the control arm, then tightening.

If I remember correctly, the inner bolt was impossible to remove. Maybe it was just me, but didn't even bother. I would pop a wheel off and take a good look at that bolt before you make moves.

 

The bushings are shot. They make a clunking noise when I hit a bump and the shop says they cannot align the wheels until this is fixed. I imagine you could just press in new bushings but apparently that is less commonly done and is difficult. There are posts on this forum that discuss this. I can get new control arms with bushings for a little less that $100 each so I was moving forward in that direction. Either way, I need to remove the control arms and then reinstall them so my question still applys.

 

The workaround is not good as the process requires continual revisiting. I suggest: Do as per the manual.

 

where did you find the bushings?

 

Typically, you'd have the car up on jack stands, meaning your floor jack is available to put some pressure on the hub and load the suspension for tightening to spec. I was spared having to change out the fronts this year, but expect to deal with it in the next couple of years. Front-end lower control arms are 2 separate parts, so I am assuming that you are referring to the "front' one, which is the curved one. It's one of the easier suspension parts to change.

 

Assuming you have the vehicle on jack stands or lift, You need to raise the wheel at it's outer most point (don't lift at the rotor, but do lift at the hub behind it). Use a floor Jack for this.

• Ride height is measured from the centre of the wheel to the apex of the wheel arch, through the wheel centre line
  

Fronts are

Naturally aspirated (NA) 396 mm ± 15 mm 396 mm ± 15 mm
Supercharged (SC) without dynamics pack 394 mm ± 15 mm
Supercharged (SC) with dynamics pack 384 mm ± 15 mm

Banana Arm - buy it from Eurospare.
https://www.autohausaz.com/pn/EU-C2P...RoCHAEQAvD_BwE

OEM is more expensive and you cannot replace the smaller bushing, only the larger so replacement is best imo.

 

OE manufacturer of XK suspension arms and links is LEMFÖRDER who also supply most other vehicle manufacturers. Large savings can be made by shopping around aftermarket Jaguar spares specialists or general auto spares suppliers.

The LEMFÖRDER catalogue is available online or to download as a PDF from:
https://aftermarket.zf.com/go/en/lemfoerder/home/

This gives very useful P/N's for cross referencing.

I'd be very surprised if anyone in the aftermarket is selling other than genuine LEMFÖRDER parts regardless of how much less than JLR they are asking for the same part!

Graham

 

I have a 2007 XKR as well and replaced my control arms. I remember the post for the workaround that you mentioned as well, but I can't remember if I followed that exact procedure. Replacing the lower control arms is very easy. I did mine one side at a time. I raised the car, removed the wheel, and used a floor jack to lift the suspension for that side. After that, I replaced the lower control arms and then went an got an alignment after. That ended up being more of a check since the alignment wasn't off, though.

 

you just rotate the eccentric bolt to match the old position. one is for camber the other is for caster.


you still have to preload the suspension with a jack or ramps or whatever

 

To answer an earlier question, I bought the control arms from CarPartsDiscount.com. They were available from several places for under or around $100. Each place seemed to only have 1 or 2 or 3 in stock.

 

Just finished the job. It was relatively easy. It took me about two hours at a very leisurely pace. It could easily be done in one hour at home or 30 minutes by a mechanic with a lift. Getting the larger bolt off took a tap with a sledge hammer on a wrench but still was easy.

I paid $201.15 for parts, tax and shipping.

The local Wheel Works gave me an estimate of $2,393.49 USD for parts and labor.