So I've now done about 750 miles in 5 weeks (nearly all with the top down). More than I'd planned to and mostly just for fun but it's so difficult to resist going out in it. Thus far, nothing has gone wrong and as far as I can see there's been no drop in any fluid levels (this is hard to be sure of where oil level is concerned obviously). The only faults are: the broken front splitter, the bent rear quarter sliding panel, and the drivers window will not go down on 'one-touch' from the button. It feels like the switch itself is sticky.

Driving-wise, the car and I have adapted to each other. I'm now able to drive it sensibly in town, without drawing attention to myself. Mind you, it still catches me out now and again. Two days ago I did the classic thing where a lane opens up on a dual carriageway and you punch it to get past a line of traffic. Familiar road, done it there many times. This time I accidentally (honest) pushed too hard and within a matter of heartbeats found myself doing somewhere between 110 and 120 and something like 6000 rpm. It wasn't even in "S" mode. On another occasion, I accelerated out of a roundabout not noticing a patch of repaired tarmac to one side of my lane. The back end literally 'jumped' off the patch, giving me a bit of a fright. They told me the e-diff would do this.

Maintenance-wise, my limited budget dictates what I can do and when. Having talked to the last couple of places that serviced the car I've confirmed it did not have plugs replaced (maybe ever) and so a set of NGKs are in the post. I will let my Jaguar indie install them. What I will be doing myself is replacing the air filters. I'm going to fit K&Ns - not because they're so much better, but because it's been a tradition with almost all 14 of my Jags over the years. My first bit of work is always to fit K&N filters; it's like marking my territory... Waiting for budget but high on the list are: trans fluid change, e-diff fluid change and steering fluid change. I worry about the supercharger oil but there's nothing I can do about that right now. It's not diy-able for me and paying to r&r the supercharger is beyond my means at the moment.

I'm running Shell V-Power for its hoped-for cleaning properties, and also dropping some Cataclean-type stuff in for good measure. I've no idea what the inside of the engine looks like but it can't do any harm. I may learn something when I see the old spark plugs.

I'm going to put the car on stands to fit the air filters so I can remove the two side parts of the splitter at the same time. Hopefully I can sort the scratches out and then I'll only have to buy a centre section, and paint all three at the same time. I'm also going to take the wheel arch liners right out and check on the earthing studs and anything else I can see. (What else can I look at while I'm in there?)

When I got the car, I worried that the wonky sliding panel was an urgent problem. I thought it would break altogether, or jam up the mechanism, or some such. In fact it seems fine at the moment. Famous last words, but it's lower down the list for now. I can also say that the hood up/down speed improved with use from when I first got the car. It was slow and creaky at first but does its thing in under 20 seconds now.

The weather will be turning soon and I need to decide what to do about the hood. With no access to a big enough garage, I'm keen to (re)waterproof it soon. I'm thinking of using Renovo products to deep clean, colour enhance and then waterproof. I have a 3m x 3m gazebo I can put over the car to keep the roof cool if I do this on a sunny day and/or keep it dry if it starts to rain.

 

Beautiful Jag.
I may have missed it, but how many miles/kilometers?

 

Lots of controversy over K&N air filters. See my Post #12
https://www.jaguarforums.com/forum/x...ilters-119498/

Your car, your money, your choice.

 

Mine have worked perfectly perfect for nearly ten years. It's about time for their second cleaning.

 

It's around 117,000 miles...

 

Glad you are enjoying your car. Yes, she wants to be driven!

Any Top Tier rated fuel will work. Some provide more detergents then the v power marketed… cheaper.
It may be the mina gallery that sourced my second “all weather car cover”…. when Jaguar EOL’d it. Anyhow, it works well.
Good thinking dealing with those fluid changes when you can.
Cheers!

 

Indeed - although there are no objective comparisons available. Without driving out of my area I have a choice between Shell's V-Power and Tesco's Momentum 99. Obviously the supermarket option is cheaper but I have no info as to whether there are decent detergents in it. I'm only doing this because, knowing little about the car's history, I don't know what sort of state its in internally. At some point I'll have to stop shelling out (pun!) for this fuel and either use Momentum 99 or perhaps ordinary E10 with an occasional bottle of cleaner dropped in. As I said above, seeing the old plugs when they come out might tell me something. I'm also curious about the impact of 99 octane E5 on fuel economy. Since the Jaguar engine can re-map around differences in fuel grade you'd imagine it was a good candidate for seeing either performance or economy changes according to fuel used. (But as I said somewhere in another thread, I don't ultimately care how much petrol the thing uses. That's not why you buy an XKR...)

 

Top Tier designation demands a minimal standard.
But regular E10…. I won’t do that.

Fuel economy?? In an XKR?? Good luck with that.

 

As I said in the post above, "(But as I said somewhere in another thread, I don't ultimately care how much petrol the thing uses. That's not why you buy an XKR...)"