Springtime is almost upon us, which means it's time to gets the XKs ready for another blissful season of cruising the boulevards, carving through canyon roads, and blazing down the highways!

It's also a good time to get going on a lot of those projects that you've just been holding back on. What do you guys have planned for this summer?

I'll start! I have several things I want to do in no particular order:

1. Oil change
2. Engine air filters
3. Transmission service
4. Differential flush
5. Brake fluid flush
6. Supercharger oil flush
7. Refinish 20" Senta wheels
8. Detail/polish car

There's a good $2-3000 of stuff in there, and that's if nothing else goes wrong with the car. Nobody ever said these cars were cheap to maintain!

 

Are you doing this service yourself? If so do you mean $200-$300 for parts? What was the last service interval ?

 

What is the recommended "service" interval on these items 3-4-5-6 in your list.

You can detail/polish the car yourself for $100, have the oil changed anywhere for $40.00 if you supply your own oil Castrol 5w20 and K&N filter for $60. You can refinish your own wheels. Change your own air filters which cost $72.00 for the 2 matching K&N filters.

 

3-lifetime sealed! But most people here recommend every 60k miles
4-differential flush, not sure but figured it has never been done and at 60k miles it's probably due
5-every 2 years
6-I've heard every 60k miles; this I can do myself pretty easily and it will cost maybe $20. The Eaton M112 supercharger takes this oil I think? Jaguar Eaton M112 supercharger Oil Refill Kit XKR XJR s Type R Range Rover | eBay

Air filters I can probably do myself. The dealer oil change is only about $65 so it may not be worth it for me to bring my own oil and filter.

I don't think I can refinish my own wheels--I have tried it once before and it came out really horrible. I can detail my car myself, but I have no garage (at least not one with power or water) and I don't feel like paying my in-laws a visit 300 miles away just to detail the car. At least not right now!

 

Oh yes, I forgot one last project. I want to replace those "R" caliper plates. Does anyone have any tips for getting them back on? The last couple times I removed them I nearly broke some fingers trying to get them back on.

 

I will try to do most of it myself. The things I can definitely not do myself are things dealing with fluids (with the exception of the supercharger service). Too much of a hassle to dispose of them around here.

I got a quote for the brake flush, trans pan/sleeve/fuid and diff flush for $1300 from an indie Jaguar shop.

Then throw in another $800 or so for wheel refinishing (quoted from an auto detailer here). So that comes out to $2000 or so.

 

Consider buying a new set of aftermarket wheels for $1400, or doing a wheel exchange of existing wheels for about $800 via a vendor on eBay. There are plenty of wheel exchange companies who will exchange OEM Jaguar wheels

I only have 14,900 miles on my 2009 so most of the list you have is not necessary yet.

Take the car to a DIY quarter car wash and use their facility to detail/polish the car. Most of them have covered areas, and outside water if needed.

Be creative to save money.

 

So I take it no one else is doing anything for their cars this summer??

 

OK I understand you now and can appreciate your problem in finding a place to take your fluids. I guess I have a few advantages as I have my own lift in my garage and I have multiple places to take my old fluids. Most salvage yars in our county take used oils to burn in their oil burners. A little trick I learned with changing brake fluid is to replace all of the bleeder nipples with a product called "speed bleeders". This allows for 1 person bleeding of the brakes. Also use a different colored brake fluid to tell when the line is clear. I used to do all fluids every 2 years on the fun cars and every 5 years on the daily drivers.

 

Alright I suppose I will share my project here finally. I haven't really shared much on this since I was planning to do a thread when finished if anyone was interested but I'll give a sneak peak. I ended up coming across this XKR down south and bought it last August. I have been working on it in my free time here and there when I get a chance this past winter....
I am ALMOST finished, I just need a couple more weekends that I can dedicate a full day or two on and I think I will be ready to go.

The car looked like an easy fix with relatively minor damage, it was fully drivable and has just over 20,000 miles on it.

 

Wow, that's really impressive! You'll have a great time with the car this summer.

 

Good for you, being able to do this and have the ability to do so. I am sure it took allot of courage to take this project on.

 

Hummm Summer projects....
1. Drive my Cat.... alot!
2. Repair and refinish my rims
3. Hydrograph my engine cover
4. Install my ACM (which I have had on my shelf for 2 years now...grrrr)

Vince

 

Thanks! At first the hardest part was simply to source the parts. I should have researched this first but found out quickly that any parts that are 'riveted' to the car, Jaguar is very adamant about not selling to the public so, I needed to get creative. Once I had the OEM parts, honestly the hardest part was finding time to work on it because I have so many other projects going on.

Also ended up buying the recommended rivet gun that the jaguar repair manual recommends, that wasn't cheap. I could have probably used a standard rivet gun and been ok, but I wanted to stick to Jag's repair methods and do everything correctly.

It's been a fun project, and I am looking forward to wrapping it up soon here!

 

Vince:

Did you see my engine cover I had done in Hydrographic Coating?

If not check it out...

https://www.jaguarforums.com/forum/x...2l-xkr-112687/

This is a great way to go ....to customize the engine cover. There are so many great designs/patterns. I choose the Silver Carbon Fiber pattern. There are really some exotic choices.

 

I will be having my new wheels mounted next week. I just waiting the spline lug nuts to be delivered. More photos to follow once mounted.

 

Waiting for delivery of carbon fiber hood louvers and clear euro side markers- will install those next week hopefully

 

Pretty wheels!

 

Words of Wheeled Wisdom

1. Law of Mechanical Repair - After your hands become coated with grease, your nose will begin to itch and you'll have to pee
2. Law of Gravity - Any tool, nut, bolt or screw, when dropped, will roll to the least accessible place in the universe
3. Variation Law - If you change your toll booth line or traffic lane, the one you were just in will move then faster than the one you just moved into
4. Law of the Result - When you try to prove to someone that a machine won't work... it will
5. Law of Logical Argument - Anything is possible if you don't know what you are talking about...

 

Hahaha, #1 is especially true for me. When I work on my car, it's in my covered parking space which is 1000ft from the nearest bathroom...