I want to highly recommend Marvin Johnson with Jaguar Top Repair. Last January I had him come out to my garage and replace all of my hydraulic hoses and rams for my XK8 convertible roof. They had not started to leak yet but were definitely showing signs (white matter flaking off all hoses in truck/pump area). He performed that repair in one day while the car stayed in my own garage (he comes to you). The only thing he did not replace was the top latch as he thought it was ok and said he could save me some expense by doing so.

Well, the latch started leaking early this week on a drive. Just a few drops on the rear-view mirror. I got home and called Marvin. He said he could be there today and showed up exactly on time as we agreed to. Within an hour he had the top portion of the windshield removed and the latch replaced, and everything works great. I asked what I owed, and he said that was covered under warranty. We did the who pays the check dance and he refused. He is very much a man of his word and does great work while you stay comfortably in your own house.
Marvin Johnson
mjohn2001@yahoo.com
888-317-9340

 

Hi Wayne

when I had my 68 Lincoln Continental there was someone that offered a similar service. He traveled by RV and came to your house to do all the repairs and adjustments. Sounds like Marvin knows what he’s doing but, I have to ask what did he charge?

Cheers!

 

Depending on location and service needed, it could vary. Here is his website.

Jaguar Top Repair | Jaguar XK8/XKR Hydraulic Hose Repair, Replacement and Service. | Call 888-317-9340

 

are you saying he goes all over the country or does he live here in Atlanta? Anyway, there are less and less people that can do good work on these cars, so it is good to get the recommendation.

 

Yes, he does travel all over (not sure about international). I do not know how he charges per location though. He does live in the metro Atlanta area. He recently went to Florida to work on someone's car. Give him a call to discuss. Very nice guy.

 

Just wanted to add to this thread Marvin helped me out of a bind
I started the replacement of everything hoses,rams and was doing ok until it wasn't
I was stumped and called Marvin luckily I live in the Atlanta metro area and he was able to come on my time line finish the job and was fair on the price, thanks Marvin not everyone is willing to finish someone else's mess
Michael Lee, Fayetteville, GA.

 

Posting again for the member with the leaky latch.

 

i checked out the link and it says he travels to ALL 50 states. I’d be interested in the cost for anyone on the West Coast who has had him conf out. AMAZING service offering for such a labor intensive job.

 

Last weekend I had Marvin, come to my home outside of Ann Arbor, MI to replace all of my hydraulic hoses and refit new seals in the latch for my 2000 XKR convertible roof.
It looks likely that they had all previously been upgraded to the 3rd Jaguar attempt with better fittings but as an engineer, I prefer to know that a tractor style hydraulic fitting is far superior to their bungling fixes.

He flew in from Atlanta, Sat morning & performed all of this repair in about 5-6 hours at my property & then I simply dropped him back off at Detroit airport that afternoon.
It was a pleasure to chat with him & I appreciated the knowledge that he has developed over 14yrs to complete this repair adeptly.

Very nice gentleman & thus I too highly recommend MarvinJohnson with Jaguar Top Repair for this work.

His contact details are as follows:

MarvinJohnson
Jaguarconvertibletoprepair.com
mjohn2001@yahoo.com
404-759-6600

 

Does Marvin refurbish the owner's existiing rams on site? If not, does he install new ones?

I think just replacing the hydraulic hoses without addressing the factory rams is a recipe for additional failure....

 

Mine had previously been replaced.

I would suggest you call Marvin directly, he is a very helpful & honest gent.
Please note that he also has multiple glowing reports on several Forum threads & this was considered before I was happy to bring him in to do the job.

He also owned an XK8 for 12 yrs, thus has his own considersble experience wrt ownership.

 

I was just curious. If my wife's 2006 XK8 hoses and rams ever have to be replaced during our ownership, Wayne (cjd777) and I will do the job together at his home shop in Spencer, NC. We already did his 2000 XK8 rear hoses and rams back in April 2015. We documented everything as we did that job so we would not have to rely solely on our memories if we had to do it again....

 

This is very good to know. I haven't experienced any problems yet but who knows. TM