10/30/14

Finished with all of the parts replacement of both the primary and secondary timing chains and tensioners yesterday. Just needed a hose clamp installed today and topped up the coolant.

She started the first time without a hitch. We now have a very quiet and purring Jaguar again. The rattle noise in the engine were the chains.

The old chains were so loose that even with new tensioners they were sloppy, what a difference new chains make. I replaced everything up front and all new gaskets, seals and o-rings. I did buy the special tools for the timing and removal of the crankshaft dampener, I couldn't have done it without them.

The degree of difficulty is fairly high but if you take your time, be organized with all of the parts you dismantled and be methodical with the new parts re-install most shade tree mechanics can do a repair like this.

 

Congratulations and well done. This is no trivial task.


Mark

 

Excellent rpbrantley
you can breath a little easier with every turn of the key

 

Well done.
Did anything give you a fit and how did you solve it??
I completely agree on doing the whole thing if you are going in there. That's of course if time permits and you are not doing it in the snow.


Wayne

 

Hi Wayne;

I had a couple of things that didn't go as planned. Removing the crankshaft dampener was one big headache. I bought the crankshaft holder tool from El Paso tool which did the job. Getting the chains installed to the proper pre-tension load was somewhat confusing to me. I used the AJ-V8 assembly guide which has you apply 7-11 ft lbs of counter clockwise torque to exhaust camshaft sprocket while torquing the exhaust camshaft sprocket bolt to 81-96 ft lbs. The cams must be locked with the tools in order for this to work.

We do get snow here, I wanted to be finished before it started to fly. My garage is not heated.

 

When I started removing parts in order to replace the timing chains I noticed that the vibration mount that attaches the intake box to the fender wall was broken. Since I wanted to replace the mount with a new one, couldn't be to expensive could it? I started checking with parts houses looking for one. Well I was very surprised at how expensive it was. The part number for my Jag is ECA8130.

A Replacement from Terry's Jaguar Parts is a Whopping $56.78 each.
Being the Frugal person that I am I started looking for a Substitute Replacement. I did find one but had to purchase twelve (12) of them
so I'm offing the other ten (10) on eBay, keeping one as an extra.

The link for the part on eBay is:

New Substitution Air Box Viabration Mount for Jaguar 1997 XK8 Part ECA8130 | eBay

 

Thanks RP, just bought one from you after twisting my old one apart doing a valve cover gasket job!

Nick

 

I managed to source one from here.

http://pages.ebay.com/link/?nav=item...d=400718468985

It was identical to the part I removed.

Peter