’97 XK8, 90.000 miles. The week before Las Vegas shut its doors I was sitting at a stoplight, stepped on the accelerator and the check engine light burned brightly, the car went into limp mode. Made it into a parking lot, shut it down and re-started it. All was well until I placed it in gear. There was a ‘clunk’, and it immediately went into limp mode. So off it went on a flatbed.

The mechanic, also previous owner of the car, is from the UK, and has held mechanic certification from Jaguar since 1997. He read a P1722, stall speed failure fault. We had a brief discussion and he had the trans out a number of years ago because the reverse failed. He sold the car because he seldom used it, but it was not rebuilt.

Since I acquired the car, I have been working through a list of items to repair. On that list was a transmission leak, not much, a few drops a day for a little more than a year and half. I have meant to address this leak since getting the car. I hang my head in shame for not addressing it sooner. One thing I did address was the bracket that holds the shift cable sheath in place had loosened from the transmission case so the manual shifting did not work properly and went into limp mode. Tighten that up and the trans manual shifted properly.

Currently the mechanic wants to pull the transmission out and have the A/B drums fixed. It sounds like the A/B drum failure is pretty common with this transmission. He says the transmission 'clunks' when put into gear.

My question is there any other places to look before pulling out the transmission and rebuilding it? Could the leaking transmission, hence low fluid, cause this fault? Or some other place to check first?

Sorry for the essay on the transmission, but wanted to provide enough background information for an informed response. I thank you all for any experience or knowledge you can share.

 

Given the known ATF leak, a low ATF level would be the first thing I would look for before agreeing to tear into the transmission....