Ok, I admit it. I wanted to burn rubber tonight. It was a glorious night in Dallas with nobody around in a particular part of town and I thought I'd give this 'white smoke' a go before I got home. But nothing! Just a very healthy lunge forward. Makes great power, but something's missing... help me feel what this car can do (on very rare special occasions if everything's in good order as it is currently)!

P.s.: I also want new tires.

 

It is not easy to persuade most automatics to break traction from a standing-start, even a properly powerful bit of kit like an XK. They're designed to grip, with plenty of sticky rubber and the hot tarmac of Texas to contend with. With the automatic you have little or no control over the point in the torque curve where the drive engages, even in Sport mode. Granted it is somewhat easier in these British Isles, with our patent PermaDamp(TM) climate...

I'd reckon you'd have to select D, then press and hold the main brake while spinning the engine up to around 3,000 RPM. Then release the brake and floor it. That should make it let go. Note that this sort of hooliganism is anti-social, and tough on transmissions and transmission fluid, and I certainly wouldn't encourage it...

 

As a fellow Dallasite, I can tell you it can be done here. It is not easy however. Jimgoose's drag racing instructions are useful, but it may also help to start normally once or twice to get the computer to start using 1st gear on take-off.

Not that I have tested this myself, but it took a few tries to really break them loose from a standing start. Tires have to warm up, memory has to be overridden, and other arcane things. Plus these cars are geared really high.

My NA XK8 doesn't exactly leave down rubber strips for yards at a time, but it will smoke 'em a little when pressed. Keep in mind the fastest starts just take you forward with no drama. With a rolling start, cut the wheel hard and stomp it. You can get a satisfying smoking donut when the gods are with you. Again, not that I have tried this myself.

 

looks like you got yourself some sticky rubbers!

its a little hard to peel out in an automatic, the other issue is, Jags usually start in 2nd gear...you'll NEVER peel out in second.

brake torquing is the only way to go....stand firm on the brake...step on the gas...let the engine build of revs and let her go

 

The computer should use first in Sport mode, though.

 

In Tucson, Arizona, my 2000 XKR is at 2700 ft. elevation making it a little tougher. It would spin on occasion if I pulled out of a parking lot onto a street turning to the right, but that would lighten the load on the right, making it easier for the back tire to sing.

Now that I have AVos' twin screw supercharger kit and 4.2 engine swap, the ridiculous amount of power spins the tire all the way through first, shifts and continues to spin a little bit into second gear up to 50 mph. It will be new tire time SOON.

 

Somehow I knew Jeff would chime in on this thread. He may have the record for burn outs at this point. His fix works, but is a little more expensive.

 

I managed consistent burnouts, donuts, and drifts on a regular, unmodified XK8 with traction off, sport mode, J-Gate, PermaDamp, autumn leaves and the university parking lot at night. I think that what helped the most is that the tires I was using were so worn they had basically become soap slicks.

 

When I drive 15 miles/hour, then floor it, the car shifts back to first gear and the tyres loose traction straight away with lots of smoke as a result.
Burnouts from stand still happens occasionally.

 

Chris, as I ponder your inability to break traction I now question how different our cars may perform, although they share the same bits. My 2000 XKR, all stock, with traction control off, showed it could boil the rear tires into oblivion at the touch of the accelerator! As this may be a very sophmoric display, it still looks damn cool to see a classic sophisticated car act in such a visceral manner!! Not something I'd reccomend on a regular basis, I had to show off one evening to the boys at my Harley Dealership. I turned off the traction control, planted the right foot, and our back parking lot is now permanately striped a good solid 25 to 30 yards before I had to get out of it, white tire smoke so thick I could'nt see anything through the rear views, now they're all curious as to what really lurks under the hood of my little red cat. I'll have to admit, quite surprised me too. I truly love my Jag, and felt guilty of subjecting it to such abuse, but I know what it is capable of! The "lunge forward", with no tire spin is exactly what I feel with traction control on.

 

How many miles are you frequent tire-smokers typically getting out of your rear pair before you must replace them? The relatively high cost of decent tires (Yokohama YK580 tires on both axles of my wife's XK8) is certainly a deterrent for me to attempt to smoke 'em. On the rare occasions when I drive my wife's XK8 I indeed drive it fast, but I never attempt to smoke the tires upon take-off and can't recall ever doing so even by accident....

 

Are you sure that you floored it? There is a microswitch that gets activated if you push your pedal all the way down hard. It's like hyperdrive.

I have no problem spinning the wheels when I floor it from a standstill, or if I'm driving 20-25 mph and floor it.

You may also have a throttle cable problem? Not sure. My XKR has scary torque. I can't imagine when I put my Avos kit on...


Oh, and as Jag#4 hinted at, you may need to regularly drive aggressively in Sport mode for the computer to learn your driving style. If you drive it tame all the time, you won't get the performance you would expect. My car will delay up and downshifts between throttling hard acceleration/coasting/braking without cues from my foot and mimics how I would aggressively drive a manual transmission fairly well... it does this to a point you may think you are having transmission problems, but once you start driving normally it returns to normal shift points. My car acts very differently now than when I first got it. My computer predicts what I want relatively well. It's actually quite amazing.

 

Precisely my thoughts about it as well!

Thanks to all for accepting a (mostly) mature curious inquiry. It could be that I have a throttle cable issue- will have this looked at though it feels rather taut to me. I too would think with the traction control off and Sport mode engaged that I should be able to melt these tires (Falkens, crap I'm willing to have some fun with before I always play tame with better meats later on this year). I've tried a couple squeals out of a lot around a corner to a small degree- I believe that works pretty well. But I haven't tried stomping on it around a corner as Jag#4 has not. Might try the 15mph bit as well.

All in good (infrequent) fun before I get good tires worth caring about! If I find the bug, I'll post back to update you gents.

 

The computer learns driving habits? Perhaps I'm still more of a newbie here than I was beginning to think... was not aware of this! I typically leave it out of Sport, thinking I'm saving fuel, though the devil on my shoulder tells me daily otherwise. Maybe I'll start listening. I drive spiritedly enough it'd be more fun. When idling, I love the slight lunge forward I get when it's pressed- a cat ready to pounce!

 

Put a 7.5L V8 in front of the automatic and it *will* break traction on demand even without brake standing and with a good LSD. It will also be capable of making the tires bark if you roll on the throttle at 60+ mph in second gear. Only three gears

 

A quick video of my Jag in sport mode and trac on. I was more interested in the exhaust note than wheel spin. I seem to be able to get the tires to chirp all the time when I mash it from a slow rolling start.

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=4836799283231

 

Would love to see the video - getting this message:

"This content is currently unavailable
The page you requested cannot be displayed right now. It may be temporarily unavailable, the link you clicked on may have expired, or you may not have permission to view this page."

 

You need to be logged into Facebook to see it. I got the same message until I logged in. log in and try it again.

Sorry,

Dave

 

I'm logged in to FB and I get this message.

 

I have no FB account. I know, but I drive a 12 year old car too.