Well 99 xk8 is in the shop. Made a right turn into the parking lot and the check engine light came on with a transmission fault and moved like a slug. Checked the code and found P1722. Yes I know! It is presently at the transmission shop awaiting the cause and the results. The car has 113,000mi on it and I had the transmission serviced at 107,000mi. For 6,000mi the transmission seemed to shift better after it was serviced. Well this is what I needed for the holidays.

 

Sorry Gus, that does not sound good............
Brian

 

it happens but we all know it wont stay that way.......than it springs back to life

 

Is that the a-drum failure? Whats the code mean?

 

It was the drum that failed. I have not had time to ask the questions I ask when the job is being done by others. Dam shame I do not have a garage to do it myself. However, I did find out that the drum is in limited supply because the company went out of business and another has not taken over. I was also told that changing fluid and other maintenance procedures would not change the failure. This is a common problem with this unit. When I get better information I will update you.

 

You are right about the limited supply of the drum. My transmission guy ran into the same thing on my Green(97) XK8 coupe with 131,200 miles. Well long story short he found one at a fair price, Oh they are out there but will cost a leg and half an arm. The cost for r/r and rebuild at whole sale was $1800.00 out the door.

 

If I was a very conservative guy, with a 1999 XK8 with 104k miles on it, would it make sense to try to find a reasonable price on a drum today to keep in stock as a spare?

Any guidance on what a "reasonable" price would be and what the best possible sources are?

I have also heard/read about an upgraded drum with dimples???

 

If I had a place to do my own work I would have done this https://www.jaguarforums.com/forum/s...ad.php?t=27985 I was forced into getting it repaired by others. I was also lucky that he had a few on the shelf. Chances are that any new company remanufacturing the drum will make improvements as they go along.

 

So you got the rebuilt drum at a reasonable price gus?

 

No he is installing a new one but I would have done the rebuild myself if I had a place to do it.

 

Sorry for your troubles Gus. Stuff like this is always ugly. The fellow in the linked post felt that all of these trannys are due to go. Am I correct in assuming that your tranny ZF 5HP 24 was for XK8's only and that the 02 XKR that I have has a different one?

 

I am not a transmission kind of guy and I need to ask additional questions when I get the car. I told him to do what was necessary. In the mean time I am trying to stay out of his way and not bother him. I want to verify the trans. model, the cause and the likelihood of another breakdown. I also want to clarify the when to change the fluid and other preventive maintenance to stimulate the mind and pocketbook.

 

XKRs through MY 2002 used a Mercedes Transmission.

Starting in 2003, the XK8 & XKR both used the same ZF Transmission

 

Thanks Paul. That's good to know.

 

I'm putting this on my list right next to tensioners. Gus I did a search on line and found only two sources for the a-drum thru ebay. The rebuilt models are $285.00 with core. There was a place in vegas that was selling new ones but it had a use for model # ZF 5HP 24 A this one is 331.85 plus s/h.

ebay item number search 280393486751 for vegas new part.
ebay item number search 330382568429 for bentinville reman. part.

I know this does not help you but to us who are knocking on wood right now this may come in handy.

Makes me wonder about getting an extendend warranty vs. continuing out of pocket since I know what the future holds.

The Maintenance manual in my 99 jag gives the transmission model number. This should verify what should be in your cars but the only real way to know is the vin# and build date I suppose.

 

If it were me, I'd get the refurbished one, as one member who went that route said it appeared of better construction (stronger) than the original. If the a-drum is the weak link, once that's replaced, the tranny should be set for many miles.

 

Well I just got my car back from the transmission shop tonight. Had to replace the B clutch hub, forward drum and the torque converter and of course the overhaul kit with filter and fluid. I have the B clutch and forward drum and I will attach a photo for you to see. The torque converter was changed for fear of metal parts from the B clutch hub that broke off and scored the forward drum shavings getting into it and causing additional problems down the road.
Now the best question is did I know it prior to it failing completely? Now that I look back I probably did. At times both my wife and would hear a slight roaring noise off and on from what appeared to be coming from the center to the rear of the car at speeds of 45mph – 50mph. I had the car put on a lift prior to the transmission failure looking for where the noise was coming from and I was unable to find it. I thought it was in the rear differential or the one set of universal joints I did not replace I never thought of the transmission being the cause because it ran so well.
I considered getting the reconditioned B clutch hub but when I mentioned Tom told that the replacement hob with the dimples are the best bet. The recondition as he said had several problems of its own and was not worth taking the risk. At this point I am pleased with my decision I made, the car runs great and I will move on to my next project.

 

So you got a recon front A hub and a new B hub. The only reason you even considered the B unit was the metal bits issue, otherwise you could have gotten away with just the A hub unit?


The question is can you really do this repair in your own garage without a lift? Will the tranny come out if just the rear of the car is up in the air?

Would you rate this up next to tensioners as stated in my earlier post?

What to do!

 

I would only do this with a trans lift a controlled environment and a good how to manual!

 

As the proud owner of a daily driver 2002 XK8 coupe with 119,000 miles I have a special interest in the transmission failure discussion. Soooo, I did my own research and contacted our friends over in Germany at ZF, who then provided me with the number of the US service branch of ZF in IL.

I spoke to them at length about the failure rate of the tranny generally and the A drum in particular. I wanted some stats before I proactively spent $1,000 + before replacing the A drum (in lieu of letting the whole thing fail...if it ever did).

They were nice but did not give me the information I needed. However they did give me the name of a Jag experienced tranny shop in CT. The owner said, if I owned your car I would replace the valve body. (A $600 job so the answer was seemed to be not motivated by money).

The theory is the valve body would wear at the point of constant speed (highway RPMs) and would hang up on kick-down thereby increasing the pressure of moving tranny parts at downshift from 200 lbs 500 lbs...thereby fatiguing the metal parts until failure.

Sounds logical...any thoughts?