I installed new foam, used the old seat heaters, and installed the new embroidered leather front seat upholstery.

Just as a cautionary note: This job is not for first timers!... Pulling, folding, and inserting the welting in the seat backs, that have had other leather in them for 16 years, with only factory clips will take you days, unless you really know what you are doing.

I sat in front of the furnace in an 85 degree garage, sweating like a boxer, just so the welting would be flexible enough to be inserted in the seat back slot. I did cheat a little though, and used a little leather glue, from a shoe maker, and held the welting in with wooden wedges overnight. The seat bottoms are a snap to install. Things should be ready today, for installation in the car. It looks nice, I just hope the 6 hours was worth it. The remaining wrinkles should go away once my fat **** sits in the seats for awhile.....Be cool...Mike

 

Oh, I wish I could curse in German! Dumkopf does not quite cover it, really.

I have been mulling over my options for a while regarding fixing a transmission fluid leak. I bought the pan kit (pan, fluid and hardware) a few weeks back, and eventually decided to tackle this myself. Figured I could replace the plastic pan/filter combo real quick, fill it up, and call it a day. But no! I had the dreaded early pan bolts on this 6HP26, with the tiny T27 Torx head. I ended up stripping 6 of them, and spending a lot more time under the car than I planned on. Curse, drill, extract, repeat.

The old fluid was dark coffee colored, but smelled about the same as the new one. Magnets showed no sign of metal shavings.

Altogether, an overall no fun zone, but I am glad this is behind me.

 

Oil & filter change today.

 

Me too, except my old ABS light/missing sgnal fault (that I thought I fixed months ago) came back.
Not pleased

 

I tackled the replacement of the fuel filter. Pretty straightforward, and just as described here on the forum. I did not follow what the online parts search was coming up with (screw-on type filter) but went ahead with the quick connect type. The hard part is to reach the nut on the bracket to free the filter. The fuel removal/refitting of the lines were completely drama free.

Altogether, a boring, smelly job that offers no driving improvement. Only satisfaction is that it is now off the to-do list.

 

Yesterday I replaced my passenger side upstream and downstream oxygen sensors on my XKR. I also changed its' oil.

Tonight I'm replacing a rear wheel bearing on my 97 A4. Then it's up for sale.

 

Also spent some time looking at the brake switch. After taking it out of the car, it became apparent the 2 switches were not clicking together, which most likely caused the occasional errors on the message center (check rear bulbs, cruise not available). For now, I put a piece of tape on one side of the "ramp" to re-sync the switches. Solder looked fine, switches seem to work just fine. Just the plastic cam seemed to be more worn on one side than the other. And yes, putting the whole thing back in place was a pain. We'll see in the next few weeks if the message comes back...

 

Took Thunderbird1 into my local Indy for the autobox exchange today. He is also going to free up the O/S side top link and replace the ball joint etc. Says it may be in for 2 days.
I just hope the secondhand box is as was described with only 37k miles of use!
An update will come later, unless of course it all turns to you know what and I abandon it at the garage.

 

Finished the brakes front and rear. EBC Red Stuff pads with EBC USR Slotted Rotors. The rears were very east. The fronts however were time consuming. One rotor was "frozen" on and the front caliper bolts were not picnic to break loose.

On Saturday I think I will do the front struts. I have new springs, shocks, shock mounts, and associated hardware.

 

Well after three years of fighting the intermittent up/down steering column today I pulled out the motor flattened the spring washer, greased it up and now it works like new. Thanks Mish_Mish, your post got me off my butt, should have done this years ago, very easy job.

 

Called at the Indy today to check on Thunderbird1, hes up on the lift with 5 sheared bolts in the transmission only one freed up. So new bolts are on order from jaguar, and I have to wait for a few days more. Anyone know the price of the bolts?

 

You probably don't want to know. Why ruin a good night's sleep?

Graham

 

Good job I read this in the morning then

 

in the last 2 days - replaced thermostat, part load breather and valley hoses. next up all 4 shocks and lowering springs

 

Hello All, I actually started this project about a month ago and finished up in the last few days.
I did a custom install on the speakers in the front door, front dash and rear seat and removed the tweeters in the corner windows.
I used Rockford/Fosgate T4 component speakers.(pretty high end)
I had already added a subwoofer in the front passenger footwell.
After the speakers I added a 3sixty.3 Fosgate digital sound processer.
The sound system sounds amazing, the digital processor tuning makes for some incredible improvements to the sound quality and of course the speakers can handle power and all the highs, lows and midrange.
The complete sound spectrum is literally tuneable to your exact specs/liking.
The pictures that follow will show your the actual custom install.

 

Changed the transmission fluid then tried some lead loading.


Practice hole.



Hammered flat.



Patch prepared.



Tacked in place, I missed with one.



Ground down.



I brushed on some standard plumbing flux.



And then "tined" the area, note that the areas with slag did not work and had the be cleaned better and retined.



Filled with standard plumbers solder.



Filed down and sanded.

A bit of dolphin filler.






And then flatted off.



This was the first time I had tried solder on a body panel, not sure when I will use it for a real job.

 

I plan to re-spray my front wings after getting rid of the rust on the wheel arches and just completed my air set up today to give me both oiled air for garage tools and clean dry air for breathing/spray gun.


Still need to sort out a small issue with the compressor restart pressure first.

 

Just installed Realgauge temp gauge.

Oil gauge tomorrow.

 

Oil and filter change, air filter, pulled the left hand rocker cover to check on the tensioner and a mystery noise, refitted the right hand headlamp, changed out two ignition coils.

The old oil was a rich dark chocolate colour and easily the darkest I have drained from any petrol/gas engined car I have owned. We have only had the car a year and 5,000 miles and I thought the garage we got it from had changed the oil.

Do these cars sludge up or cook their oil much? It only has 88,000 miles on it so I would not have thought wear would be much of an issue.

Both upper tensioners are the updated aluminium type, so no worries there. I found a 2.5" long piece of red gasket stuck in the cam box right next to one of the valve springs so I spent a while fishing that out. I didn't fancy it finding its way down one of the oil passages.

Tomorrow sees me changing the spark plugs and the fuel filter, repairing a cracked plastic casing on the side of the passenger seat and trying to figure out why the demist button has stopped working. Busy busy

 

Oil gauge option now fitted. But I found water leak near the temp sensor. Oh well yet another result of driving around at 104C.