Best of luck, and keep us posted on your situation. If you decide to chase another S-Type, stick with a 2005-or-newer. You'll be dealing with far fewer issues down the road....

 

Well all sorted , car has been returned for a refund minus a couple hundred refund. I'm aware I was entitled to the whole lot but to be honest couldn't be bothered with continuing phone calls and emails. The cost of me not working when I should have been was greater than a deposit.

The bloke was as good as gold and couldn't say he was sorry any more than he did. Even gave me a ride to the station which saved £20 for a taxi.

Left me car less so having to hire until the weekend...then I've bought a £500 diesel Saxo to keep me going whilst I decide what to do next. Will see what's about, may look at an X-Type, probably not an S-Type, maybe I'll keep the Saxo and bank the money! :P

 

Good for you. If you are skeptical about the reliability of the S-Type, take a gander over at the X-Type forums and then make a descision. From what I have heard X's are pretty terrible reliabilty wise, nice looking cars, but bad reputations warranted or not.

 

As a long term owner of both and X and a more recent owner of an S, the only thing that the X is plagued by that the S is free of is the premature transfer case failures of the AWD system. Fluid changes seem to prevent this... Other than that the motors are the same..

I've had the coolant recovery tanks on both go, the X doesn't have a DCCV so that isn't an issue.

IMT O-rings on the V6's are the same. etc... The X's motor is transverse mounted, so it's a bit tighter to get to some things, but a lot easier to get to others. The X and S are very different to drive though. Both from a size perspective as well as a handling perspective. With the 3.0 the X almost feels a bit more sluggish because of the AWD.

George

 

If your talking 3.0, yes, but I believe they are tuned differently.

The AJ30 is a 3.0 L (2967 cc) version and is the most common, especially considering the Duratec 30. It has an 89 mm (3.5 in) bore and shares the 2.5's 79.5 mm (3.1 in) stroke. In the X-Type, it produces 231 hp (172 kW; 234 PS) and 209 lb·ft (283 N·m).

This engine is used in the following vehicles:

• 2000–present Jaguar S-Type, 240 hp (179 kW; 243 PS) and 216 lb·ft (293 N·m)
• 2002–present Jaguar X-Type, 231 hp (172 kW; 234 PS) and 209 lb·ft (283 N·m)
• 2009–present Jaguar XF, 240 hp (179 kW; 243 PS) and 221 lb·ft (300 N·m)

The Jaguar XF will debut a refined version of the AJ30 with continuously variable cam-phasing and variable geometry air intakes to increase power and broaden the powerband up to its 6800 rpm redline.


From what I have read on here, STypes share VERY little in common with X Types, and X's are the hallmark vehicle of Jag's marriage with Ford. As others would say, "a Mondeo with a Leaper", or "Mondeo in drag", I dont even know what the hell a Mondeo is but it seems to be a pretty common joke.

 

Oh I know, I was just speaking in terms of reliability.

The Mondeo is a Euro Market Ford:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Mondeo

Basically the first generation was sold here in the US as a Ford Contour. The X-type is based on the 2nd generation, that had AWD etc... Ironically that's considered a large family car in Europe.

There are some differences in the engines, but not that much.. As far as physical layout of parts and what have you.

It's not that much different than the DEW platform of our S-types being used across the corporate Ford stable, in that its the same platform shared across multiple vehicles. In this case, the Lincoln LS, the S-Type, and the T-bird Convertibles. The only difference was the "entry level" factor of it, which is something new and novel for Jaguar (and why it caught so much slack). The Interior of the X looks exactly like a smaller version of the O3+ S-type. The 00-02 S-Types scream Ford, especially with the center stack.

George

 

The 3.0 has Jag heads, I understand. Also, 2003+ uses a different PCM (Denso 32-bit). I expect the Ford models (Mondeo or whatever) use the EEC-V (or even EEC-VI, maybe). (The 2.5 X-Type doesn't use the Denso 32-bit, apparently.)

I think the Denso is how the 3.0 can have VVT and also how it uses the wide-band upstream O2 sensors. I doubt the Mondeo has VVT. I've no idea what O2s it uses.

But this will still mean a lot of metal engine parts will likely be identical. I suspect things like throttle bodies will not be but there again they may be.

The 00-02 S-Types use the so-called PTEC PCM and all sorts of things are different but again a lot of the metal engine parts are likely identical. There's no CAN bus in the car so many of the modules are different (and use Ford's SCP).

The DEW thing can mislead because it's also used in the Jag XF and if you're not careful you'd start thinking you could put LS parts on an XF. You probably can but good luck figuring out which ones!