Been having a quick search around, but haven't been able to find anything to help yet, as I have an issue with my front fog lamps on my 1998 XJ8.

The switch illumination is on for both front and rear fogs, but the telltale does not work for either. The rear fogs work, but both of the fronts do not. So far I have checked the appropriate fuse, and removed the relay and tested it for correct operation, both of which are fine.

When I look to see how to get to the front fogs, to test the lamps themselves, I can't work out how to do it. Do I have to remove the bumper? If the lamps turn out to be fine, I suspect they will, where do I look next?

Does the telltale being inoperative for both front and rear, even though the rear fogs work, point to anything in common?

Any help would be appreciated.

Cheers

Sutty

 

The plot thickens.

I have another issue, where the heater is only hot when I rev quite hard, otherwise just barely warm. I searched for that fault online, and someone posted, fuse 3, front fuse box, engine bay. The description of the fuse has absolutely nothing to do with heating, in the vehicle care book, as far as I can see, but he said it fixed his issue, so I went and checked. Fuse 3 was indeed blown.

The vehicle care handbook describes it as:

10A Security sounder, headlamp levelling, ignition coils +ve, fog lamp switches.

I already checked the fuse for the heater pump, and that was fine, but I thought, maybe it will fix the fog lamps problem, so I'll change it anyway, thinking if it fixes the heater too, well, all the better, so I replaced fuse 3, which is a 10A fuse. Got in the car, which already had a warm engine, and started the car. Lo and behold I had full heating, for a minute or so. I then put the front fog lamps on, and the heater went cold. Obviously I didn't have time to check if they came on.

Checked the fuse, and it was blown again. Changed it again, and this time when I started the car, yes I had heat, but, smoke started pouring up from the front of the engine bay. I immediately switched off, and the smoke stopped. Checked the fuse once more, and it was damaged, but not failed.

So, I must have a short somewhere, to do with the fog lights, or, maybe as in his case, to do with the security sounder, and somehow, don't ask me how, that same fuse affects the heater pump.

Anyway, I'm pretty sure now I will have to get the front grill off, and most likely the bumper as well.

Has anyone already done a guide for this, on a 98 XJ8?

Thanks in advance.

 

We are an International forum with knowledgeable members from across the World. Do you specifically want replies only from those in the UK and Eire? If not, X308 forum is the place to post technical questions.

It is not neccessary to remove the front bumper to access the Fog Lamp bulb. Only the undertray needs to be removed for access:







A little more involved than most bulb replacement which is the reason for the recommendation in the Vehicle Care Handbook to have these bulbs replaced by a Dealer. The scrivets (screw/rivets) can be unscrewed, pulled out and re-used.

Graham

 

Hello Graham

Thanks for taking the time to reply. I don't specifically want only answers from UK owners, I just thought being in the UK myself, it might well be forum etiquette. I'm now concerned that I might cross post, or double post if I ask again in the X308 specific forum. I was wondering if anyone was able to help, because I also have another thread about the rear view mirror, which in fairness, for that one, I was looking for someone who had specific knowledge of the UK market/options for replacements/repair, but neither thread attracted any answers until yours.

As for access to the fog lamps, I now have a pdf manual, for £3.99 off ebay, but I need to familiarise myself with reading and understanding it, because I've only had it an hour, lol. Had I even found that image, with the scrivets, without your explanation, I wouldn't even have known what they were. I had already looked at them, on the car itself and they have no screw head? I was scared to just pry them out, not knowing what they were. I appreciate the images posted. Is there a trick to unscrewing them, without there being a slot, before I give it a try?

Anyway, the reason I was thinking the bumper needed to come off, is that there must be a wiring loom fault, and I need to examine that wiring carefully. I'm sure there must be a short somewhere. The fuse keeps blowing, and when it didn't blow, or was in the process of blowing, there was a lot of smoke rising up from the area of the fog lamp, on the left hand side. I wouldn't be at all surprised to find the lamps are perfectly fine, but a short lies elsewhere in the wiring. Good to know I can get the lamps out in the manner described, but do you think I'll also be able to gain good access to the wiring, just by removing the under tray?

Thanks again.

Andrew

 

Hello Andrew,

A major advantage of being 'International' is there's alway someone, somewhere around the World online whatever time of day or night. We have a small number of high activity/contributing members in Australia, UK and US so definitely worth picking the collective brains through the MODEL forum.

Another tip for successful posting - stick to one topic per thread and make the title relevant.

Scrivet - this is what they should look like:




Open, it will push easily through a hole in a panel. When the screw is tightened, it spreads the 'arms' and locks it in place. They often go missing or are damaged but not an expensive cost to replace. Here's an example from British Parts but they are widely available elsewhere:
https://www.britishparts.co.uk/jagua.../scrivet-p7653

Front (or rear) bumper removal looks straightforward although two pairs of hands are an advantge. The problem is often the two vertical bolts (item 6) through the bumper beam (item 12) corrode into their fixing nuts. These are brass - they break away from the plastic beam and simply rotate. In worst cases, the brackets (item 4) have to be broken to progress.





You may be able to access the fog lamp harness with only the undertray and the wheelarch liner removed.

Graham

 

Hello Graham

Thanks again for looking at this issue and for the advice. I was conscious of not merging two topics, but I did so because they seem to be related. Fuse 3, oddly, has something to do with the heating, though not mentioned in vehicle care, so I brought it up here. Replacing 3, caused the heating to work, until the fuse blew again, or until I turned the fog lights on, so I linked the two issues, after I'd confirmed this. I found this information in another article, where someone had gone to the trouble of explaining he had no fogs, and no heat until high revs, exactly as my issue, and I do mean exactly. He found fuse 3 blown, and replacing it fixed both of his issues. In my case, fuse 3 was also blown, and replacing it fixed the heating, but only until it blew again.

As for the scrivets, that might be what they should look like, but they do not on mine, Maybe they changed for a while, or maybe after a service Jaguar used another type, whatever they had on hand, I couldn't say, but mine are different. Having seen the type you've posted, I would say these are simply push in types. Maybe like a fir tree, but for sure, there is no screw head.

I'll go take a look at getting one out, and depending on difficulty, I'll decide whether to continue or not. I'll update the thread as I go, as to cable access, etc.

Thanks again.

Andrew

 

Hello Again

Having taken a closer look, and then looked for the under tray rivet online, a genuine part looks like this, before use. Looks like a pop rivet type that shears off the pull pin when tight:

https://www.moss-europe.co.uk/rivet-...kra106001.html

Here is mine in use, from the inside.




Based on this, I suspect if I tap the pin back up, through the hole on the outside, in the centre, with an appropriately sized bar, they will come free.

Off to try now.

 

Couldn't tap them out, but realising that like a metal pop rivet, they are one time only and no way to use them again, I just cut them off, got the under tray off. Two were different, which went to the wheel arch liner, and I could see how they were removeable and reusable, so I have saved those. Got one fog lamp off, and can now see how it all works. Very difficult to remove without the wheel arch liner out, so I'll have to do that tomorrow to put it back, and look at the wiring to the other one. Although I didn't need the fog lamp off the car to get the bulb out, I'm pleased I did it, to see how it all looks, and works. By the way, the bulbs work fine, both sides. Just comes down to a wiring fault somewhere. Hopefully I'll be able to spot that tomorrow.

Funnily enough, the other side, would have been a piece of cake to remove, without the wheel arch liner out. That would be the left side. The right side, which I took out, and is the drivers side for me, if that makes a difference, was a right royal pain in the neck, quite literally, as my neck is now sore. Maybe I will get it back, without the wheel arch liner out, but maybe not. Time will tell.

Thanks again Graham.

 

You couldn't make it up. It's raining today, and to get to the fog lamp wiring, I have to have the car half in and half out of the garage. The drive is angled down, and it tips the front of the car up nicely. Anyway, I thought with the back out, and the front in, I won't have an issue with the rain. However, rain found its way down and through in only two places, the left and right front corners. After a couple of minutes, lying there, drip, drip, drip, right on my head. Then looked at the other side, and it was the same there, so jobs off for now. Hopefully it will clear up. I just thought it was funny, that the only place it was dripping, was right where I needed to be. Sod's law.

 

The joys of Jaguar DiY.

If memory serves me correctly, those Moss-Europe fasteners are used on the sides of the tray but are different from the Scrivets around the bottom edge of the undertray. Sounds like you've made good progress despite the rain and a harness fault is going to be considerably less cost than replacing faulty fog lamp(s).

Graham

 

Yeah, getting there. Wiring looks suspect near the connector, so fingers crossed it is near there, and nowhere else. Certainly the smoke came out and up from that corner, so it's has to be near there. The under tray plastic pop rivets were all the way around and not a scrivet to be seen. The only two that were different were right at the ends, where they passed through into the wheel arch liner. Those had push through pins that could be grabbed with pincers, on the accessible side, to draw the pin back, and thus release the expansion on the far side, allowing them to be pulled out. Those two are the reusable ones, because they remain undamaged. Obviously I need replacements, of any sort, for the undertray refit, but for now I'm just going to worry about tracking down the wiring fault, if I can that is. May or may not buy real ones, but for a plastic pop rivet, £3.10 each seems excessive. I'm sure I can find equal and cheaper alternatives.

If I can indulge you please Graham for some very basic advice. I'd like to jack the car up, and I do have a hydraulic jack, to make that easy, but I have some questions. First, is it okay to jack on the bottom of the square tube used for the supplied jack, and second, will it be obvious where I can put axle stands, once I've done that? Embarrassingly basic questions, but I'm new to dealing with this Jaguar. It's only become my daily runner, since my other car failed on me. The Jaguar was loved and washed, dried and polished by my late father, if it so much as got rained on. I've never been like that, but I want to now have it as my daily runner, and I don't want to spend Jaguar type costs on anything I can possibly tackle myself. Plus I've always gotten immense satisfaction out of repairing anything myself, if it's at all possible, so I always want to try first.

Lastly, having positioned axle stands before, I still feel extremely uncomfortable working underneath a car. Are there any simple methods to make it utterly fool proof, to stop the car dropping, even if say a weld were to fail on an axle stand? I just read the health and safety guidelines on the government website, and honestly, some of the safe examples they show, I would still have felt uncomfortable being underneath. Okay, I just watched a video, from an axle stand manufacturer, safe practice, etc, and honestly, until the very end, I was thinking, I still don't want to go under their 'safe' example, until they said, use railway sleepers, or bricks, to serve as a dead weigh failsafe. Now that, I'd just about be okay with. Axles stands, and two big piles of bricks. I'd been thinking of that, but never thought I'd see it at the end of a high quality axle stand manufacturer's safety video. If it's good enough for them, I guess it's good enough for me.

 

With the XJ's, I've frequently used one of the four jacking points to lift one corner of the vehicle with a trolley jack but am also very careful when working underneath. Here's the recommendation from the Workshop Manual for lifting front or rear of the X308:




The problem is if you use the vehicle jacking points to lift, that's also exactly the same place you then want to put axle stands to support it.

I tend to use two methods of support for safety. Here's an example where I had the front suspension off an X300 to replace the sump. Axle stands on either side, a stout timber across ramps in the centre so if it did come down off the stands, there was plenty of room for escape.




Bottle jack with load spreader timber under the sump was probably going too far but it felt reassuringly safe.

Graham

 

That's brilliant Graham, thank you. It had been crossing my mind how I could jack, and put the stands there too. The excerpt from the manual you included there clearly shows how to go about it. I too have ramps available, and I like what you did there and I can do that too. I will also go as far as redeploying the jack, just touch tight, to go over board with extra support. I too should like to feel "reassuringly safe."

Thanks for all your help.

 

Needing more simple assistance please. When I disconnected the coupler for the part of the harness I wanted, the only bit that didn't come away from the bumper was the bit I wanted off. I have a complete section of harness, that I am interested in checking, hanging off the car, all apart from the coupler end, which is somehow fixed to the bumper, on a swivel. How do I get that off please? Picture below shows the part I am interested in removing. I have tried and tried, but to no avail, and I do not want to break the mounting point.





I always struggle, but manage, with things such as this, and when you get them off, it's usually easy to see how they work, and how it should be done, but on your back, underneath, looking up, in a small space, and I am struggling. Any further help would be appreciated.

 

It was a fir tree. Struggled for ages, then as I looked, I realised it spins freely, so it probably was. I pulled and pulled, but was not strong enough, and so I just levered it out with a big screwdriver. Minor damage occurred to the fir tree shroud/flange, but it will still work, and go back in when required. Now to check the loom. I could try also the fuse again tomorrow as well, and if no issues, then it must be the section of loom I have removed. Have my doubts though, but let's see.

 

Quick update. Without the left hand wiring loom for the indicator and front fog lamp, everything was working again. Fuse 3 does not blow, there are no smoking wires, the right hand fog lamp lights up, the tell tales on the dashboard switch illuminate, and the auxiliary heater pump runs, and thus the heating is working again, at low rpm.

However, the loom tests okay on the bench, and looks okay, but hopefully there will be something wrong internally, which moving it and flexing it has corrected, so I am now going to strip it down and make certain that it is fault free, and then rewrap it. If it proves to be entirely fault free, then I must have fixed an error elsewhere, simply by moving wires about, which will leave me feeling somewhat anxious about the fix. I hope I find a smoking gun inside this harness, LNC3220BD, photographed below.



Hopefully it will be this, otherwise it will be somewhat annoying, frustrating and slightly worrying, that a potential fault remains, to rear its ugly head at any moment. I'll further update after I've stripped it down, but it seems in worryingly good condition.

Cheers

Andrew

 

Loom is perfect. Every wire scrutinised along its entire length, and not a break, crack or even an abrasion found.

 

After a good deal of extra research, I found out that this fault is often caused by the Intelligent Sounder, LNC 2620 AC. Today I jacked the car up, used a heavy duty axle support, left my jack in place, just barely tight, and placed a ramp under there too, as a belt and braces approach to safety. I got the wheel arch cover out, and then unbolted the intelligent sounder.

On removal of its cover, I found out where the magic smoke had come from, and worked out why fuse 3 has now stopped blowing, and everything is now working again. The fault with the sounder finally got so bad, that something completely burnt out, with me forcing this by replacing the fuse a couple of times. Once it burnt out, I saw the smoke, but from then on it went open circuit, so no load on the circuit, and fuse 3 now remains intact, so everything works again.

I'm pleased to have found the real culprit, and can stop worrying if the smoke had caused any damaged wires. The real smoking gun, has been found, so to speak.

I found this on jaguarforum.com. Not sure if it is related to jaguarforums.com, I get a bit muddled between where I keep finding things.

Here are my pictures of the unit and fault.



Burnt out area, specifically one component is clearly badly burnt.



Back of cover, which has also suffered some heat damage.



Now to research a replacement. Leaving it off is the recommended action, due to cost. Apparently it makes the beeps when you lock and unlock, and keeps sounding the alarm, under its own battery power, if the main battery is somehow disconnected by a would be thief. Further evidence of it being faulty all along, in that I have had no beeps for a long time.

 

Andrew,

I'm only just catching up on the thread as I didn't have much time on the forums yesterday. Good to hear you've tracked down the culprit.

The sounder is NLA from Jaguar and a very used one I found in the Netherlands was listed at an eye watering 217 Euro. Makes this one in France listed as 'coming soon' at 75 Euro almost a bargain:
https://www.jagpieces.com/avertisseu...ac-c6x24830356

Graham

 

Thanks for those two links Graham. Having read more about used ones, bearing in mind the nice looking one is technically older than mine, it makes sense that what I've read is that the nicads will be stuffed. That used unit is the same age as mine, 23 years old, made in March 98 and mine was made in June 98. Not a prayer there will be any useful life in the nicads, and the whole unit could fail at any moment. As you say, they are not available new, and if they were, I feel sure they would be prohibitively expensive. If mine was only a nicads issue, I could attempt a repair, but as you will see from my pictures, they are buried in rubber, so even that is not easy.

If I can find a cheap used one, I will replace the nicads. The badly burnt area on mine, looks like the top of a ceramic capacitor, when I look at one that hasn't blown up, though could be something else, but it does mean there is more wrong with mine now than just having old nicads. Replacing the fuse twice, probably resulted in that.

I can live without it anyway, but it would be nice to have it beep, like it should do.

Thanks for all your help. I did feel kinda safe underneath, with your suggestion of axle stand, jack, and a ramp, but even so I never felt totally relaxed.

Cheers

Andrew