You have inspired me! I have picked up some wrap today and will try it on the black interior of my XJR.

 

Nice, just take your time, have you looked at that link i put up a few comments back - its worth a look if you havent done it before

 

I did the passenger side airbag yesterday. The round corners on the outside are a bit tricky. Today I will try the center console around events.

 

Wow, so far it looks great with the black dash leather. What did you find worked best on the outside corners? I haven't had much luck with the hairdryer, so I've just been doing it cold.
The nice part is that the tiny imperfections in the corners aren't visible in the car.

 

Before and after:

 

WOOHOO nice job :-)

 

Thank You M9G, for the inspiration of this easy, inexpensive update. Using the hole punch on the airbag light was a brilliant idea, so I copied it...

This stuff is an excellent value, best bank for the buck improvement I've tried in quite some time...I had disliked the strangely colored, shiney "wood" trim since I got the car...

pics of the pieces prior to installation:

 

All X-Types had real wood veneer, except the some rare later models that left the factory with carbon fiber or aluminium trim :|
There's just a lot of clearcoat, which makes it shiny, which then makes it look plasticky to some despite the grain having significantly more depth than any fake when examined closely. Yours was probably pomme sapelle, I think it was the standard veneer in the US while in Europe the standard was bird's eye maple.

I strongly dislike the look of carbon fiber, but I have to say you've all managed to wrap things up very neatly indeed. Either it's not as difficult as I'd imagine, or you're all just really good at it

 

Did you use the same 3M Di-Noc wrap? For some reason yours looks shinier. I have a carbon fiber "dash kit" I got of ebay in my car. I really like the look and I've been wanting to wrap some other parts in my interior in carbon fiber but the problem I have is my dash kit is like, laminated, and most of the good quality carbon fiber wrap I've seen is more flat than glossy.

 

Yes, the wood is one of the things I noticed Jaguar did not do cheaply in this car. It's heavily lacquered as its traditional on some high end veneers,but its definately very real. I also don't particularly care for the carbon, but I have to say it looks very well done. Great job !

 

I like the wood in my XJ8, in fact I was thinking of swapping it over to the XJR.
Where Jaguar did poorly (IMHO) is the black trim in the XJR.
It isn't wood, there is no grain that I can see even in sunlight, and as a result it looks like plastic. Also on my car there were many cracks, making it look worse.
I used 3M Scotchprint On Demand vinyl.

 

Yes, I used the same 3M Di-Noc vinyl. Perhaps the camera flash made it look different.

As for the wood being real, I didn't see anything that resembles real wood on any of these panels. The panels are metal, and you can see where the color of the "wood" seeps around the edges of each panel. Does Jaguar use Liquid Wood?

 

It's thin veneer, as is common in veneer trim, glued to a metal panel probably for cost and weight savings. Even Bentleys have similar thin veneer in their trim, though in them it's apparently glued to a thicker slab of wood rather than a metal panel. It would be ludicrous to use thicker slices of the precious woods, since the thickness of the veneer makes no difference in the appearance whatsoever.

https://www.jaguarforums.com/forum/x...582/#post12460

I've also had the wood/leather steering wheel un-leathered before having it re-trimmed, and there were some spots where you could see the pale unfinished wood.

 

Thank you for the link/proof that the wood is real. Now I feel bad that I covered hand made wood veneer with $30 worth of vinyl

 

It's just like with any piece of fine furniture. You have the frame made out of oak and then you veneer it with layers of the finest ebony/ mahogany/burl, then further inlaid with marquetry, even silver ,pewter, bronze, mother of pearl, etc. it's unmistakable on the Jaguar because of the pattern and shapes. We have just gotten so used to the processed wood conglomerate crap made to look like teal stuff its hard to differentiate for almost anyone.......9sorry, I come from a furniture antiquarian family..lol.


Don't feel bad if you like it better for your car, but personally I would not want to cover up the fine wood at all. I enjoy it a lot and reminds me of the earlier Jaguars. Still think y'all's carbon looks standard equipment from factory

 

I am one of the people that actually really likes the wood trim. I want to add a few more of the factory wood pieces that I don't have as well, like the door insert wood trim. I also really like the look of carbon fiber so I've been working to cover what isn't wood with carbon. I also have some stainless steal happening in a few places and a suede wrapped wheel...and of course leather. I'm going have my door inserts and arm rests done in suede too as well as seat inserts some day. This is actually the first car I've owned that has really made me think and want to do a lot to the interior.

 

thing is the wood wouldnt look too bad if there was other traces of it around the car i.e. on the door and centre console but my car being completely black inside and out the blummin great plank of wood across the dash looked out of place

 

Indeed, don't feel bad about it! It's your car and the important thing is that you like sitting in it. The dash is wrapped so neatly it looks OEM, and I assume that if you ever wanted to remove the wrapping, it'd probably peel away without a fight.

Sport and classic trim models with a manual gearbox only had it in the dash, yeah. Mine's an SE so I have the trim bits in the doors as well, and I've added both the wood/leather steering wheel as well as the ashtray and gear surround from an automatic model. Plenty o' wood, just missing a fitting gear knob.

I wish they also had black-stained woods as an option. That would look great with either ivory or black leather...

 

yeah it would just peel off but I actually bought another set and covered them so to keep the originals, when i sell it the next owner has a choice then

 

I think what you have done looks greate, and you have done such a good job .good idear to keep the originals as is for chance you sell later ,in the meantime you can enjoy it your way. congrats. BL