These all wheel drive cars are a great purchase, but have a few areas of concern. Do the following, and you should have years of trouble free service.

I just bought a used X-type, what should i do.

Everyone else on the site feel free to ad to list.

This is a quick check list, search for the reason why on this site.
Between Ebay and Amazon nothing below is more than $100

1. Replace the negative battery cable to the chassis. add another cable from the battery to the engine. This will stop/repair 90 percent of your alternator not charging, and most check engine lights.
2. check/replace the alternator drive belt, idler and tension pulley.
3. check/replace the water pump belt and tension pulley
4. check/replace power booster vacuum hose.
5. check/refill transfer case with appropriate fluid.
6. buy a $20 fixd OBD II scanner. Has cleared all codes for me in the last 5 year of ownership

a. when bleeding brakes, never let the pedal travel all the way down. Short strokes only.
b. it is all wheel drive, replace all 4 tires at once. through the years have replaced tires for $53 and $75 a piece car handled fine with both.
c. if the ac does not work well, pull the ac compressor flip the valve and replace the two o-rings
d. if your blend door doesn't work for fresh air/recirculate air here is a trick if you want to leave on recirculate. Did this five years ago, and living in Florida has never been a problem. In the passenger compartment, take a 6 inch quarter drive extension, put it inside the heater core box and push the blend door closed.
e. be ready to replace a rear abs sensors, they will go

 

Yes, I have read on a number of occasions you need to use short strokes, because if you floor the pedal, apparently, it breaks the diaphragm in the servo or something similar, which results in a good deal of work and cost!

I bought my car about 10 years ago, second hand and I guess the only problem now is that part deteriorate with age and may become scarcer.

Mike

 

Oddest of things that brought me to replace the brake booster. I am here in Florida and while my wife was driving she lost the brake pedal, due to a burst brake line. Not a spot of rust anywhere on the car or brake lines, except where the brake line has the hard bend around the chassis by the rear wheel. When the factory bent it, it caused a weak point (looked like a stress crack) in the line. Unfortunately, my wife kept driving it destroying the master and brake booster. Might have been a one in a million, but food for thought for all X type owners.

Ron

 

>> c. if the ac does not work well, pull the ac compressor flip the valve and replace the two o-rings
If you do that, then also replace every O-ring you can get your hands on. Buy a complete box of those green O-rings on Aliexpress before you even start.
Replace the receiver/drier: This part has many functions, INCLUDING being the filter of that system...

If there are any leaks, there are probably a number of seals/gaskets, which wanna be replaced.

Replace ALL fluids: Engine oil, full flush ATF (Yes, this IS possible, even on the X-Type - I wrote a thread about this), coolant, rear axle oil, power steering fluid, and as mention above: brake fluid and (if AWD) oil of transfer case. Check brake pads and rotors for their condition/thickness. Check all rubber parts of frt. & rr. suspension.

There will probably be many areas of the engine harness, where the wires are exposed to the heat on the short sections just before any connector. This should not be like that. Use electrical tape and put it around all those wires (after visual inspection that the wires are not cracked yet) to additionally protect them from the engine heat.

 

They produced 355,000 X-Types so your brake line failing was 1 in 355k and between you and me it is 1 in 177.5k I had the exact same thing happen in probably the exact same place, by the passenger side rear wheel where the driver side hose makes the hard 90 degree toward that driver side. My brakes went from seemingly fine to absolutely nothing there in 2 gentle taps over 200 feet. Scary day.

 

Misery loves company. Welcome aboard!!

It really does sound like the same place even.

I was away for work so she drove it like that for a few days after mentioning the pedal drop, and i asked her to drive her car.

The master was empty when I checked it at the airport. I had the car towed home.

I guess there is a higher power looking out for her.