Nürnberg, my former hometown, born in Bayreuth, grown up in Nürnberg :-)

A familiar story ... finding a qualified workshop, basicly anywhere in Germany.
In my area, there are exactly zero workshops, where i would hand over any of our cars. Neither VAG nor Mercedes workshops are trustworthy in a circuit of 100km. Even Bayreuth, known as MGS Motor Gruppe Sticht is no longer trustworthy.

Once i had timing chain problems on my XJR X308, it was repaired and fixed by a mechanic of Autohaus Konrad, Paul-Gossen-Straße 116, 91052 Erlangen. But i don´t know if he´s still working there. This guy built racecars for semi-professional races.

Like you, i am repairing all of our cars since 15 years. Really specialized repairs like engine, i go to Redhead Zylinderkopf Technik, for ZF Transmissionproblems to Lang GmbH, ZF Partner near by you ... in Stein. Everything else can done by my own.

Ähm, yes i know very well saving money buying OEM parts. My trustworthy dealer is Autoteile Wimmer, to by Lemförder, Meyle, Bosch, Mahle parts. But when Bilstein does not sell or produce my air suspension, then it will be a Jag-part.

 

Quite often they are the SAME parts anyway. They just followed a different packaging (and "mark-up" percentage) routing to reach the end-luser.

The "proper" kit recently taken aboard for timing chains, sprockets, guides & tensioners for the AJ133 V8 had no parts from China. Made in UK, Belgium, Germany, Poland, and France, rather. All were in the same genuine JLR labeling and correct part #'s. And under $300 USD.

My fuel pumps & c.? Continental Gummiwerke's "VDO" division ... based in Chechia - never a place short of highly skilled craftfolk and sound "QA", either. If a body wanted a better-built VW? Time was, they bought it as a Skoda Octavia.

"Detective work" in advance of purchase pays rather well.

Wealthy folk didn't become such off the back of carelessness, after all.
Persistently seeking "value for money", rather.

 

I've been living in Nuremberg for 26 years now, and my experience with workshops and dealers is the same as yours, that's why I was asking...

Konrad in Erlangen is not a Jaguar partner anymore, and as far as I know, also the Jaguar specialists do not work there anymore. Some of them seem to have moved to Feser Graf, but I am not a big fan of Feser Graf, having had some bad experiences with my Audis.
Also Roadstar in Nuremberg is not a Jaguar partner anymore.

There is a specialist workshop in Fuerth (Ralf Reiser?), but I think that they only work on models up the X308.

I know the name of Lang in Stein, but fortunately I did not need a specialist up to now. I was able to do the maintenance jobs on the transmission, including the replacement of the sleeves and of the electrical connector myself.

Most of the parts I buy come from Motointegrator, sometimes also from Autoteile Wimmer and others.

For Jaguar parts, I also use Jaguar Hermann near Hamburg, or xkStore in Austria.

Regarding the struts, at the time I bought the Bilsteins B4 that you showed in your first thread, and I am happy with them. The main reason why the car is a bit harsh at low speeds is that Jaguar had the (for me crazy and unexplainable) idea to set the suspension on "firm" for speeds below 50 km/h...

Best regards,

Thomas

 

Same part, out of same factory, so that is but a "logistics" choice - driven by whomever actually stocks it - or has the least off-putting order lead-time, at any given calendar date.

Comes the point that the cost of "seeking avoidance" of a spend exceeds the price of post-op medical care for the economic rape it carries with it.

Or so the grownups tell me... given I once incurred a USD $8,000 bar tab, back in the day, and wasn't even among those partaking of the festivities? The price of far the more durable airstruts isn't horrible.

There's even an "ethnic" joke about it, nearly as old as creation:

"If <we> are God's 'chosen people', why did he create so many of <the other kind>?"

"Simple enough."
"SOMEBODY had to pay 'full retail' prices!"

Not new-news that the persistent Brits have found yet-another means to bill Germans more for German made goods than the Brits have to pay for the same goods, themselves, either, is it? Bezos.. not his birth name ... is ethnically a Scot, after all!

Faced with armed robbery at risk of their life? A true Scot will take the bullet.

He's saving his money for his Old Age.

 

Interesting ... so Roadstar lost its contracts, sad to hear, but what do we expect, their stuff for jag came from this aweful and then bancrupt jag/ferrari-dealer. Feser :-) not even tyres i would let them work on. Konrad lost their contract too? Sad to hear, i loved their mechanical work on my X308.

I was living in his neighbourhood, but after one experience with his work, it´s better choosing someelse, if you own a jag from 2000 over younger.

Some maintenance, like ZF is in good hands at Lang GmbH. Repairing things like changing mechatronic on a Audi or Arteon, we did last year successfully.

Autoteile Wimmer is my main dealer, because i know, they will never ever sell fake-parts and i love their support.

Hermann, i know very well, bought a lot parts for my XKR, but turned my back on him, cause way too expensive. XKStore, i heard bad things, a friend of mine bought there rare wheels in so bad conditions, he was ready to bring an action against them

Like AMG ... i still don´t get it and spoke to an AMG engineer, why on earth are they not willing but able to soften air suspensions lower than 50km/h. After a test drive over the weekend with a CL65, i was so dissappointed, because even if a car can handle 300km/h, there is no need for harsh, hard over even stiffy airsuspensions. Anyway ... if its programmed at Jaguar suspension being "firm" below 50km/h, then it must be possible to correct that by programming (if so).

Why not start-up a professional workshop for Jag for Mittel- & Oberfranken :-)

 

Could work if one specialized in suspension only, and included the major German marques and (two, was it?) Japanese luxo door-stop-wedges with similar air struts, but...

if you get it wrong, or the clustomer-fact even FEEL as if you had done, the re-do, arguments, ill-will, and even liability costs could be lethal.

WHEN. .you get it RIGHT? By definition and the "nature of the beast", you won't see that customer again for five to ten years, if ever. Even Dr. Moulton's rubber toilet-stopper suspension has a 5 to 7 year life.

Easier ways to make a better living at lower risk.
So they do.

BOTH .. of my JLR's began their working lives "on lease" and were leased again as second and subsequent users took a turn.

That meant decent records, but no better than bog-average mantenance. Even so, in a society that regards even fine motorcars and family homes equally disposable as kleenex? It was better maintenance than many "owners" bother to pay attention to.

I can still brew a fine cup of tea.. even a whole pot for three... but boiling THAT ocean is above my pay-grade.

Run what you can keep running. Be glad it isn't TAXED the same as "new".

 

I am aware all of it ... to philosophize is a very nice leisure-time activity, but has no place in repairing cars :-)

Three things are naked reality:
1) planned obsolescence, created by clever profit greedy humans
2) Label stupidity for consumers
3) Car manufacturer in Germany do not make profit by selling cars, they earn it by selling carparts. Workshops earn by just doing repairs. Even so, they mostly their job very badly, almost criminal.

A joke, but just a joke, because in reality, germans were always paying the full price of anything, related to cars. No one in the world payed that high price for a german part oder car, like germans have to. A VW passat -> US 25.000Dollar -> Germany 35.000€ Euro. GM Parts or even engines -> US cheap -> Germany expensive. Germans were always the milking cow on this planet. But this will change very soon.

That´s not true with carparts ... SNG in UK sells a Lemförder part nearly double prices to UK Guys, we in Germany get it for half. Buying a part from Jaguar in Germany is cheaper than buying from SNG in UK. And brits food, we germans never would eat, so UK food should and can be a thousand times more expensive than german food :-)

 

Wise Brits have OTHER sources for their carparts, not just the uber-visible high-street names.

Food? ROFL!!!!

I cannot take SALT... nor excessive fats.. nor tolerate 'root crop' veg when I want leafy greens for a salad.
Damned near starved to death first trip to Berlin until discovering Argentine restaurants.
Or in London without eyetalian..!!!


That said? Cut the salt overload, German-speaking Europe can do meat mains almost as well as .......the South Chinese.
ANY "good " recipe, from anywhere on-planet, is soon assimilated, if not also improved. Chinese name for it may even refer to the country and style of origin.

Wasn't originally "Cantonese" ... but NOW it is! Some "intellectual property" is worth stealing more than other, and food is well-above 'religion' to those folk. Over 30 years ago, I added a big-**** oven to the HKG flat's kitchen, geared-up to do a US traditional roast turkey. Wife's up-angled snoot pronounced "WE dont eat Turkey!!"

Hell they did NOT! One sitting, 16 family members, 26 lb bird.. didn't even leave soup fixin's!!! Only large oven in the family means we have had to do two or so every year, since!!!


Japan still wins on "Tsukemono" over Germany or "former East bloc".

That lot will pickle anything in sight, short of left-handed fountain pen nibs and double-barreled condoms.

Still have to go to KaDeWe for those. My age, a body could get lost leavin' the loo without dry storage for the Maglite and spare batteries.

 

Quote: Autoteile Wimmer is my main dealer, because i know, they will never ever sell fake-parts and i love their support. Unquote

That's important, I agree. Until now I also never had problems with Motointegrator, and normally they are very fast with their delivery.


Quote: Hermann, i know very well, bought a lot parts for my XKR, but turned my back on him, cause way too expensive. XKStore, i heard bad things, a friend of mine bought there rare wheels in so bad conditions, he was ready to bring an action against them Unquote

I agree on Hermann being expensive most of the times, but sometimes you find items that are reasonably priced, and he also sometimes has parts that you cannot find elsewhere.
xkStore, I never bought used parts, and I never had problems with the parts I bought. But then, it was mostly smaller parts like nuts and bolts, gaskets, etc.



Quote: Why not start-up a professional workshop for Jag for Mittel- & Oberfranken :-) Unquote

Oh my, I have already enough to do with all my cars, so I'll stick to working on them in my free time and try to support the people that have helped me a lot with their knowledge, like here in the forum. ;-)

Best regards,

Thomas

 

And so you have done. Very much so.

Sometimes... the most valuable input from those with scar-tissue on their ****... is how to avoid a problem... and not HAVE to fix it!

Grateful for that, Herr Ritter

Y'all carry-on with the OEM torch...

The in-depth discussion... has altered my plan to restore with new OEM Bilsteins.. to going with coilovers instead.

Largely because:

- I, not a programmer at a console writing firmware and software, many years ago, will be able to CHOOSE the balance between comfort and stiffer damping.

- Same again, ride-height and spring rate.

"Static" settings, all, of course. Adjustable only between test-drives, never whilst in-motion.

But that's "a feature, not a bug".

Driving even rather BAD cars fast - especially on roads not habituated to - (guilty as ever was..) wants one thing above all.
Repeatable, consistent, road response.

Even if/as/when it is highly unwelcome road response, the driver adapts.. because it is the same for each similar loading.

And one has no other options. Well.. I took a Vauxhall back to the rental agency at Kloten once.. and swapped a particularly offensive skinny-tired Mercedes POS for an Alfa 75, another time out of Malpensa.

- i don't really appreciate that computer program of many years ago.. that haveth not eyes to see black ice, broken pavement, wet leaves, stray farm equipment, or such ...pop-up on the road ahead... let alone "predict" if I will brake, accelerate, swing wide, dive into the corner, defecate or lose my eyesight, to deal with the "surprise" challenge.

Besides... at $300 for all four corners? I can hire the new headliner done and still buy the Jaguar several year's worth of her favourite cat-food off the savings.

Time will tell if being overly frugal.. earns me a rude frugaling.. but even so?

Cheap experiment, yah? So long as I leave the air lines, valves, and compressor in-place? "Reversible", even.

Nice weather for it.. need to keep my neighbours from distracting me by asking what I'm playing at... inspirational music to insult an English motorcar's underdrawers by ... yet still keep the ENGINE sweet..... lesseee ??


No. I don't understand Welsh. But that's another "feature, not a bug."

One isn't MEANT to do!

 

"Change 22"..... @ only USD $ 360 the pair?

Now have front L & R Chinese "Suncore" air struts inbound. "Comfort" level or their equivalent, thereof.

Known that the shock portion has no provison for electronic modulation. But neither did the coilovers.

- I can live with that.

Taken as "stipulated" that such a creature will not match a Bilstein's 10+ year service life.

- For as few miles as I drive this particular vehicle? Their seals and bladders assuredly will fail from age & similar insults before ever I wear-out the shock.

KNOWN.. that "rubber" / elastomer goods from Chinese makers are rather more prone to degradation than US or European compounding.

- I'm only expecting 3 to 4 years.

At the price? Any longer than four years, I shall class as a "freebie".

Hope to see them in about four days. Will report how well - or badly - it goes.

NB:

At the 19 year mark WEF February 2024, one front strut and two rears STILL not leaking?
Bilstein had long-since not "owed me a dime". I'd have been delighted to replace with the same units, even to half that expectation of longevity. But Bidenomics is still Bidenomics, no certainty of a better outcome, nor how soon, if-even.

Even so, I must thank them for producing a right-decent step-by-step You Tube video on the strut replacement process. Good folk, good product, Bilstein. Given how long my ones had served, even with the last few years at very minor cold-weather leakage? Doesn't seem to be a lot of risk.



Use 'em if you can afford 'em.

 

Hi Bill,

I installed a pair of the Suncore air struts in a friend's car and he was satisfied with the ride, though he is not a sporty driver. That has been at least 2 years and he hasn't mentioned any misbehavior.

I have also converted one X350 to the Suncore coilover units, and I was surprised that the ride was very close to that of the Arnottt coil units that I have installed in more than a dozen cars. The Suncores were a little softer with slightly less control of body roll, but my recollection is that the Suncore set cost less than half the price of the Arnotts.

We'll look forward to your report when you get your Suncores installed.

Cheers,

Don

 

Thank you, Don.

I had been "eyeballing" the various reports on those "generics" until I was reasonably satisfied that all or most out of that tribe were Suncore or re-badged if not 'no name'.

eBay vendor I ultimately selected stocks theirs quite close to Virginia, shipping was free and should also be quick:

Casus Belli.. ...I was 'that close' to wrenching on the MaxPeedingRods coilovers Monday morning - (KNOWN to be a mediocre supplier, at best...) when I found NO other leaks, and said "WHY?"

Near-as-dammit same labour in wrenching, and I can retain the Bilstein rears, do Suncore rears later in the year - or some other thing if the fronts DO NOT work out well.

"Speedy driving" ... fell off my options list a while back, save for emergency evasion of OTHER fools, our roads most-often-traveled are above average in quality, so...

... I'll not be much use as to reporting ride quality nor stressed handling. We take the Rover for the hard stuff, such as it is.

As to "fooling" the electronics?

- Use of a shunt resistor to pretend to be the missing coil in the Bilsteins has been covered.... but .... the electron-pusher in me believes that to be sub-optimal.

- If indeed the control is by means of a 5 V pulse train @ 400 Hz and interrupted @ "n" duty-cycle?

- The "dummy load" should be an inductor, not a resistor. Upstream control box can tell the difference .... if the designer wished it to do... off the back of the inherent response of a remote inductor pulsed @ 400 Hz... a resistor, by contrast, sayin' little.

Winding a pair of similar coils to suit might actually come to be one of the more interesting parts of the 'project'?

Better-yet, ID'ing suitable "stock" inductors & cores... more easily shared than DIY KTE.

If it works well, best I can determine, the onboard "con-puta" will be blind to the substitution?

All input welcome on that.

Not kidding myself that I'm re-inventing some prior Pilgrim's wheel.
This has all been done more than just the one time.

 

The ECATS signal for the adaptive damping is definitely pulse-width modulated, 5 volts and 400 Hz. Cambo has posted a scope shot of the signal - possibly in his thread about how to lower the air suspension.

The need for an inductive load rather than a purely resistive one has been discussed as well, and I think at least a couple of members have experimented with small inductor coils, but I can't recall to what degree of success. You should be able to find threads where this is discussed using either the forum Advanced Search function or google (which is often better than the forum search function).

EDIT: I just checked my Air Suspension Summary and the ECATS solenoid coil impedance measured by some of our members is 5.4 ohms.

Air Suspension & ECATS System Summary: Components & Operation

If your DMM can measure inductance, you should be able to read the coils in the solenoids in your original Bilstein air spring/dampers to get you in the right range for substitute coils.

Cheers,

Don

 

suncore is useless in germany, it´s illegal installing not authorized parts into your car. So this chat about suncore should be transferred into a different thread. Not supporting the main thread question

 

So, Germans can't install anything in their cars that are not approved by authority?!!! No hotrods for you?!!! No updated entertainment system?!!! No loud muflers? I welcomme latter!
WOW!

 

People know by now that Germany has the most meticulous laws. We have a DIN standard for everything, and I mean everything.
Firstly, every car get a general operating license from government. This includes each and every part inside and on the car, which is tested and certified with, for example, RCE 90 Norm Certificat. Most controlled are parts for car function / driving security.

The ECE R90 standard states that a vehicle part must meet the strict safety requirements of the European Union in order to be considered safe.

So you loose your general operating license for your car, if police or two-yearly MOT main-inspection discovers an illegal part.

Of course you could mount any part on your car, if your MOT inspector gives you permission. Security parts like head/rear-lights, brakes, suspensions, etc must have a parts certificate, which you can order, but is very, very expensive.

You find "wild-west" all over the world, but not in Germany. Even Waste separation is regulated or opening business, like a garage/workshop, you are not allowed without a special education title.

That´s why i asked for parts like Bilstein or if Jaguar delivers suspensions, they are certified. US or UK or AU Stuff is of no interest in Germany.

 

That actually classes as "a feature, not a bug". DIN.. and the overall German legal approach, as well as scientific and technical, in general, are more appreciated than not, globally.

DIN standards tend to be saner, more pragmatic, better documented, and published in more precise terms than most of the rest of the developed world had bothered even to try to match.

More of a solution that a problem, IOW.

UK or US side, by comparison?

"We LOVE standards. Can't possibly have too many of them!"

Our challenge, what with so many dfferent authorities promulgating duplicative, contradictory and partially redundant ones, is often how best to select WHICH standards to ignore or even violate!

Yah but.. part of the journey in this very thread found that there ARE firms IN Germany, selling non-Bilstein goods TO the German marklet, that ARE able to qualify to the appropriate rules, are there not? I, for one, suspect some of those are "Suncore" rebadged. Suncore is big enough to meet a DIN standard if they care to do.

Not that Bilstein is the only maker in Germany itself that has figured out how to manufacture an air-strut. Or an air force.

DIN sets a certain "bar" that must be met, surely.

But producers outside of German borders meet one or several DIN standards, every day of every week.

"Strict" is not the same as "'impossible", or your national trade balance would not be recording such massive flows of goods trade, both directions.

Look at the ancient "Reinheitsgebot" purity order. Sound rules as to what can go into a beir.
I like that.

"Pure" it may be, but it has never prevented some fool making a seriously NASTY tasting "pure" beir, has it?

One can even get Analhoser-Buttwasher's notorious "Bud Light" in Germany.

So long as you don't mind risking being bludgeoned to death for CALLING it "Beer".

Because it is not.

For "barley malt"? Add "any fermentable starch source that was going cheap that day from rodent-contamination, molds, or other impending rot".

A-B's genius lies only in making it taste exactly as nasty, no matter if they made it out of wheat, corn, millet, or recyled rice paper birdcage liners.

There is ALWAYS "a way".

It's pesky HUMANS we are dealing with, yah? The same careless lot as have somehow managed to get microplastics into our OWN liver and other body-tissues, not just those of marine creatures.

Bad enough wicked-greedy folk were going about "harvesting" kidneys for transplant.

Now we have to look over our shoulder to avoid water-bottle recyclers, too?

 

The OP has filed a report complaining about the volume of off-topic content in his thread. Since his initial questions were answered many posts ago, I am closing this thread.

Cheers,

Don