Hello everyone, three weeks ago I'm searching the classifieds around midnight and find a 2004 XJ8 2nd owner Zircon Blue, near perfect interior, exterior 9 out of 10 minus some bumper rashes. I rush over the next morning and see the car. Beautiful, I fell in love. Local low speed test drive and car drove super smooth. no leaks or rattles.. It had a bad headliner, parking brake fault, weak heat. I hand over $3700 and the XJ8 is in the family.

On the drive home I noticed a low speed surge (1400-1600) and a vibration at 70mph. Got me a little worried. Over the next week fixed the parking Brake fault (cable wasn't hooked), antifreeze was low (fixed the heat issues), tire pressure very low (reduced vibration) plus I ordered new tires. Figured tires and balancing needed to be done first. I'm happy..... every used car purchase has it's issues plus I do all the work myself.

Last week enjoying the car daily, I get a gearbox fault (P0783) 3-4/4-3 ***** and locked the tranny into 3rd gear. After hour and hours and hours of reading, video watching, and discussion w/ the transmission specialists. It's determined to be a worn rear stator bushing (requiring a complete rebuild) or maybe, if lucky, a bad solenoid. Plus the low speed surge is most likely a bad torque converter.

Cost of a complete rebuild was ranging $3500+! I really didn't want to spend this much. I can do the whole job myself (drop tranny and rebuild) but I don't have a lift and it would be a driveway job.

There was a ray of light yesterday! My brother talked to a Transmission shop that said they'd do the job for $2600 with all the correct ZF rebuild parts. The specialists knew the ZF tranny very well. I have an appointment with another transmission shop on Monday (very well recommended) for 2nd opinion.

I loveee the car. I just feel great driving it...... Sorry for the rant, but figured a little water cooler chat for everyone. Thanks for listening

 

new Jaguar owner here too and they are wonderful and fun cars to drive. Get the tranny fixed and enjoy the ride and stares!!!!!

 

Thank for the support and yes they are great to drive! Enjoy your XJR!

 

 

I hope that everything goes well for you with the 2004 Jaguar XJ8, and of course, they're not selling used vehicles these days because they're working. Actually, I purchased my 2005 Jaguar XJ8L in January of 2014 for $10, 300.00, and wound up with a whopping $6,300.00 in repairs. Most of those repair costs went into the faulty air suspension system (typical with Jaguar XJI8's) in which I quickly had the air suspension converted over to Arnott coil/springs. In addition, another big chunk of the repair bill went into purchasing new W rated Bridgestone tires for the car which ran a little over $1200.00. The Jaguar XJ8's do ride nice, are zippy, quite fast and are an awesome sight to behold.

 

$2600 for a rebuild is a very good price.

 

Yes Rick totally hear ya when it comes to unexpected repairs, BUT once done hopefully good for many years ahead. The air to coil/spring conversion is in the future plans. They absolutely are a beauty to look at..

Yes! exactly. $2600 installed which includes all ZF OEM parts(Omega bronzed bushings etc) and seemed very knowledgeable on the these transmission. I read the google reviews on the shop and one guy just had a ZF rebuilt for his Jag. He raved about the price and quality of work performed.

 

Being in New York I’m hoping you talked to Gary Ferraro? He’s at a shop in Franklin Square. I’ve talked to him a ton, he’s been super helpful. Other members have talked to him as well. He’s got a bunch of videos on YouTube. If you are relatively close I would definitely recommend talking to him.

 

Hi Brad, I've seen almost all of Gary's videos on Youtube, plus I reached out to him via the comments section of his videos. Gary is great, so nice and extremely knowledgeable. He helped me narrow down the issues to either a read stator bushing or solenoids. He said it doesn't hurt to try the solenoids first and even offered to reset my adapt numbers when done. A true gentleman. I asked him to send me a quote for a full rebuild (exactly what you had done in your signature). I'm hoping he can come close to the $2600 estimate I got.

 

Have you checked the fluid level yet?
You could get lucky

 

I was going to do a transmission pan drop this weekend, but the transmission shop order to give me a free evaluation of the tranny on Monday morning. I figured I'd wait to see what they said and maybe I get lucky.

 

The Ferraro videos are excellent.
I know because I spent weeks checking around after my X350 3.5L V8 started failing 3 to 4 shifts when the fluid warmed up.
My car has done 152,000km and that is about as far as the ZF6HP26 goes before the bushes wear too much.
I just took the ZF out with help from my step son. I do have a hoist in my garage which helps a lot.
I have a quote of A$1800 to A$3000 for a rebuild just dependning on what is wrong.

 

There is a fault with these 6HP26 whereby the seal between the mechatronic mechanism and the rest of the transmission failed in places, so that fluid under quite high pressure leaked and caused change problems. The cure is to remove the mechatronic mechanism, clean the making faces and reseal. I'm not sure if a gasket is used. Also the solenoid valves on the mechatronic can fail too, and are quite common to replace. You could try searching the net using the box ID. Here is one site: -
Everything about your ZF 6HP26, 6HP19, 6HP28 transmission issues | BAVLOGIC, LLC
It has to be said that cars like the XJR are going to subject this gearbox to rather more stresses than normal as nobody buys an XJR to tootle around town. It does look to me as if the previous owner found the problems and decided, after finding out the cost of repairs, to off-load the car to another unsuspecting motorist.

 

Excellent link Fraser on the ZF6HP26. It point out the pressure (leaks) and high transmission temperatures are the main causes for the failures. I drive the car vert easy so I expect a future rebuild to last hopefully 150,000miles.

Oh this morning I go out to check on a few things and a LOW COOLANT light came on, but the coolant was at the full level. I just read through a bunch of posts, I see its a common issue. My baby is keeping me busy. Going to check the float now to see if it moves freely.

 

The 2004 I test drove before I got my 2007 had a torque convertor lockup in/out/in/out/in/out which on searching, I found was a common issue with 2004. The lockup in the torque convertor engages and disengages on about a 1 to 2 second cycle, resulting in RPM going up and down by 2 or 3 hundred RPM with steady road speed. Dealbreaker for me when I did that research.

 

Yes unfortunately that's exactly what's happening with my car. The low speed 2 to 3 hundred rpm movement.

 

My first X350, a 2003, had this hunting action during warm-up of the gearbox, and went away after a few miles. I was told it wasn't a bug, it was a feature, and was there to warm up the fluid ! It was still there when I part-exed the car for a 2007 which didn't have it. I also had a few troubles with the gearbox, but nothing that needed a lot of expenditure. I had a TCM reflash fairly early on, as I recall, which seemed to fix things, but the changes could be harsh sometimes. although nothing broke, thank goodness..

 

Like a lot of higher end cars, when it comes time to buy parts/service, the fact these new are $80k+ cars rears its ugly head.

 

Hi everyone.

Update on the car: Took my baby to a couple of transmission shops. First shop's checked and said all the adaptation numbers were within spec! This made me extremely happy. Fluid level normal. He could not reproduce the gearbox fault. He recommended me to keep driving and when the fault occurs again bring back the car. The Second shop (seemed like they knew the ZF transmission better). They told me to fix any existing engine fault codes first. They mentioned that the TCM receives signals from the ECM, so if it's not running correctly it will affect the TCM control. I had a P0101 error stored. I'm going to smoke test car this weekend and if no leaks change out the MAF sensor. Right now my LT fuel trims are 6.25% at idle, 12.5% under light load/acceleration and 15% under heavier acceleration. I'm think it's a MAF sensor since LT % are increase under throttle and not decreasing. I contacted the previous owner and he mentioned that the transmission fluid was changed at 60k miles.

I've been driving the big cat (very easily) the past week (100+ miles) and no issues at all. Again I'm driving the car like I have an egg between my foot and the pedal. Maybe Maybe after the P0101 is fixed maybe the issue is resolved. Fingers crossed. I'm waiting for my diag software to arrive, so I can monitor everything more closely.

 

The TSB for the "hunting" syndrome is : -

B307-04 dated 12/2003 Surge during warm-up at 40 to 60 mph