I went to home depot (hardware store in the U.S.) and picked up 1ft of 1/16 stainless steel wire the kind used for bicycle brake cables, a mid duty spring,1/16" Cable Ferrule, and a washer.

1. feed the cable through the hole at the bottom of the ornament
2. place the ornament in position and tape it to the hood to hold it in place
3. slide the spring up and then the washer
4. slide the ferrule through and tighten and crimp.
5. cut the slack of the cable and done.

 

Removed the wing "vents" ready for painting in body colour (solid black). It has only taken me 3 years of procrastination to decide that the silver is a little too gauche. The horizontal chrome Jaguar strip will remain as it is to break up the expanse of the wings. I got them off without damaging the integral plastic clips by removing the wheel arch liners, sound deadening and screenwasher bottle for access to squeeze the clips through the slots in the wings with fingers and probes. A pita, but better than breaking them, and they will clip back easily when the paint and lacquer are dry.

 

I am also in LA area, do you have the info on the mechanic? Thx

 

Non functioning chrome vents are worse than useless, they are ugly.

 

They look great, they’re use is pure aesthetic. Wish mine came in the Indigo Blue like my car though...

 

Mine are silver well actually they're now in primer, but this is what it looked like (except in the photo it's on its Winter wheels):


They are the one X350 / X358 facelift item which I am unconvinced about.

 

How about these X350 Portfolio abominations then?

 

To me they look ugly however I am sure I am in the minority.

Each to his/her own.

 

No they don't, if you unlock the boot lid remotely or by pressing the bootlid button only this just releases the lid from its catch. Lifting the lid by hand about 4 inches or so then allows the lid to lift the rest of the way on its own. I changed both bonnet and boot lid gas struts just to freshen them up, not because they necessarily needed it. That said there is a noticeable improvement with the new struts and its only a 30 second job each pair of struts to change.

 

I was wondering if I had boot struts that were too weak.

 

With mine i had to lift the boot lid all the way up by hand now its much better, my 2006 X350 has done 109000 miles so I was going to change them anyway just due to age and mileage,and as their reasonable price may be worth just doing anyway

 

My 2005 XJR has the same mileage however I replaced front hood struts and boot struts 2 years ago.

 

They should in theory be okay then I would have thought

 

They are. I just wondered if the boot was supposed to lift all the way without help.

 

I'm not sure? Mine never has whilst I've owned it maybe someone else can tell us if they are supposed to

 

Something that the S Type did that i had, that was a nice feature.

 

my 2002 s type when I had it did it, so don't know whether the X350 is supposed to as well or not

 

Clipped the newly painted vents to the wings. A tad quicker than removing them for painting.



I'm pleased with the result; a little more subtle, and a lot less gangster.

 

At 100K miles the upper radiator hose was past its service life. It was collapsing after the engine cooled. (Even after new expansion cap installed) I know the SC engines can have issues. Tested and no hydrocarbons evident in coolant!

Hose was squishy...

Replaced that and the aux heater pump, since I had to drain the radiator anyways.

All is good now and nice toasty heat at idle. The aux heater pump that was in the car was shot as I suspected...

As a bonus I took it apart and replaced the brushes. Not that hard of a job, so I have a spare!

No more collapsed upper radiator hose either

 

After a few nice road trips with the Mrs, I decided to give the road queen’s interior some much needed love. With such an iconic interior, it’s only right that we meticulously maintain them so they can stay looking iconic for decades to come.