Hi all, (Warning, long story)


I am new to owning a Jaguar and I came across this forum after purchasing a 2000 XJR and found this forum to be extremely helpful and supportive. So I like to share my 2000 XJR no start, no crank story in the hopes of helping others down the road.


Tuesday, 08/16/2011:
It was a silver 2000 XJR, 103K, only has valet key and wireless remote. It started fine and drove fine during the test drive, so I brought it that night for $5400 from $5600 original asking price.

Wednesday, 08/17/2011:
I drove around and it showed COOLANT LEVEL LOW on the odo message center. Sure enough, it was low, so I added some green 50/50 coolant($10) per advise from a auto parts employee. The message went away after that.

That same night, I picked up a relative from the SD airport and the entire drive was super, no issues what so ever. As I unloaded the luggage from the trunk I heard a electrical short burst sound and smelled of burnt wires. I dug around the trunk and discovered two active amplifier wires connected to the positive and negative terminal of the battery. The previous owner took out the amp and left two dangerously active wires in the trunk dangling close to each other. The two wires must have accidently bumped into each other when I was moving the luggage and shorted out some circuits.

Then, I tried to start the car again, and all hell broke loose.
BRAKE FLUID LOW
ASC/ABS NOT AVAILABLE
FAILSAFE MODE
TRANSMISSION FAILURE

I turned the key, all I got was 1 click coming out of the passenger side, and nothing else after that. It would even lockout the crank position, meaning I could no longer turn to crank after the first turn. So that’s when I discovered this forum and read as much as I could about this no start issue. I know that the temporary short caused the car to go into this berserk mode, so let’s get started debugging. Seems to me it’s stuck in a security mode.

Thursday, 08/18/2011:
First thing I did was to check all the fuses. All I found was 1 blown fuse for the cigar lighter. Which makes sense because I found stack of pennies stuck in the front cigar lighter hole. Again it was the previous owner’s doing.

Next thing I did was wiggle around with shifter because it was stuck in Park. Some magical event happened and I was able to shift it to N without insert a key into the shift release hole. I then turned the starter and it started right up without any problems! Yay! Premature celebration followed. This proves that the car starts, and it’s not really having transmission or abs issues, etc… After a minute or so of smooth idling, I decided to turn it off again and see if I can repeat what just happened. Well, no such luck, the car went right back to weird berserk mode, no crank, no start. I can’t move the shifter to N anymore without inserting a key into the shift release hole.

Next thing I read about was hard reset. So I disconnected the battery terminals and shorted them together for 10+ minutes. I tried to start the car and still no luck, same symptoms, same messages. Somewhere I remember reading leaving the terminals shorted overnight might do the trick. So I touched the pos and neg terminals together and put a heavy weight on top to keep them connected overnight. Then I closed the trunk!

Then I closed the trunk! That’s when all the fun started. As I found out, I only have the valet key, the battery terminals are shorted together, resulting in a permanent closed trunk!! No battery means the trunk button will not work, the valet key can’t open the trunk. I can’t connect jumper cables to it since it’s shorted from inside the trunk. You do not want to know how many "can't open trunk" threads I read for this little incident. It was very frustrating indeed.

Friday, 08/19/2011:
So I called the previous owner, he said he’ll check but pretty much can’t find the master key.
Then I went to the Jag dealer, and had them cut a master key that should open the trunk. It was a basic key without programming, for $25.
After work, I tried the newly cut master key, and found out it does not work!! And the Jag service department was closed over the weekend. Another interesting sequence of events.

Saturday 08/20/2011:
I decided to crawl under the trunk and found some round holes which I can open up. So I went to Home Depot and brought a multi-meter($20) to measure the positive terminal in the engine bay. I jacked the car up and poked into the opening with a variety of long objects in hope of breaking up the shorted battery terminals weighted down by a heavy object. After a long day, I was finally able to break through and disconnect the short. I quickly connected jumper cables to the engine bay’s positive terminal and ground, and voila, opened the trunk! Time for minor celebration! Tried to start the car again, and still got no crank, and one extra code. “INCORERECT PART FITTED”. I am thinking, could the valet key needs to be reprogrammed now that the system had reset?

Also, the gas was low and the gas light had been on, I thought maybe the fuel pump can’t pump enough gas? So I brought a gallon gas container($6) and added more gas to the Jag. That didn’t solve anything.

Sunday, 08/21/2011:
I rested. Went to church in family SUV, was hoping for the Jag…

Monday, 08/22/2011:
At work, I searched this forum for more solutions and wrote down a list of possible things to try:
1. SWITCH OUT RELAYS, BYPASS STARTER SECURITY, APPLY 12V DIRECT TO STARTER?
2. CHECK AND CLEAN PASSENGER SIDE NEGATIVE TERMINAL UNDER THE CAR, AND ANY OTHER NEGATIVE TERMINAL
3. CHECK THE CAN INSTRUSTMENT PACK ASSEMBLY GROUND CONNECTION. STILL DON’T KNOW WHERE IT IS EXACTLY?
4. ORDER EXICTER RING SENSOR? $34 FROM ONLINE, SOUNDS LIKE PITA TO REPLACE?
5. CHECK INTO ALL THE TPS STUFF BEING DIRTY, ETC…, ANOTHER PITA TO CLEAN AND REPLACE?

After work, I was in the garage getting started for a long debug session. Then wife and 5 month old daughter came by to wish me luck and success.
I started on the relays. I found the horn relay, I pressed the horn, the horn sound was nice and loud. Nice, that means that relay is working. So I switch out other relays and put them in the horn position, pressed the horn again, and got sound. I tested out a few relays this way.

For some reason, I decided to pull all the relays out of the engine control module in the engine compartment, passenger side. Maybe I was thinking the starter clicking sound should go away if those relays are not in place. I then turned the key over and still no crank, but I can still hear the clicking sound in the passenger side.
By then, I had forgotten which relay belonged to where exactly, so I just randomly put them back into their sockets.

Miraculously, all the issues went away after this. I was able to start the car consistently. All the odo messages went away.
Could removing and putting back relays cause the circuits to clear their messed up states? The Jag probably still have a defective relay somewhere?

I drove around, and drove back to the drive way. Shut off the car, and was able to start it again, no problem.
Then I drove to 7-11 to get more gas and back home. Tested out the supercharger, it was quite fun.

Tuesday, 08/23/2011:
Was able to start the car this morning without any issues. Keeping my fingers crossed for the future.

Well, what a week! I pretty much spent any free time thinking and debugging this no start issue, and in summary, it was well worth the effort!
I drove the XJR and hit the supercharger mode, and it felt superb. Nothing quite like it, it pined me back, smooth acceleration, wonderful feel.
Now I need to get insurance, registration, and license plates

 

Thanks for the post and welcome to the forum!

We have all been there trying to discover the obvious.

Badkitty posted a great quote recently that truly applies to these cars:

"I have come to understand that owning a Jag is like owning a horse. There's no joy in it unless you love taking care of it."

 

Tom:
Boy is that quote right on!

And JagYi, let me add my congratulations on doggedly getting the problems sorted. I bet you will remember the electic trunk lock in the future! It took m a few times, since I am a slow learner, but I think about it now.

Although I have not independently verified this, I iunderstand the differences in the relays, if there are any, are in the contact current rating. It is also possible that some relays are not designed to be on continuously, like the horn relay. I believe all of the relays on my wife's MY 2002 XJ8 are exactly the same, but again I am not sure. Others have reported different color relays in different locations. Obviously if the current rating and the duty factor are the only differences, then a continuous diuty high current relay should be "universal" fit.

Your original no start might very well have been fixed by whatever relay you swapped, but it sounds like it might just be the key chip. I would suggest you bite the bullet and get a master key, properly programmed.


From your positive outlook after that ordeal, it seems you might be insane enough to enjoy your ownership of the XJR. I have two of them, primarily so I have a spare and do not have to feel pressured if I need to work on the other one. And it also sounds like your wife is supportive at this point, instead of ridiculing your purchase of such a fine example of luxury- sports automobiles.

Welcome to the forum.

 

I have also chased the ghost in the machine (you might have read my thread during your research!). This forum is a fantastic resource, but it can also cause a great deal of paranoia. It's kinda like WebMD. . . a sore throat can turn into a cyanide poisoning diagnosis if you're not level-headed.

I loved reading your story, and good luck in all future efforts.

By the way, my wife isn't always as supportive. She was watching me work on the car in my garage. I casually asked her if she had seen the 15mm socket and she replied, "did you check up your ***?" I love that woman.

 

some additional info for all:

If you look at enough of the Bosch specs, you will finally find somewhere that the ratings are something like: 30NC/40NO. That is for the usual 5 pin relays with both 87/87a positions.

That means that the contacts for the normally closed poles is 30A and the normally open poles is 40A. That makes sense given the difference in expected duty cycle.

The common tan relay used in most positions is a 4 pin relay and the socket is formed for a 5 pin relay. The other day, the parts guy at a Jaguar dealership pulled out a 5 pin "general purpose" relay when asked for a relay. This might be meant to fit in both NO and NC applications since the sockets have space for the unused pin.

It's worth noting that the Jaguar relays have EMF quenching diodes in the case, whereas most no-name ebay universal "bosch style" relays do not. These diodes are a must because of the electronic driver circuits used in a Jaguar.

HTH


++

 

Hi All,
Thanks for the warm welcomes. I definitely feel much better with everyone's support and understanding around here.

So here is an update to the story.

Friday, 09/01/2011:
Car has been running well, got an oil change 2 days ago and still runs fine.

Went to work in the morning with the Jag. At noon time, the car can't start it again!
It's displaying the same messages:
BRAKE FLUID LOW
ASC NOT AVAILABLE
FAILSAFE MODE
TRANSMISSION FAILURE

I didn't have any tools to open the passenger relay box to switch the relays around, so I decided to put it off till I get off work.
After work, I read about the inertia switch being trigger. I thought that when parking, I might have brushed up against the landscaping bushes and caused the inertia switch to trigger. So I followed the instructions to reset it, but car is still in "zombie" mode

At this point, I decided to call the wife and have her pick me up. Gives her an excuse
to get out of the house.

While waiting for the ride, I decided to try the other relays. Mainly the relays in the ENGINE COMPARTMENT FUSE BOX. This time, I left the keys in the II position. I pulled the top two relays and put them back into the same place.

And to my surprise, the error codes went away and I was able to crank the car. The first crank did not get the car to start. The second crank started the car right up.

And right at the same time, my wife's SUV pulled up. Oh well, all is good now

Maybe I should buy a OBDII reader to reset the codes next time?
And keep some tools in the car just in case this happens again?
Seems there is a root cause or circuit issue somewhere in lala land...

HTH others with similar issues.

 

What you might try doing is to remove and install the relays several times. This will clean off the contact areas through abrasion. The relays and contacts are now 10+ years old. Corrosion forms over time.

A preventative maintenance routine might be to perform the same exercise on all 5 fuse boxes and relays nearby. Also clean and tighten all ground points that are near the fuse boxes. Ditto for both ends of the battery cables in the trunk. In other words, renew every connection that you can easily reach.

There are also the joints in the main power distribution cables at each fusebox, the stud connection at the false bulkhead, the high power protection module, and the ground strap between the starter area on the engine block and the body.

Some people recommend the judicious application of a *thin* film of dielectric grease on every connection. Others will argue over the semantics of "dielectric". That is not surprising given the meaning of the word. You can make your own decision. The grease is not there to help conduction, it is there to prevent future corrosion. The usual theory is that the metal to metal connection being made under pressure displaces the grease as required while leaving a air and water barrier.

This exercise can take several hours on several days because of the sheer number of connection points. However, it may prevent a whole host of seeminly random electrical gremlins from appearing at inconvient times for some number of years.

Be sure to disconnect the battery ground cable before carrying out this work

 

I also recently had the same issues. One cllick in starting, error messages.

Many of these warnings will come up with low volts when starting. Low volts when starting can be caused by a number of things.
1. Poor battery condition or terminals.
2. Tightness of the main supply connections in the trunk at the 'Mega' fuse (black box at front of trunk with 500A fuses in it)
3. Tightness of the engine false bulkhead supply connector on passenger side.
4. The engine to chassis grounding strap underneath on passenger side.
Mine turned out to be the battery, but it still had the original in from 2001 so 10 years is a good life.

Also, you may want to check the conditions in park and neutral as the interlocks are different.

Separately, you said that the additional coolant was green, the original is yellow. While some coolants claim to be universal, there were reports that certain mixes can cause sludging.

Good luck

 

Help!

I am one of the wives previously mention except I am the one who has "broken" the car.
Here's what happened:
I stopped for gas, did not want to leave the tank empty for my husbands next trip, forgot to replace the gas tank cap and did not close the fuel intake flap. Drove home 3 blocks parked the car, got out of the car, electronically locked the car. Saw that the gas tank flap was open and the cap was missing - swore - closed the fuel flap. Used the electronic remote to unlock the door - heard the fuel flap lock but the dorrs unlocked - got in the car, turned the key.....nothing but some clicks.
Took the other car to the gas station picked up the missing gas cap, came back. used the remote a few times and got the fuel flap open, replaced the cap....tried to start the car...nothing. Went to get my husband, feel like an idiot, we checked every fuse in the front 2 fuse boxes and the rear fusebox - all are Ok - no idea what or where a relay is and didn't want to ask. Can anyone offer advice?

 

Open the fuse box, the relays are the square brown or black cubes.
You can just pull them out with your hands.

 

Hi thank you for your advice, we can pull the relays tomorrow in the daylight, but how do we reset them. At this moment all the electronics are crazy, they dash lights up, wiper swishes the screen and steering column goes up and down but no power to ingnition. Can this be a relay problem?
Thank you for ANY advice!

 

You can try this.
Leave the key in the ON position.
Pull a few relays out, and put them back.
Pull a few relays out, switch them up, and put them back. Meaning switch positions of different relays.

 

janet:
There is no such thing as "resetting a relay". What I think you refer to iswhen relays are swapped around, somtimes the removal and replacement cleans the electrical connectors, causing the circuits to work again. Sometimes, a relay that is bad is moved to a funtion that is either not important or is not as sensitive to high resistance internal contacts.


Back to you original confession (sorta!), I do not believe that the opne filler or gas cap has squat to do with the problem you are having. There is just not any connection. The car does not know if the flap is closed, and the missing cap will throw a code but not immobilize the car. Now, if it rained,or you parked under a sprinkler and got water in the tank, that could be a connection.

So my advice, is quit balaming yourself. And if its your husband blaming you, ask him exactly how what you did could have any effect on starting the car- That is, unless my rain theory applies, in which case apologize and figure out how to siphon the bad gas out.

If you have another key, try it. It sounds like it MIGHT be the immobiliser.

 

Hi Ross and everyone,

Thank you for your advice and support....my hubby has been great about all of this - it is just me feeling like an idiot.
We have solved the problem - bought a new battery and the car now works like a charm. It seems that the combination of the doors unlocking whilst the gas flap couldn't unlock or locked ( whatever it did!) sent some sort of shock to the whole system. Yesterday as we were working through this the seats kept changing postion, lights came on and off, windshield wipers just started independatly..the car was possessed!
So - to anyone out there who is having electronic problems.......it might be just the battery that has been asked to do too many things and just said ......NO WAY!

Again thanks for your help and support....good to know there are understanding friends out there,
Janet

 

Again, quit kicking yourself. The two occurances are not related. You just happened to have a failed battery at the same time you had the blond moment.

 

Good to see your problem fixed , a dead battery can cause weird issues , not just car related but also notebook related lol

 

Low volts can cause so many problems.

Often it's the combination of an older battery and an aging electrical system that checks out fine but that on occasions will cause a low volt situation.

When you get all of these unrelated failures at startup - The battery is the first thing to check. Then the bulkhead -- A poor design. I wonder why it was built this way.

 

I'll tag on to yeldogt's response. I don't want to be a downer, but if you changed the battery because it was bad, you may still have a problem causing the battery to go bad (mine was a bad ground strap). A new battery (or recharge) might only temporarily fix the problem. Until you fix the root cause of the problem, the issues will keep popping up. I'll cross my fingers for you that it was just the battery.