oil pressure and oil temp are on the filer housing.

It doesn't sound like the supercharger. It's more like chain slap. Charger coupler noise is more of a random clatter on overrun and the sound comes from the centre of the engine. Easy to drop the sc belt to confirm.

It's a case of refreshing the chains, guides and lower tensioners. Going in again sucks but you'll know it's finally boxed off

 

Like Sean B said, the oil filter housing is where the oil pressure and oil temp are located. I think you can run it without the oil temp input but it won't stay running without the oil pressure input. I think. As far as the threads, I cannot recall what they look like. I think some cars were pipe thread and others were a standard thread with a washer. You'll have to take one of the sensors out to find out. I hear ya with the garage bit. I don't have one and that keeps me out of the side work game.

Now, not to scare you but I clearly remember a 2003 XJ8 come through the old dealership and had a chain rattle. We replaced tensioners upper and lower. Still there. We even ran some marvel mystery oil in throughout the engine to try to clean out any built-up sludge in the galleys to the tensioners. Did not work. We sent the car to the auction just cause they didn't want to pay to tear down the engine to find out what was going on.
That car was a beautiful Sapphire Blue standard XJ8 with low miles. Clean, Clean car but just had the rattle and the owner didn't like it.

With that said, you may have come across a concern on a car that no one cared about. Since you had the original tensioners (which were in relatively good shape) and the car still has the rattle, you will have to dig deep. Next logical step is the lower tensioners. Thats a bigger job and timing is crucial for the crank and cams. Read up on it thoroughly.

 

I've got a coworker with a 98 XJR. He's got the specialty tools, I'm glad I can borrow those.

 

Here's the post primary tensioners and chain replacement vid. Note, it doesn't have the airbox on.

IMG_0486.MOV - YouTube





The rails were cracked in multiple places. Also one of the tensioners didn't pop out when I removed it, and the other did.

Now I've got a leak from the water pump gasket to contend with. The replacement WP I ordered from chris had a metal gasket in the box with it. It got damaged in shipping, so I suspect that's why it's leaking.

Also, I have an oil leak on the drivers side back bottom corner of the valve cover. So I've got to dive back in and resolve that. I replaced it when I did the secondaries earlier, so I'm hoping it's ok. But I might just replace it again.

At least it doesn't sound like a GD diesel anymore! Hallelujah!

Now I can concentrate on less important things like hardwiring my newly upgraded valentine one and bluetoothing the stereo..