I recently purchased a 2003 XJ8 Sport. The brake light that is mounted in the rear window is loose on one side, thus leaning at an angle. I took a quick look at it and it cannot tell for sure if the tang on the brake light assembly was fitted into the windshield moulding or possibly glued to the black area on the glass. Not hurting anything, just annoying that it is leaning at an angle.


Any ideas? Thanks.

 

The sun beating down on the rear window eventually causes the adhesive holding the stop light to the rear window to fail and the unit either sags or tilts. ALL jags of this configuration will eventually have this problem.Replacing the adhesive is an utter PITA !First you need to be a midget to work in that area. Second , the actual stoplight housing itself is as brittle as Christmas ribbon candy and easily cracked when working on it. its an incredibly bad design for a car costing north of $70 grand. Thankfully its the only thing I've found to be "chintzy' on my 2003 XJR

If your housing is still attached even somewhat to the rear window a simple "fix" solves the sagging stop light problem. I took a 3 inch square piece of dark grey foam rubber approx 2 inches thick and slid it under the housing which pushes the housing back to where its rubber feet contact the glass. It Works perfectly as it can't be seen from outside the car and its virtually invisible from inside the car. Also it stays nicely in place even on the bumpiest of roads. give it a try.
Good luck !

 

Mine fell off: trying to glue the retainers back on window didn't work, so I tried epoxy; worked great except the freaking pieces (both black light holder and grey cover) crumbled in my hand. Plastic is ridiculously poor quality. Had forum friend send new part from a junk yard in CA, it broke too. Piece is now a a combo of epoxy and duct tape; but it works. Bottom line, ditto Ronco1's comments: be super gentle; you will probably find half the bulbs burned out.

 

Great feedback - and cautionary statements.


Thank you.

 

As others have pointed out .... the plastic either started out poor or gets that way in the sun. The actual cover (interior color) is a bit more robust -- the part that holds the rubber bumpers and the bulbs is the problem (black plastic)

Mine cracked and then the metal holders came off the windshield. I was able to get another on ebay.

Jaguar makes a kit to fix the two metal tabs when they come off the glass -- I used rear view mirror glue and it eventually failed. I have it wedged in for the time being.

The rear glass has a black coating on the inside where the two metal clips are glued -- when my clips came off they took some of this coating with it -- can now see a mark from the outside where the black coating (paint?) pulled away.

It is a dumb design -- the upper bumpers are always putting outward pressure on the lower clips. If I was you -- take the light off and glue on the side that came off .. before the other comes off.

The interior colored cover snaps onto the black holder -- you will see the push clips on the bottom. The black holder slides and snaps onto the metal window clips. Another fun item -- the bulb holder on some models has the electrical connection under the back shelf -- so you can't undo it. I had to remove the original bulb holder -- move it out of the way and then attach it to the replacement

 

I couldn't make the rear mirror glue work: used epoxy, still holding. Found both the black plastic retainer and the interior cover both are very brittle.

 

Hi all had the same problem with both my XJ8's. solved them using Loctite Epoxy plastic bonder .works great had no problems since, hope this helps.you can get it at any hardware store jrb53

 

A local glass company that replaces windscreens will have all the adhesives or might even tell you what they use.

Jaguar issued a TSB for the recommended products but that was about 15 years ago.

bob gauff

 

FIRST.. if you plan to remove the lamp assm , REMOVE the fuse in the trunk fuse box that is closest to the bumper . Look at label in fuse box to see which one. Otherwise, if you cross the wires on the lamp assm during the repair , it will blow and when you get everything back together and the lights don't work you'll be saying.." What the...?""

Forgot to add that if you go the "re-glue rout" you probably will need to remove the entire unit from the rear window. Note that to do this, the 2 wires that attach to the light assm must be removed.... There are 2 different configurations..... in one case You may find a small 2 pin connector that easily unplugs from the lamp board.....in the other ,the wires are soldered to lands on the lamp board. In this case I suggest simply cutting the wires leaving enough wire on the lamp assm for an easy re solder of the wires where cut . Be super careful waving a soldering iron around in the tight space

Re attachment alignment is critical so that the lamp is positioned correctly.
In the case where the attachment points are not completely separated from the window, carefully spread the recommended adhesive on the areas that have lifted from the glass then do the foam rubber "fix" i described in a previous post here.

If the assm is completely separated from the glass follow the techniques outlined in the Service bulletin that "motorcarman " so kindly attached.
Some folks have used the relatively new 3 M double sided tape which has adhesive property specs well above and below the temps found in a parked car summer or winter. I got a roll at Home Depot ($6 bucks) and couldn't believe how well this stuff works.
Using this tape is much easier than playing around with any liquid adhesives. In any and all cases I strongly recommend sliding the foam rubber "fix" under the assm as "insurance"

One other suggestion might be to hire a midget to do this job as there is virtually no room back there.

Good luck to all !