Thanks all, looks like I'll have to take it to the local power steering expert and get him to have a proper look and let me know what he thinks.
Coincidentally, the local Jaguar club went there last month for one of our 'technical' evenings, so I'm sure he'll appreciate the business.

 

Randy, I assume that question was for me? On a hard left turn the steering jammed slightly at full lock , meaning you had to wrestle it back again. This is down to a worn u joint I think, so I'm happy to have solved that.

I believe that the original steering column needs replacing with the updated one which collapses in the event of a crash, rather than pushing up into the cabin too. My original had rusted its separate parts together too, so I just wanted that sorted this summer.

The hardest bit is getting the column off and then back on to the steering rack mount & the upper column too. That really was hard work. Not expensive though as the "new" column was used from ebay. Bleeding the power steering is very straight forward too.
The steering is far more sensitive now so I'm taking some time to get used to that. It felt more damped before. If you do this yourself, remember to install the rubber boot before the steering column.

 

Those 2 piece steering columns (the one you installed) were actually the older style, and were prone to wearing at the sliding interface causing play in the steering, and eventually a knocking. There was a tsb... The one you removed was one of the updated versions that superseded the split style one.

The one in my car (older 2 piece style) had a few degrees play in the steering wheel - replacing it with a newer style one in good condition fixed the play, and gave a lot more confidence in the car's steering due to that. Didn't notice any damping effects on the steering, if anything it only helped reduce the NVH being transmitted through the steering.

The hardest part of getting it installed was getting the lower column off the splines of the rack the first time - after that, the other tricky part was getting the boot seated properly, and then the new column seal to seat into the boot.

 

Nilanium,
Looks like I got mislead by the picture on the jaguar classic parts site. That must be the original pic on their site. I'll have to try and find another newer one as mine had gone well past its sell by date. So far the "upgrade" seems OK though. You're so right about the boot too.
​​​​​​

 

After going the last two weeks with only one P1121 episode, today on the way to work it reared in full force again, unable to drive the car without my foot on the pedal yet again. I did go out and replace my Purge valve, and even managed to find the seal that was missing between my master cylinder and booster so I fixed that too. Granted, now I have to bleed the brakes, but I believe I finally FINALLY have solved the air leak from that part at least. Still have the Low Brake Fluid light, I get the feeling that I'm never solving that one while I own the car. All while waiting for my thermostat housing for my Mustang that my son drives, since that died on Tuesday. You know how it is, Amazon says it'll be overnighted by 8 PM, tracking number on UPS site says nahhhh, 1:30! And here it is, almost 8 and it doesn't even show that it's left the regional facility. So I have a feeling I'll be getting with Amazon to get some credit for the overnight Saturday delivery charge that it looks like I won't be receiving. If it wasn't for having the car towed to my mom's driveway thanks to her AAA, I would be more annoyed than I am, at having not being able to get it fixed tonight. But hey... 27 minutes, miracles can happen.

This is not my weekend for wheels..

EDIT: Oh look, never arrived. Amazon JUST showed that it was "delayed" and if I don't have it by Wednesday, to let them know. UPS still shows it on pace for a 1:30 delivery today, so figure that out. I got a refund from my shipping, for what that's worth, and sent UPS an e-mail expressing my disappointment in not only the lack of service, but also the lack of updating information. Mind you, the facility it's at? an hour away. If they weren't going to put it on a truck, they could've called and I would've driven and got the damn thing. Hell, they pass 15 miles from the house from the other center, TO this other center. Very aggravated today.

 

Installed console and put it all back together after stereo install.

 

 

Popped the car up onto the stands and got underneath it to see if I could open the differential. Managed it without a wobble fitting using a u joint instead, but I realised this job really needs a wobble. Managed to grease my u joints without any problems using a ebay grease gun.


Ebay grease gun for the rear u joints. Worked easily and came with its own grease cartridge


Rear u joint grease nipples near the wheel


Ujoint grease nipple


Greasing the u joints


Unscrewing the rear differential oil fitting A wobble fitting is needed here really


Using a u joint to free the differential oil fitting

 

Did you grease them because you were getting noises back there, or were you just doing it because it had never been done before?

 

Johnny B, I greased them because I recently read on jaguar forums that it needs doing once every 10k miles I think, and by the state of all my other fluids, my guess was that they had never been done. My mileage is over 200k,so I'm in preventative mode. :-)

 

Only a tiny bit of dry rot around the top, same on both sides...


Productive couple days! Finally did hopefully the last big service that I've been putting off for a while:

Diff fluid
Rear shocks w/ OEM bilstein (and related hardware)
Rear coil isolator donuts
Rear A-frame main bushings
Sway bar links

Those A-frame bushings were the most straightforward bushing replacement ever - removing them with a press went without a hitch, and install was done by hand with epoxy acting as an installation grease while it was wet... Shocks made a noticeable improvement too, the old ones didn't seem bad but the new ones perform noticeably better in cases like speed bumps (much more composed on the rebound), and they seem to be working better all around anyway. Now I'm tempted to order some fronts to throw in, those are a way easier job.

Also got to break in my new electric ratchet, and I can't believe I didn't buy one before. Saves so much time and effort over swinging a ratchet around in tight spaces for hours.

Finally, a bit early to tell, but it seems that this job helped with the nagging issue of pulling to one side sometimes... I thought the same thing after my big front-end suspension overhaul, so I'll let things settle in and see how it goes.


Now I get to address all the little things, like squeaks and rattles inside, oh boy!

 

.


After watching all those videos on YouTube, I installed a dash cam in my VDP today.

I bought a Uten UCA001, just $49.95 free shipping on Amazon. choice of 720, 1080 or 1296 resolution 30fps, and it has a really nice wide view angle of 170 degrees.

It has lane warning, and collision warning, but, good as they are, they can get confused with other lines/objects, and I don't need those features so I just turned them off. It also has a parking security feature and motion detection, if anyone comes near the vehicle when it is parked it records their presence, and if the car feels a vibration it also records a short scene.These are adjustable for sensitivity.

It does not come with a mini SD card, but I bought a 64GIG from Walmart for $20 bucks. It comes with a a stick-on windshield mount, but I prefer a removable suction type and so i bought an aftermarket one for $9 bucks. So $79.00 total for everything. I am really impressed for the price.

It is plug and play, and easy to adjust the features you want or don't want.

The only thing I don't like is the cord is not quite long enough to reach the rear power receptacle and so I have to use the front one, and so that lid has to stay open. I'm not sure if i could cut and extend the power cable?

 

That's pretty cool, Carnival Kid. I may shop around for one of those myself.

What did I do to my XJR today? I finished the last transmission service in my planned series of drain & fills. In the last few weeks I have drained & filled 3 times with about a hundred miles of driving in between each. I got out and put back exactly 3 Liters each time. If the car is level I get exactly 2.5 Liters but if I have the front higher than the rear I get 3 Liters. So, That's 9 Liters that has been cycled through before today.

Today I did the 4th drain & fill. I dropped the pan and replaced the filter, gasket, electrical sleeve and got out almost 5 Liters! So I put almost 5 Liters back in and got the level perfect at 80 C. So that's a total of 14 Liters it took to conduct the whole drain & fill series. Needless to say the fluid in there looks brand new.

Despite the fact that many fluids are backward compatible I still decided to go with a 236.10 fluid. This transmission has been taken care of so frankly the gasket and filter I replaced looked brand new. The electrical sleeve looked a bit older, but it wasn't leaking. Replaced it all anyway.

Weird part is how much I enjoyed doing it all....

 

I pulled the hood release a week ago, and only the passenger side hood release let go. A few days ago, that side failed too. Any suggestions?

 

I've had my 2000 XJ8 now about 4 months. Bought it for $500 with a known transmission failure and a dead miss. I replaced #8 coil to fix the miss then had the trans replaced with a rebuilt one. I also replaced a failed brake light switch. Once it was a drive-able car, I replaced the grille surround with a silver one from a Sport to match my silver car. I now have a very pleasant car to drive with about $3500 all in.

 

pics!!!



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Car's finally in the local shop known by many as "The Jag Whisperer" a month+ waiting list but I wholeheartedly feel this will be the end of my problematic rear end riddle. Meanwhile the newest Asian addition is keeping me occupied lol.

 

 

Was getting rattling type engine noise coming from up top it seemed. Diminished with a bit of revving, but wouldn't disappear.
Checked the oil and it was in need of topping up by almost one litre. It's got 230k miles so does burnt it slowly. That cured the noise once it was up to level.
Think I'll change the oil though as it didn't look very good and smelt oxidised. Last oil change was in January. Think consensus is once or twice a year after reading various posts here.
Also connected my sdd & "mangoose" cable for the first time. Cleared the codes that I consider historic. Made note of them though just in case. Had a few attempts at entering my vin number before I got anywhere with the software too.
Cool.

 

So the wheel bearing job(rear driver side) I had done recently has already failed. I contacted the initial shop which performed it & the tech. stated they had a real difficult time w/ the new spacers being a different size etc. so they used the old ones & here we are still w/ a noisy wheel bearing. Work's under warranty so they're taking it back in to figure out what they can do. Rear differential's fine, so that's a reassuring thing to take from this.