G'Day Friends
From my initial to-do list a while ago things changed and cars changed.
As intended here we go.
Part one now happening.
I have another motor and a 5 speed that will end up in the car, but not today, work family and a heap of other things, might be next year. So Ill leave that one be now, in the meantime I thought I go through and give the old girl a once over in the motor. She may only be driven a dozen times in the year but at least it will be enjoyable and reliable.
Firstly I was certain the dizzy was seised , bad accelartion and at times awful idle, and wanted to run a bit warm. So why Im at it, time to change plugs, leads, Clean the injectors and replace their seals. Overhaul the Dizzy and change fluids and alter (Butcher) those stupid air cleaners.

Firstly any work on these motors can be achieved easily and without too much stress by stripping everthing down and removing it. Remove just about everything in the V , its not hard and simplifies the whole procedure. Word of advice if possible leave the AC pump Unless (still to come). With all removed you have acess to all , plugs, dizzy, wiring, you can see whats going on, they really are not that bad to strip down and don't let all the plumbing scare you.

While everything is out I am replacing all fuel line hoses with new Gates Hose Gates Barricade 8mm 5 16" Unleaded E 85 Biodiesel Methanol Fuel Hose 485 05 | eBay
New upper and lower injector seals again from Ebay and an off motor injector clean and test. (I did myself) but that will be another thread.

I will leave this post here, and continue tomorrow. My findings not only shocked me but lay testimate that these motors can run on the bare minimum and originally how poorly they were thought out and put together.
Cheers
Katoh

 

Friends
Continuing from last nights rant.
Firstly to change all these bits and pieces you really need to strip the top of this motor down, looks daunting but really quite easy, take off just about everything you can. First thing I noticed in the pull down was the two wires connecting the pick-up in the dizzy that connects to the amplifier only one of the wires was connected, big "?" there! It must of had some sort of contact, but when I got down that far, one was floating around freely. As I dug deeper and starting dismantling the dizzy I noticed "A" one of the cap screws missing, as the dizzy came out I found a piece of rubber wedged under one side of the dizzy to where it meats the valley cover, Another big "?".
Plug leads where not all the same brand, haven't checked the plugs yet as I'm still waiting for the new ones to arrive, I wonder what surprises await me there. The Dizzy itself was actually Ok, was not seized and looks as if it had recently being overhauled. One thing I did notice was the gap in the magnetic pick-up was set to just over 0.5mm, should around 0.1mm.
Now I was told when I bought the car last year that only recently a lot of work had being done to it by a Very Reputable Jag dealer, so I looked back through the receipts and there it was, Yes only done about 5000k ago and an extremly hefty bill to suite. Well frankly why am I not that surprised with what I found.
Now like most things I do I got a bee under my bonnet and thought I should just have a quick look at this wiring for the injectors. Looked not to bad where all the plugs are for the injectors and around the connections, but something bugged me to remove the harness and have a good look. Now people be warned, it may look Ok but its NOT!!!!!!!
My harness came out crispier than uncooked dry spaghetti, as I was removing it it fractured clean in half in countless places.
I stress to all replace this harness! Get it out of the V.
For those in OZ looking for supllies, Im going to give them a little Plug here. Rapid Cables in Queensland Rapid Cables, Accessories and Value Adding talk to Ray. I just rebuilt my entire harness today with high temp wire, 15 plugs with full and split loom, high temp tape and freight for $126Au Easy as!

With the car the way it was I still cannot believe we drove the darn thing nearly 800Km home and it made it comfortably, but still produced a fuel leak in the injector rail 3/4 of the way back. I realised at times the motor seamed unhappy but to even run in that condition is beyond comprehension.
I will post again in a weeks time when it all goes back together and I do wonder how much difference if any is there going to be, now we have Air, Fuel and Spark.
Cheers
Katoh

 

Colleagues
I finished putting the little kitten back together, a few things should be noted. The two wires that also run up the v that drive the AC pump and Water temp sender need to be replaced also, these will be fryied extra well done. With some help of a couple of astute freinds on this forum I have worked out that these two wires are Green/Brown AC Pump and Green/Blue A bank a water temp sender. If your wires are like mine than you will have Black\crispy and Black oily\extra crispy! Cut these wires from the connecting plug behind the a bank head near the brake servo (RHD cars) I believe its on the male side of the plug you need to cut but check first with a good multimeter.

Initial starting showed great promise for a minute or so then the motor slowly ran down and DIED?????????????????? After checking everything and I mean everything, I worked out it just ran out of fuel! Who's a DH? yes I am. After fuelling I bought the motor to temp, sounds great and all is well but setting the timing is a pain in the A**E, you need two people and like all timing lights the cables are not long enough to go round the side panel so you have to go through the motor and even that's stretching it. I used a separate 12v Power supply to run the light. Please note, one other thing a hoist is a huge help, I have a low lift tyre changer hoist. I wouldn't do this off a jack and stands not with the motor spinning at 3K

The test drive shows it's no *****-cat any more, response on the throttle is fantastic, and it has an absolute roar coming from the motor when opened up. I couldn't get a real good run today, too much rain and wet roads meant traction was getting hard to come by. Coming up my street and giving her a little squirt showed both back tyres light up and lot of sideways motion, but strangely it amused my wife who was sitting in the passengers seat. One thing she did comment on was the lack of fuel odour in the car, we had times you could smell fuel but I never found a leak I believe it was unburned fuel out exhaust, maybe?

That's it for now, it runs well and I think maybe reliably too. (famous last words) In the pipline is a full re-spray being slowly orginised already. I have another V12 and a five speed here for a transplant but thats a good year or so off. Stay tuned for that one. In the meantime If I get a chance I may do shocks and springs both back and front and possibly brakes, I have already replaced Ball joints, Stearing and control arm rubbers, again highly recommended and used neoprene.

Sorry just remembered there are two other things that will be done shortly, I purchased a TWR rear spoiler I will attach it when it arrives, and I am going to have pressed Louvre vents put into the bonnet for ventilation, for those in Oz that are interested here is the link At Lone Star Body Shop we design and build Hot Rods, Custom Cars and Custom Trucks to the highest standard. Look under louvers. I have seen an XJS with the pressed style louvers and you would swear it was factory done, this is not a cosmtic thing but a cooling issue in my mind.

Cheers
Katoh