When you click on links to various merchants on this site and make a purchase, this can result in this site earning a commission. Affiliate programs and affiliations include, but are not limited to, the eBay Partner Network.
for my a/f ratio gauge i welded a bung into the down pipe on the passenger side of the engine, access was better in this location
the gauge is a aem a/f ratio gauge i have plans to biuld a custom ski slope that the gauge and a few others will mount in but seems how i haven't gotten to that yet the gauge has never really been fully installed....lol don't laugh.
the o2 sensor wires run along the transmission and across the trans cross member to cross over to the other side and then up threw a grommet in the trans tunnel.
Sometimes it comes down to what works at the moment. I was told Form follows Function. Worry about the function first, then worry about what it looks like later. Just a thought.
for sure, some of those things its best to leave a bit unfinished for a bit as it kinda lets you play with the placement a bit and notice what will work and what wont, like orrigionally i was planning on just mounting some gauges flush in the ski slope after i cut out a new one out of a peice of aluminum but now i realize the gauge need to be pointed twards me and i haven't really decided how exactly i want to do that yet iv got a few idea's but still unsure. so that's part of why i haven't started that project yet.
the boost gauge being on the carb under the scoop wasn't really intentional at first either...lol as i was getting ready to take it for its first test drive i needed to have a boost gauge hooked up so i zip tied it there because it was quick and functional, i ended up liking that placement so that's where it lives now....lol
today i installed a shift light that also has a digital tach i did want a shift light in my line of sight but i didn't want a big 3+ inch big monster tach this seemed like a good solution, i installed it with some 3m double sided tape in case i change my mind later.
set the shift light really low just to see what it looks like and then re-set it to my actual shift point.
i ordered one of these to correct my factory tach but its not in yet.
i grabed the tach signal for the shift light from behind the cluster, while i was doing that i went ahead and looped the tach signal line down to where i plan to install the dakota digital box. once i get the box in ill just have to cut the wire that i looped down and one side will become the input the other will become the output to the tach
on my car the white and gray wire going into the cluster is the tach signal wire. the green wire is the signal wire to the shift light, its taken off of what will become the input side as it already has a v8 calibration.
i had also noticed that my trailing arm bushings were starting to go bad on the rear i wonder why that would be.....lol new bushings are ordered should be here tomorrow so i dropped the trailing arms out and knocked the bushings out and got them ready for new ones
yeah the cage mounts and trailing arm bushings are the weak point of the rear end, they are something your defiantly want to keep a eye on once you get yours up and running. it seems the older the rubber is the more prone to failure as well. i replaced them all on mine once already i am thinking it was about a year before my v8 swap and its had a v8 in it about 2.5 years now. cage mounts still look good but the trailing arm bushings were starting to crack and separate. once i get the cage braced and tied into the body though it should greatly improve the life of those bushings, the xjs rear suspension really doesn't even need trailing arms. the hot rodders that use jaguar rear ends don't use them but the diff and suspension are mounted solid to the car. trailing arms are mostly there to help take the torque load off the cage mounts.
trailing arms are mostly there to help take the torque load off the cage mounts.
They are also, and this is important in a road car with ordinary drivers like me, there to provide a degree of steer to the rear wheels to provide benign breakaway and rear handling characteristics. From memory: The toe of the inner rear wheel changes as the car rolls on a corner, because the radius arm cannot geometrically follow the axle travel exactly. This exerts a forward pull on the inner axle and effectively forces a slight toe-in of the inner rear wheel on a corner.
interesting, i am having a hard time visualizing how that would work though. because the lower control arm is very ridged in the direction that would controll toe in toe out, im not sure how the trailing arm would be able to change the toe in toe out without actually moving the entire cage on its rubber mounts. seems like that would have to be built into the angle of the dangle so to speak on the lower control arm. im not sure i am not a expert in suspension geometry and engineering.
i got my new trailing arm bushing in today and re installed in the car that went pretty smooth. i also think i found the root cause of why i was experiencing some detonation after i dropped the boost down to what should have been straight pump gas friendly and removed the octane booster. witch was the main reason why i ended up adding the water methonol injection. still glad i did because im able to run at boost levels that should be giving me 600+ horsepower on 91 octane fuel now after adding the meth injection witch would not be possible before. plus the benefits of much lower intake air temperatures.
when i ran out my fuel that had the octane booster in it i swapped pulleys for less boost and i also put a new set of spark plugs in it because the octane booster left a residue on my plugs and i wanted to get a good plug read. i went to the autoparts store with a acdelco r42lts and told them i want 8 of these, none in stock but we have these ngk tr55's witch are the same plug i asked them are they the same heat range (the r42lts are 2 heat ranges colder than stock) and they said yes there a direct replacement, myself not being that familiar with ngk part numbers said ok that will work. i just now did a little looking into ngk part numbers and found that the tr55 is a stock heat range plug. what they should have sold me was a br7 (2 heat ranges colder) or a tr6 (one heat range colder) it never really made a lot of sense to me why i was more prone to detonation on what should have been a safer setup. but now that i realize the mistake it makes a lot more sense.
pic of my trailing arm bushes , 2nd time replaced tho, also lower arms to help control lower edge of cage , youd be surprised how much the cage moves around, put a set of 10" wide soft drag slicks oh her!
that will find the weak areas of the rear cage suspension,, truth be known Sir William Lyons was never complelty satisfied with the rear suspension setup, but time /money was tight and so they went ahead with what they had!
of course 50yrs ago NO one in UK ever thought crazy Americans would try to put 500+ HP thru it!
1st thing Group 44 (1975)did was mount the cage solid to the body along with reinforcements to the sheet metals!
i have seen old rubber mounts rip loose backing up and yank the E brake , the whole rear cage went cattywompuss sidewise,jammed against the wheel wells! Yikes.
lot of guys dont realize that the driveshaft is NOT centered at the rear(pic).
back many moons 1965 , i had a SBC chevy put on engine dyno made 950HP at 9000RPM,!
car went 200mph 7.20 et.
ron
nice, i will be at some point connecting the under side of the cage to the body of the car, i haven't really decided how i exactly i want to do it yet, i have a few different idea's but i have not decided what one of my idea's im going to do yet.....its nice to hear these rear ends can hold 900hp on 10inch slicks. with fresh bushings in it im not too concerned that there going to fail but i realize until i do something that more solidly locates the cage bushings are going to be a frequent maintenance item.
your notice in my driveshaft pictures a few posts ago mine has the same offset
im not familiar with that truck but im not looking to competitively drag race my jag its just a fun project. occasionally take it to the track every now and then on test and tune days. but mostly a street driven car so i don't want to have to put a cage in it or anything like that. if its fast enough to be faster than 98% of factory production super cars currently made i would be pretty happy.
interesting, i am having a hard time visualizing how that would work though. because the lower control arm is very ridged in the direction that would controll toe in toe out, im not sure how the trailing arm would be able to change the toe in toe out without actually moving the entire cage on its rubber mounts. seems like that would have to be built into the angle of the dangle so to speak on the lower control arm. im not sure i am not a expert in suspension geometry and engineering..
The lower link itself is not designed to carry normal acceleration and braking forces, so it is located by two radius arms that run forward from each lower link to points on the (unitary construction) vehicle body, beneath the rear passenger compartment. Each radius arm attaches to its lower link at a point just outboard of the bottom spring mountings and pivots vertically about its fixing bolt. The fixing bolts pass through a small Metalastik bush, which consist of a metal sleeve held within a rubber bush. Where the radius arm meets the vehicle body, it is attached by a vertical bolt passing through a large Metalastic bush that is pressed into the forward end of the radius arm. Safety straps retain the radius arms in proximity to the vehicle body should one of the front securing bolts happen to come loose.
As a consequence of the radius arm forward attachments not being on the axis of the lower link arm inner pivots, it would appear at first glance that free movement of the suspension would be impossible without some components bending, or the trailing arm elastomeric bushes being compressed unduly. However, as described above, the crossbeam is rubber mounted to the body. The crossbeam and lower links maintain the correct toe angle of one wheel relative to the other, however due to the relative angles of the trailing radius arms, body roll results in the entire cross-beam and lower links pivoting slightly about the crossbeam's mounting points, thus inducing a small amount of passive rear wheel steering, which may result in significantly improved handling. When the Jaguar components are re-used in other vehicles, the differential is often rigidly mounted to the chassis, different radius arm configurations are used, and the passive rear wheel steering effect is lost.
Last edited by Greg in France; 01-01-2019 at 02:49 AM.
GREG , the cage can/will move more than a 1/16", easily as much as 1/2"!
that is why i put adjustable ball links on the end of my custom arms , i can put a PRELOAD on the cage , and it holds much tighter with tension on the cage!!
and if hard acceleration is your thing , then simply go to a solid axle(9" Ford, or Dana 60, with a 4 link torque suspension setup).
the best Accel. is good when you can LIFT the front wheels a few inches, OFF the ground!! HEhe, that my friends is ACCELERATION!
ron
for sure, my car will be way faster with different tires. with the tires that are on it using an accelerometer they are traction limited at around 1g. the car works really good it weight transfers well and dose not wheel hop or do anything strange like that. but the all season tread pattern and tread compound only has so much grip. so far the best 0-60 iv recorded was 4.8 seconds using less than half throttle off the line and wasn't wide open till 50mph. the car will pull .89g's in 3rd gear and those numbers were all recorded on just 4lbs of boost. i think the car has enough power to pull 3g's pretty easily off the line if it was on slicks at the track. big problem iv had is i really like the look of the factory rims but tire choices are really limited in a 235/60/15 pretty much your choices are a full blown drag racing tire witch will have a soft sidewall and funky street handling characteristics or a all season tire like what i have on it.
i did order a set of rims for it recently that are in a 18x8.5 i plan to mount a set of 200 tread wear autocross orientated tires on that set of rims for my street tires then ill put some drag radials on the factory rims. on the 18's im hoping to get a 245/45/18 on the rear and 235/45/18's front.
12-29-2018, 07:50 PM
