Actually, my mechanic and I agreed very early on in my ownership (oh, I think maybe shortly after I bought her and took her in for the high idle and some other fixes) that she is most decidedly a "she." These cars are WAY too fussy, pretty and high maintenance to be male (although she is frequently called a "James Bond car" when people first see her). In my case, the spouse who sighs and says "do I want to know how much THAT costs" is my husband, though (who's less mechanically inclined than I am).

And, yes, a sense of humor and appreciation for the quirks is critical. Also a smidge of disassociation from reality :-). But then, the horses I handled before my V12 were ex-racers, so I've earned my crazy badge already I think.

Seriously, though, thank you all. I can't imagine owning one of these without some kind of support system!

 

What you want is a gun style infra-red thermometer with a laser sight. There are literally hundreds available though most are made by just a handful of companies in China and branded for various sellers.

The main differences between them are range, accuracy and distance to spot ratio. (the units emit a cone of light so the further away you get the wider the measurement area.) They pretty much all work by measuring black body radiation so you will get more accurate results measuring black or dark objects, like rubber hoses than a shiny bit of chrome.

I would look for a unit that is able to measure up to at least 700F or more with an accuracy of 2% or better and a 12:1 dist/spot ratio.

You'll find many decent ones in the $20-50 range, here are some examples

They are actually very useful for all kinds of things around the house, for cooking and even taking one's body temp.

Cheers,

Allan

 

the reason you saw a lot about specific gravity is because it is important.

Anti-freeze doesn't just bring the freezing temp down, it brings the boiling point and the heat exchange up. It eventually drops off at some point, looks like an X on a chart.

Point is, 100% water is better at cooling than 100% anti-freeze, but the 50/50 and 70/30 are MUCH better at cooling than either of those. So in a pinch you can refill with water to get you home, but using 50/50 coolant is imperative to keeping it running cool. If you know you have a slow leak keep some 50/50 in the back to refill it with.

If you just bought the car, FLUSH the system. the additives in the anti-freeze to prevent corrosion,aeration, deposits, and electrolysis are all probably gone, because most people don't flush their coolant when they should.

oh, also a note on coolant.
Jaguar recommend Jaguar coolant or universal phosphate free. In regular north american coolant (green), phosphates are used as a cavitation retarder and as a corrosion inhibitor. European water is much harder than north american water, and hard deposits can form that will cause blockages. This shouldn't be a problem in North America with city water as long as you change your coolant everything 2-3 years as recommended. I will also note that this is a reaction with the phosphates and hard water. Using purified water would completely negate this issue, as well as using pre-mixed coolant. Stay away from the full force peak as it has no SCA package for whatever reason. The others are oat extended life coolants which can sometimes share the dexcool characteristic of gelling when exposed to air. If your choices are peak, you should get the pink fleet charge. The fleet charge is regular universal coolant with all the normal SCAs in it. No idea why they make it so complicated other than marketing to get people to buy "extended life".

 

^^

The only quibble with the above is that while the boiling temperature does rise, and rises further again due to the pressure cap, the heat transfer ability of water is greater than antifreeze. This is offset by the fact that water that has boiled away has no heat transfer ability at all.

 

right, I sort of mis-phrased that. Pure water has something like 1.4 or 1.5 times the heat transfer ability but there are other considerations to make with coolant like cavitation retarders, corrosion and electrolysis prevention etc.

But like you said, the boiling point going up is necessary for the cooling system to do its job.

In case anyone was wondering if the characteristic of Anti-freeze is not the same way, its not. Anti-freeze has a lower freezing point when mixed with water. I think the lowest is at 30/70 (AF is 70).

 

Yes, the lowest freezing and highest boiling points for a antifreeze/water mix is somewhere around 70 percent antifreeze to 30 percent water. Since the higher percentage also carries more inhibitors, that's what I have always run.

There is one member who has run 100 percent coolant for decades and swears by it.