What color smoke? Bluish is oil. White that dissipates entirely is water vapor , expected on startup if humid and cool. Not cool if present when warmed. Black is over-fueling.

Kirby Palm compiled postings and advice from years of jag-lovers and jaguar forums postings into a single volume. It’s widely considered required reading for new owners. Covers almost every common failure mode, numerous modifications and fixes.

http://www.jag-lovers.org/xj-s/book/Jaguar.html

 

Ha! Thanks JigJag,,, for all of that info. I've wondered what that little brownish thing was all about. I think I to will bypass it. And, the Kirby Palm stuff,,, excellent! Thx

 

FYI there is a similar item on my starboard water rail. That one was a cold-engine vacuum switch related to the complex vacuum advance system. I don't recall the routing but if I recall correctly it cut vac advance until warm to retard timing and speed up heating the engine. I'm not sure if the two are interchangeable / same part number.

 

Having started the engine in a fashion, once it started to get warm, it started smoking quiet a lot from the left rear of the engine.
I now have the car jacked up and can see the rear of the exhaust manifold has a lot of oil on it
The oil of curse is dripping down on to every thing
It cant have been getting oil on it for long as its not burnt on to the manifold,
It looks like its just recently got wet with oil
I cant see where its coming from, the cam cover doesn’t seem that oily and likewise with the cam box
not that I can see anything much
any ideas

thanks

 

OK, its running, goodo.

Oil at the rear LH side is usually from the tappet block to head seal, which is NOT a gasket, but a chemical seal. Total mongrel to reseal. Greg in France has a write up on how he did it and it worked.

The "D" seals in the rear of that tappet block also shrink and leak badly. Not hard to replace, Inlet off, camcover off, new camcover gasket and D seal, and back together.

There is a banjo bolt at the rear of each tappet block, and they leak RARELY, and being under high pressure, oil will be soaking everything in seconds. DO NO attempt to tighten these, as they a well documented to strip the threads in the tappet block, and then you will be sad.

 

Grant,

So what’s the solution if I were to have a leak on the banjos?

 

not long ago I was chasing and trying to figure out why I was getting no oil pressure at the gauge on the dash. At the time I had NO idea how in dismal shape the ribbon on the back of the cluster was. Shot. Replaced the cluster and now have pressure readings. Anyways,,,,

I'd ordered a new OP sensor/sender and in the process thought (dumbly) it would be a good idea to pull all of the lines connected to the sensor sending unit at the back of the engine in the V to check for a blockage.... There are two lines (at least) coming into the sensor sending unit set up from either of the two rear cams. In the back of the engine near fire wall, I think a 14 or 15mm bolt,,, banjo. I undid those to find an inner and outer copper washers on the banjo bolt. To get to them,,, I removed the cross breather or the balancing pipe. Made it easier to get to. I think if there is a leak there replacing the Cooper washers are a good first step and maybe some teflon tape on the bolts...? just my two cents.

now that I'm reading the trusted Grant France's warning, I am thankful to high heaven I didn't make a mistake. I think Greg also kinda warned me at the time. Be careful.

 

Engine OUT.

Longer banjo bolts, heaps of thread further down the holes, and new copper washers.

Access is near impossible on the XJS, I did the RH on the XJ12 years ago, and took all damn weekend, and the engine would have been out inside 4 hours, duh.

 

i have tried to get my fingers around the banjo bolts and my fingers came out dirty but dry, not that that means much
the weather is not good for this sort of thing at the moment but now I know the oil is on the exhaust manifold, I can take it off the jack and remove some of the stuff that’s stopping me from looking around the back of the head

 

HA, our weather sucks also.

If your fingers are dirty, good, dry, even better.

I would be looking along the tappet block seam with the top of the head, and a STRONG LED torch is the best here.

Next, find that oil sender pedestal, and feel around those senders, bet your wet.

The one on the RH side is the small Idiot Light sender, and prone to leaking. Simple Generic Toyota etc with a spade terminal will do. VDO brand is my choice for longer life.

The larger sender is the Gauge sender, and prone to leaking also, but slightly less than the idiot light sender. This sender is a Smiths, and specific to Jaguar. There are replacements, but the ones I used are hard to find now.

These units will flow oil into the V, and it will run across the back, particularly if the front of the car is jacked up, oops, and then run off the edge, straight onto the exhaust.

Look carefully and look some more, before ripping things apart.

 

Been starting the car on and off for a while.Every time I start it, it seems to run a bit better, still only on about 8 though Idles at 600rpm
One day I stated it and it was battling to run and the more I tried the worse it got until it was only firing on one cylinder
I already knew I was going to have to do the plugs, plug leads and injectors
I fitted new plugs and plug leads, the original plus were like new apart from them a bit black
Gave the engine a crank It started immediately and ran like a clock
A lot of white smoke until it got warm and I can now see where the smoke is coming from at the back of the engine, its coming from the exhaust flange and blowing back
Now that all cylinders is firing its not as bad and once the engine is warm you cant see the smoke
Still got to look into the oil leak though, sill cant see any thing