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Well, I thought this car was immune. But apparently not! We have a 2010 XKR and got the dreaded puddle of water in the floorboard. The fix of closing the vents and putting the air on max only helped temporarily. So today I put the car on the lift and crawled underneath to attack it from below. Dear lord... three hours later and I have the tip of that duckbill in my hand. One very important piece of information that I have not seen discussed on any of the previous threads - on our 2010 there is a piece of carpet/insulation covering it up!!! The transmission must be lowered a bit and the insulation removed before you can even see the duckbill. It does not directly drain on top of the transmission in this model, but rather it drips onto the insulated cover and has grooves molded in it so that the water drains off either side. What a dang mess. I'll be posting a YouTube video in a few days. In short, here are the steps I took:
1. Chock the tires, disengage the parking brake.
2. Start the car and put it in Neutral. Turn it off, listen to the car scream about not being in Park. Ignore it. (Can't rotate the driveshaft later if you skip this)
3. Lift the car with a lift. Do not fool yourself into thinking this can be done on ramps. I have a portable unit that lifts about 18".
4. Remove the bracket in the center of the exhaust (4 bolts).
5. Loosen four band clamps and remove the exhaust center section that runs down the car.
6. Remove the center heat shielding covering the driveshaft (4 bolts).
7. Drop the plastic front engine splash shield / skid plate (4 bolts, 2 nuts, 2 screws).
8. Remove the forward cross brace that extends from the engine diagonally out to the rocker panels. (6 bolts. Necessary to get enough drop on the transmission. Otherwise the catalytic converters contact this.)
9. Remove the four bolts holding the transmission mount to the car.
10. Remove the two bolts holding the transmission mount to the transmission.
11. Remove the three silver driveshaft flange bolts and nuts. (The black ones hold the damper ring, the silver ones attach to the output flange)
12. Pull down and remove the front driveshaft section. It may be easier if you remove the two bolts securing the center support bearing.
13. Pull down on the transmission to reveal the tunnel.
14. Remove five plastic clips securing the insulation to the transmission tunnel (four large flat ones on the sides and one that secures to a stud directly in the middle).
15. Behold! The duckbill is visible!
16. Grab the duckbill with a pair of channel locks, and slice off the tip with a razor blade.
17. Have a pint. Then put it all back together. Sing songs of this glorious day!
A few things to note. The driveshaft is indexed/keyed and will only go in one way. Removing the engine cover before beginning is a good idea - it may get pinched when the engine drops. Be sure that the two outward bolts on the larger crossmember are not covered by your lift before you lift the car. I had to lower the car and reposition in order to remove them. Alternatively, remove those two bolts before you lift. Be sure the car is in Neutral or you won't be able to remove the driveshaft bolts. You can also use the "tow feature" method to pull the cord hidden beneath the cupholders. Start to finish this took over four hours - 3 hours to find and cut, and about an hour to put it back together. Cheers!
The following 6 users liked this post by BlackCats:
DGL (07-09-2021),fxdwg (07-08-2021),peterv8 (07-08-2021),ralphwg (07-10-2021),tmich (07-08-2021),u102768 (07-11-2021) and 1 others liked this post. (Show less...)
Man, I read every thread I could find on this issue. There are only two "fixes" in the how-to section, and they're both attempts to slice it from above. What really threw me was the insulation/carpet cover. Even the one post that has videos and mirror view, there's no carpet in that tunnel - water is dripping directly on the trans. You sure wouldn't be able to just stick your finger up there on the 2010 because it is completely inaccessible without removing the cover. Maybe it's just me, but the drain hose itself looked much longer in the previous pics as well.
Man, I read every thread I could find on this issue. There are only two "fixes" in the how-to section, and they're both attempts to slice it from above. What really threw me was the insulation/carpet cover. Even the one post that has videos and mirror view, there's no carpet in that tunnel - water is dripping directly on the trans. You sure wouldn't be able to just stick your finger up there on the 2010 because it is completely inaccessible without removing the cover. Maybe it's just me, but the drain hose itself looked much longer in the previous pics as well.
You can get to it from the top on a 2010 with carpet... Ask me how I know...
My apologies - I was trying to contribute to the community by posting the steps to tackle the job from underneath. I've seen plenty of references to it, but never a description of the process.
My apologies - I was trying to contribute to the community by posting the steps to tackle the job from underneath. I've seen plenty of references to it, but never a description of the process.
Man - I'm totally with you and I'm really grateful for this post. And once again - looking forward to seeing a video.
My apologies - I was trying to contribute to the community by posting the steps to tackle the job from underneath. I've seen plenty of references to it, but never a description of the process.
No worries, I commend all your hard work... Not trying to run you off, just stating that it can be done from the top...
I read your post and thought this would be my final solution when all else fails, being a car guy and new to Jaguar I bought a 2010 XK last of my vin B36433 with 51k miles on it, super clean car. I was completely amazed that an engineer would design this duck bill and have it drain at the top of the transmission tunnel with no access. I called my local Jaguar dealer and they wanted to rip out the 12 year old dash and get to it that way… $195 per hour x 12 hours to do the job…. That was not an option to fix a $5 piece of rubber….. So I started to read lots of people on this site were talking about lubricating the duck bill. I have very skinny arms I don’t see how they were able to do this. I also went and bought a borescope and I was able to see that sucker tucked in there…. So I started to think if water is to run out of this piece of rubber, and all these people are rubbing there finger with lubricant on the rubber , what if oil came out of the duck bill… Would the oil passing through pool enough to soften and lubricant this piece of rubber, and the answer is yes. I used olive oil since I didn’t want any oil smell coming out of my ac vents. I had to do it twice but it worked …. Remove the 3 screws that hold in the blower motor, no need to unplug it the wire is long enough, I took a paper cup and put about a 1/2 an inch of olive oil in the cup and cut off the rest of the cup with a scissor. You need to jack up the passenger side so the front wheel is an inch off the ground, take the cut cup with the olive oil put your hand up in the hole where your blower came out and push your hand towards the center of the car as far as you can get it and dump the cup…..let the car sit for ten minutes on the jack, put the blower motor back in and lower the jack … my first time nothing came out so I tried to close all the vents and motor on high and I got a sprinkle of water and oil, but driving around not enough to do it on its own. Parked it thinking this was not going to help, but I kept reading all these people talking about lubricating the duck bill by hand, but I can’t reach it…so I repeated my olive oil idea a second time after letting the car sit for two day but this time we I put in the oil when I took the car off the jack I had drops of oil on the floor, about a two inch circle…. I live in Florida and yesterday was 86 degrees so I took her out for a 4 hour trip and not a drop on the passenger carpet…. So this crazy idea worked…. I did change the original blower motor and relay before trying the oil trick….So my thought is maybe this needs to be done once a year to keep the duck bill soft…..
07-08-2021, 09:49 AM
2010 XKR duckbill (really??)
