Hi all,
My first six months of 2007 xkr ownership has already had more ups and downs than most it would seem. I bought the car in october 2021 and have only driven her from 85000 to about 87750 in the following months. The car is a thrill when working properly, and ive even taken it to about 170mph, just once of course. Back in late february, the check engine light came on for the first time, I promptly took it to autozone to scan for the code, and was greeted with this:

I dont know why it says January or why the odometer is messed up.
The next day the passenger brake light went out, so that had to be fixed as well. Anyways, I took the car to the local Jaguar dealership, and they estimated that it was most likely the oxygen sensor that was causing the light to come on. They then broke the tailight assembly while trying to get to the brake bulb. Soon after I set up another appointment, April 4 for the bulb, tailight and sensor replace. I showed up and they got everything done within 2 hours, only charging me for the bulb and sensor, for a grand total of $781.31.
That leads me to todays issue, April 5th. The check engine light has come on again, after an Autozone scan this is what it shows:

Again the odometer and date are all messed up
So that leaves me here and now, If anybody knows why or how this is happening, a thorough explanation would be greatly appreciated. As for now, I will contact the dealership in the morning and let them now what has happened. My best guess is either something is still broken in the exhaust system or something has gone wrong with the computer, but Im no expert. I would prefer not having to dump hundreds or thousands of dollars out of my savings (Im only 18), as at the end of the day its only a car, but I want to take car of her in the best and most sensible way that I can afford. Ive barely driven the car during the winter months, only about once a week. My main concern now is how to get this issue resolved in a reasonable manner.

Again, any response is appreciated, and ill try my best to respond to any questions there may be
Thanks, Stephen

 

The CEL/MIL will be due to the P0442 code which by itself is no biggie.
A very common cause of that code is a loose fuel filler cap so I reckon you should take the cap off and refit it until it clicks at least twice, you never know that might fix the code and remove the CEL.
A reset of the battery system will often fix a U code, just disconnect the negative battery lead, leave it off for a minute or so, then reconnect it.
And you should also invest in a simple OBD2 code reader, plenty of cheapies out there which will at least read and display common codes and possibly save you a trip to the dealership.

 

As you only driven it once a week during winter I think your battery is weak. Do you have it on a battery maintainer when parked?
If not, charge your battery, erase the codes and see if they come back.

 

P0442 can also be caused by fuel additives, like CRC 1-tank, which has been recommended here and worked fine for me. warning goes away after a while.

huge changes in ambient temperature also triggered that code on me twice more since, although in this case, it's reasonable to assume that that's the fuel cap beginning to fail.

one thing i would add, since you have IL on your profile, an older-ish car, and a bout of electrical issues that all seem unrelated, is that if the car has also lived there all this time and been driven in the winter, the underside will show it. get it up on a lift, remove plastic shielding, and check around behind dark corners with a flashlight. you're looking for chewed wire shielding, corrosion near ground wires, stuff like that.

 

Jons is on the right track I get a lot of customers coming in with all sorts of issues including faulty O2 sensors and coils due to E10 fuel being used instead of premium to save a couple of bucks

 

Invest in a code reader; worth every penny.

 

(nearly) Every fuel station in the USA has 10% ethanol in every petrol pump. There are a few stations that sell ethanol-free fuel, but those are usually the low-octane stuff for small engines mostly for yard equipment. Every once in awhile a person can find non-ethanol high-octane, but it's at a very premium price, like almost double the cost of the 10% ethanol stuff.

 

Apologies for the highjack, but Cee Jay started it
I didn’t know that. I occasionally drive in NY, VT, NH. I’ve been able to locate ethanol free gas at Costco, Shell, Sunoco and Mobil 1 stations.
Only in the high octane fuels, of course.

My son just took a road trip in the WRX to LA. Through Detroit, Omaha, Denver, Las Vegas (of course)…. he didn’t mention not being able to find ethanol free gas…. I’ll ask him.

Spartanbadger, thanks for providing the codes. What I’m missing are the details on how you care for your car. If you have a look at the workshop manual, you will find common courses of action for thrown codes. What would help immensely with an odometer at 7,621,413 mi (lol!) is an understanding of maintenance? modifications? driving habits? fuel brand and octane, etc. Many of use only use Top Tier fuels and specified lubricants, that maintenance schedules are kept and ensure the battery is a fully charged and good condition battery. This allows us to quickly diagnose deeper issues.
For example, I’m on my second set of catalytic converters. I have a new gas cap. PCV vales are in good order, o-rings replaced…. etc etc.
Truly, at 85000 miles, a major service is due. Has it been done?

Quite frankly, I wouldn’t be taking my cars to Autozone as they are all european imports…. there are a number of codes that a generic reader won’t pick up. (besides, if they can’t even get the odometer reading right, lol!). then playing this game of ‘guess, hunt and peck’ or ‘musical sensor or module replacement’. The dealers know the cars best and have a knowledge database available to them. Thus, can get to a root cause very quickly.

 

Get SDD and a Mongoose cable. It will guide you on troubleshooting the circuits, components and make more educated parts cleaning/replacement decisions. That said, the newest 4.2L XK is 13 years old. It's to the point where the statement that the dealer knows them best starts to become an inaccurate statement, specialists garages start to become better educated than the techs at the dealership. Often this is because they left the dealership to start their specialist shop and they were the techs when the cars were more common at the dealership.

They act like I've unearthed a piece of mayan history when I come in to buy stuff for my X100, since X100s haven't been in dealerships with any regularity for 5-8 years.

 

That don't seem like much of a problem that would break a car down when it's just leaking somewhere.Patch the leak and it's fixed.Far as the cruise control goes,i wouldn't even worry about it if you don't use it