Hey TEXFireBlade, Thanks for bringing this to my attention. I know very little about hardware, especially electrical engineering.


Where I'm from in Canada the roads are not as smooth and dry as they are in Los Angeles. Cars in Canada are subjected to salt, crushed gravel, sand, rough roads and extreme weather conditions. This thread bought memories back when I picked up my car seeing the exposed wiring on the undercarriage. Although, I store my car in the winter and never drive it even in the rain, the wiring under the car just doesn't look right.


The wires and connectors look so fragile and precarious installed under the car in this manner. I'm not too sure if this would be considered best practice. I never seen wires and connectors installed in this manner before under a car. Given the opportunity I'd will like to add some additional protection as a means of a first defense against the elements.


The wires come from a tube and go into the connectors with about 4-5 inches of unharnessed wires exposed before going into the connector. By adding some surrounding protection I would not to changing the length of the wires , how close they are to each other or any other physical assembly.


Do you suggest these wires should be left as is and to not add any further protection? Thanks for warning me about the corrosive properties of some silicones and for your expertise.
.

 

It's difficult to comment about the specific issue because I haven't seen the connector or wiring in question. I'm going to have a look under my 12 XF tomorrow to see if there is anything similar to give me a frame of reference.


These are my thought though. The outer conduit is probably there to provide some level in abrasion protection for the cable, and to act as a neat way to route everything together. It will usually be open to the atmosphere with no seals at the ends (or maybe at just one end) to let moisture escape. I'm assuming that the uncovered wire you says exits the tube is covered with insulation, just no secondary protective layer? If that's the case, then the insulated wire entering the connector should have insulation all the way up to the point that the wire disappears in to the back of the connector.


It's hard to describe in words so hopefully this link will take you to an image of a typical connector and the associated termination.


Corsa Technic Motorsport, Delphi Packard Metri-Pack, Sealed 150


If you look at the connectors on this page and on the rest of the site, many will have seals that prevent the ingress of moisture and dirt between the connector halves, AND a separate seal for each cable as it enters the back of the connector. I have never seen dirt or moisture or corrosion on this type of connector and I'm originally from the UK where they love to use salt on the roads. Sometimes I have seen dielectric grease inside the connectors but I suspect that is to allow the connector shells to slide together easily and the seals to not get bound up during assembly. If you're really concerned you could pull the connector apart and see how it looks inside. If there is dirt or corrosion then you can start to worry and look for a solution. Just make sure when you re-assemble the connector, you don't leave dirt on the connector shell seals or you'll loose the integrity of the seal. And never pull the connectors apart by the wires. Release the locking tab and the work the two parts until they separate.


Good luck and let me know if you need anything else.

 

Adding to the list, I got one today in my 2012 XKR that I had never seen before - on startup when leaving my office at the end of the day, the climate controls on the touchscreen were greyed out. No external temp, and no internal temp. You could control the fan with the dials, but it would not display anything on the screen. Also I my heated seats/steering wheel were not operable either.

Oh, and I used to get "Cruise not available" on my 2007 XK all the time.

 

If it stays that way, try pulling fuse 6 (15A, blue) in the fusebox in the LH footwell. Wait 10s, then put it back in. That does a 'hard reset' of the climate control system.

 

This sounds like a bug in Windows OS - first step of troubleshooting - reboot

 

Yeah: "Have you tried turning it off & on again?"

 

Any evidence that this had to do with the battery?

 

How many Americans have ever watched The IT Crowd? (Check Netflix.) That's now a running joke at my house.

 

Has anyone noticed that if you leave the audio on when you shut off the car, it seems to exacerbate the battery issues? And then when you turn it back on the radio is still on, even if the Jaguar logo gets stuck on for an extended period of time (5+ seconds)? From now on, I will be sure to shut off the audio before I shut off the engine!

 

I'm sure that some of you had the same quirks that I had with the battery voltage low. My voltage in the battery was still 10.8 when loaded but it did some crazy things.

1) I would start the car and it would continue cranking over and then finally starting but running rough(hasn't happened since new battery)

2) Screen would just go blank and sometimes while driving down the road the volumn indication would just come up and blink for minutes on it's own.

3) ABS and Stability lights would come on. Power would be reduced to limp mode.

4) Rear park assist would beep with nothing there.

As I stated, all these went away with a new, fresh battery. And I had a happy kitty once again.

 

Nope, pure speculation but it seems that these little hiccups always seem to be blamed on low voltage/battery issues.

 

The problem with a weak battery is though you might see 10.5 -12 volts or so that itself is often not the issue...it is the brief dip that can go below 7 or 8 volts while the starter is cranking the engine under these conditions, due to the high power demand of the starter.

This is where the electronic modules can 'crash' and then continue to malfunction until reset.

 

I park in a parking deck and have no access to power so this is a great idea. I'm actually starting to have the electrical gremlins myself. My auto up/down for my windows would not work until I drove the car for 30 minutes and the paddle shifting was also very lazy

I've never experienced issues like these in any other car, very odd and I'd like to know what causes them as all modern cars have complicated/draining electrical systems.

 

Very helpful. I put those symptoms on the master list.

 

Does anyone get a mismatch between what is playing on the title of the iPhone vs the name of the song displayed on the system. All of a sudden mine will no longer match. I thought it was the iphone but it showed the correct song. I can navigate to a certain album or song within the infotainment system select it and something different plays.

Could this be battery related?

 

Your Jag has many electronic modules, and each has their own internal voltage regulator besides the one on the alternator for the charging system. However, some modules may be more sensitive to voltage drop than others, and if the battery is not holding a full charge, the temporary voltage sag on starting can create havoc. Further complicating this is the fact that MANY of the modules communicate important shared data via the CAN bus. The CAN bus communications can be interrupted and/or corrupted by modules sensing low voltage trying to communicate that problem, and/or trying to alert other modules it is having troubles sending data. That can result in low voltage DTCs and/or communications problems DTCs. Also, connectors continue to represent one of the single largest trouble areas with vehicles and electronics. Low voltage, combined with an intermittent, or high resistance connection can also create hard to track down issues. The best way to start to resolve such issues is to insure you have a good battery that maintains its charge. A fully charged battery at rest should be about 12.4V. If its consistently slipping below 12.0 volts, its time to replace it. If you're not driving the car enough to keep it charged (at least once/week), then you should consider a battery maintainer to help preserve it. If your vehicle has set a number of DTC codes due to low voltage, then a trip to the dealer, or a reset with a scan tool cable of reading generic + enhanced codes is advisable, AFTER reading and printing all the codes noted (for future diagnostic reference, if necessary). With a fully charged battery and the engine running, you should be seeing around 14.0 V. If you still have problems knowing you have a good battery and charging system performance, then you must start diagnosing each individual problem, one at a time. I would start with any DTC codes that were set, and check each system/module individually. Also, keep in mind that something as simple as a loose battery terminal connection, or GROUND connection is quite common and could also be contributing to such issues.

 

Worth trying a hard reset of the infotainment system - pull, count to 10 & replace Fuse 21 (15A, blue) in the rear fuse box under the panel between the back seats. If that doesn't fix it, do the same with Fuse 24 (10A, red) which is for the portable audio interface.

 

Mine will go in and out. Pandora seems to confuse it sometimes. It seems to self-correct, but I really don't pay enough attention. I don't think it's battery related.

 

Someone in another thread had mentioned that the windows may not drop upon opening the door when battery voltage is low. This has happened to me before, but I thought it was a fluke. I have added it to the list.

 

Dunno about this in the XK, but in an XK8, the sure-fire sign of a low battery is the windows dropping when opening the door but not coming back up when you close it. Any time that happened, I fired up the trickle charger.