Hello,

I have been lurking the site for quite some time while I deliberated XKRs and Gran Turismos. After I unstuck myself from the various sap covered interiors of the GTs I found a really well cared for 2010 local to me (ATL). It isn't perfect, but it is a solid car with a lot of previous maintenance, so I feel good about my baseline...except for 2 things I'm hoping the forum can help me with. I'm happy to become actively engaged here and give back advice as much as I can, especially as I learn more about Jags in general. I've been a BMW driver (still have a 7) my entire adult life) and have wrenched on all of them.

Question #1- when I was looking at this particular car I brought up with the owner the issue of the air conditioning taking a very long time to get cool, let alone cold. It was a really warm day that I test drove it so some of that I expected, but it took well over 5 minutes before it even got cool. His answer to me was that these cars take a long time for the AC to cool down the car. I didn't take much issue with it because I've never had a British car but it just didn't make sense to me that that's how the AC worked on a modern car, so I went into it with eyes wide open that there may be an issue with the AC. The previous owner had and aftermarket warranty and had a lot of work done under the warranty, except the AC. When I took delivery of the car Monday I did an AC test which I probably should have done in retrospect before I bought it, but I did know going into it the car potentially had some issues, and the pressure on the low pressure valve for the AC was reading just under 100, which is very very high. To me this indicated that someone had pressurized the system and had done it too much in an attempt to get the compressor working. When under load the air conditioning actually will get cold, but if I'm cruising below 1500 rpm on the highway it doesn't get very cold at all and some instances in hot weather it gets somewhat humid in the car. To me this indicates that the compressor is either not running normally or is only running occasionally under higher rpm load. Admittedly, this isn't my strong suit when working on cars. I am really unfamiliar with air conditioning systems and I'm kind of out of my depth. To me it sounds like it could be a compressor and from what I have read so far on the forums it is a very involved process to install a new compressor. Any guidance on what my issues might be or if I'm looking in the wrong area and potentially need to start over in my search for the problem I'm open to those suggestions.

Question #2- The previous owner had the entire leather dashboard replaced with a brand new dashboard due to shrinkage. This looks like it was done back in 2018 and the car has been garage kept and driven rarely, so when I drove the car in my test drive the dashboard looked brand new and didn't have any issues. When I picked the car up this past Monday we talked briefly about the dashboard and the reasons for buying a new one and he reiterated that it originally had shrinkage and his wife did not like the way it looked. Fast forward to today which is Wednesday and I noticed on the corners right where the windshield meets the dashboard there are small whitish spots, very small circles of white, where it looks like either the black of the dashboard leather has worn or is pulling away it's really difficult to tell what exactly has happened, but it is a small dot less than the size of a dime on each side of the dashboard toward the corner of the a-pillar where it meets the windshield. My question- is there anything I can do to prevent this from spreading either further or becoming a bigger problem? I'm also not a leather person so I don't know anything about interior materials, stretching or repairing, this just is not part of my experience with cars. I don't want to have to replace the dashboard anytime soon and I like the way it looks minus those problems. What I'm thinking might be available, I just have not found it yet, something like small circular leather patches of some kind. Any suggestions here would also be appreciated.

Thanks in advance and I will be sure to post up pics as soon as I can.

Chris

 

The immature me...
"...he reiterated that it originally had shrinkage and his wife did not like the way it looked..."

You may just need a recharge of the A/C system, that car is over ten years old. Some other people have needed further work for a fix though, and there are a few easier/cheaper fixes than hard/expensive ones.

Yes, the dash shrinkage is a problem for some of these cars, and if the one you're looking at was completely recovered, that is actually the best possible fix. Sucks it's having problems now though. Pictures would certainly help on this.

 

If the car sits in hot sun all day, it will take some time for all of the metal to cool down, this may impact how long it takes to cool down or there could be a problem with the AC, low Freon, compressor valve, leak, etc. If the car was sitting undercover or inside a garage, it would take no time at all to cool down.

Dash leather shrinkage will be accelerated by heat and sunlight and humidity. Part of the problem’s also in the way the leather’s attached in manufacture and can be mitigated to some degree by stapling the leather edges, particularly along the windscreen edge.

 

I have redone the dash in my car because I had the shrinkage (every time I hear shrinkage in my mind I yell I WAS IN THE POOL George Costanza like). It’s a bit of work but not awful!

Get the AC checked out. Check high and low side pressure, it may be low. If the leak is slow enough and the missing amount within say half a 12oz can of r134a, add the appropriate amount of refrigerant. If the refrigerant is low enough, evacuate, pull a vacuum on it and recharge with the right amount of refrigerant, pag oil and some UV dye. I’ve found a lot of used cars where people just overcharged systems or they just kept refilling never accounting for oil to keep from frying the compressor.

 

The condensers on the JLR vehicles (the aircon radiators) are made of cheese. I can gurantee yours will be leaking. If you do it yourself my preferred option is nose off, then you have good access, and from underneath remove everything and change the condenser. If not get the system re-gassed with dye put in it, then run it until it starts failing again and give it to a good independent, ask him to change the condenser - he will find the old one covered in die. If you are in the UK its about £600 including parts I think. Don't buy JLR, get an aftermarket (I got mine from SNG Barratt - apparently much better and half the price.
Put things in perspective- wife has a 3 year old Range Rover - guess what - its failing as well!

 

All good suggestions and the 1st I would do is put a set of gauges on the system and see what it tells you. Also the compressor runs all of the time and the freon flow is controlled by a valve in the compressor. This is a weak point in the system. Check the pressures both high and low. My 2012 cooled quickly at idle in the golf club parking lot under the sun. These systems should work efficiently. As for the leather stretching , yes there have been problems. Better to show us a picture and let those who have had the problem chime in. Good luck

 

If you're seeing areas pulling away on the leather near the windshield, eventually it will pull all the way apart. Either you pull the dash and staple the leather on the edge up against the windshield and under the center speaker cover all the way around, or if the windshield is pulled an air stapler with a long nose should be able to do the trick without removing the dash. I had my dash removed to correct mine, but once it was out, the repair was so obvious that I realized and have suggested to others to simply have a windshield replacement company like Safelite, remove it then replace it after the repair is made. You can glue a small flat leather braid over the staples and nothing will show. Jaguar, in its infinite wisdom, did not staple the leather to the frame, thinking that an adhesive would stand up to 100F+ temperatures. That simply is not possible, and the only way to keep it from happening again is to anchor with staples.