stalling build up ...

Today I picked up the sanded and painted parts. A bit pricy but it's now done nicely. 

The reservoir tank apparantly had some small holes. I'm not going to repair it and buy a new one instead. So that was money wasted on sanding/primer. Thinking about it; likely it explains why underneath there was a layer of surface rust on the chassis:

For the sanding and spraying the rubbers of the fan were removed. I only realized that when I was back in the garage and wanted to mount the fan:

So I got in contact with him to see if he still had them. He claimed they were dried out and would check on monday if he still had them. Else I need to find new ones … sigh.

Besides that I could not continue in any case. Earlier this week I checked with SNG Barrat regarding the reinforced hose kit that was suppose to arrive mid January. Turns out they will not arrive untill mid March. Sigh!  So I cancelled the order and searched for alternatives. On Ebay I found them but these were located in Hongkong and about the same price. But also with potential very long lead times. Then I found one kit in the USA. But when checking they charged 75 US dollar shipping costs. No way. Eventually I found one in the UK and despite being on stock it turned out the next day this was not the case. They would however arrive within 10 days. Sigh! Let's see.

And one more thing I need to look into is this aircopump sensor connector. Which is brittle and partly disintegrated

So I need to search for that as well. In fact when fiddling around the other end of the cable snapped at the other connector. Hopefully something is available.

Airco Pump / Spark Plugs / Belts and Fan build up

http://erwinxjs.blogspot.com/2019/01/aircopump-harrison-a6-spark-plugs.html

So, here we are again. Although I was fairly happy last time with the aircopump supplier I have to say I got slightly annoyed by them. Reason being is the lack of response on my request to get the pump sorted out due to the different bolt thread used. I left them voicemail, email and what's app messages which simply did not got responded on. When I called their main number it got diverted to a mobile number. Which was a different number which I previously used to send him a whatsapp message. So when I whatsapp'd him I finally got a response back late in the evening. I was told to ship both pumps back so they could remount the backside. But the frontside also used different threading and I was told they would fix that as well. As I did not fancy to pay twice expensive shipping cost and the return of one I searched at another DIY shop with a more assorted bolt/nuts department. So I found the bolts with finer thread. But when trying today it still appeared to be a different size though, sigh! So I figured to remount the backside myself and fix the front screws. Not sure what to expect I obviously first dismantled the backside of the seized aircopump.

This went fairly easy and no surprising (nasty) things happened or became visible.

I noticed these typical (3) drill holes in the centre - not sure why that was done?

But since all looked good I went ahead and dismantled the refurbished pump. This was one was properly oiled and with a new seal:

 To my surprise this one had also the typical (3) drill holes in the centre:

In any case, I simply could place the cover backside with the proper threadings onto the revised pump. As for the front screws I simply forced them which worked out quite well. That threading was somehow not that fine but still slightly different. It only required slight force to adapt them. Glad that is sorted now!

And two decals that were on the old pump for the records. I only now noticed the remark regarding the metric threads for the mounting holes on the Original decal:

Still I had those 2 seized spark plugs to sort out as well before I could place the pump. Previously I used WD40 and them soaked. This time around I used penetration oil (kruipolie) which should be better. Although I doubt if it had any effect (don't think so). Effectively they came out using strong force. On the below you can see the threading just survived but it shows how stuck the lower part must have been. A pitty I don't have a good camera to make it more visible

In any case, the new ones all went in fine. Glad that's sorted as well. The remaining 6 ones will be done a different time. Likely that will require some work as well! To start with some dismantling to reach them. Who designed this!?

Now with the aircopump mounted I finally could fit all the belts and properly adjust and tension them.

And yes, I used all new Original Jaguar belts (4x), no immitation:

And last but not least I did mount the shiny yellow fan:

Nice to see it's slowly coming together again. I'm still awaiting the back order for all the new hoses. Maybe it will come next week. Hopefully the other paintwork is finished as well. Let's see.

Sandblasted parts

http://erwinxjs.blogspot.com/2018/12/parts-sanding-spraying.html

Well, today I got a call from the sander/painter. Bad news, when sanding the reservoir tank it revealled tiny holes which requires welding. Nice, another task to be fixed. He nevertheless ground painted it to stop any aditional rusting. 

Nice connections visible:

Rust protection  2k PPG epoxy primer  :

Aircopump Harrison A6 & Spark plugs replacement

Long story short, yesterday a revised aircopump was delivered at home. I was very happy with this service (company: www.aircoherstelservice.nl). The price was € 286,- with 2 year waranty, so a good deal in my opinion.

And today I was looking forward to continue my build up. The old one I could return once completed. It still had some hoses connected to it. Turns out these were very easily mounted, but I'm glad I still had the aircopump with me.

When mounting the hoses on the revised pump I found out by surprise the main bolt did not fit. In fact all the other mounting bolts did not fit either.

Turns out the threading of the revised aircopump was slightly different and using a finer thread:

The bolts used are having a common regular thread. So I'm unsure why the revised pump is using different finer threading. Clearly I'm not going to mess around with it. So I will seek contact with them in order to solve it.

So this meant I still could replace the spark plugs today (which had to be done prior to placing the pump). I had them double checked to be sure they are the right ones, and they are.

The first 4 spark plugs went ok and came out fairly easy. The next 2 however felt likely to be stuck. Although with force I could move them a tiny bit it did not felt right. So I stopped to avoid damage. I have them now soaked with WD40 hoping that will do the trick.

The other 6 spark plugs behind the other side of the distributor cap seems to be pretty difficult to reach as well. But I leave them for now until the front 6 six are all done. Hopefully no nasty surprises.

Fan cleaning

Well, I'm still waiting for some parts to be delivered by SNG Barratt. I'm also waiting for some parts to be sanded and painted. And more annoying, I'm awaiting for the airco shop to open up. Looks like they took off this entire week as well. I really hope I can source one next week so I can continue to build up. But I'm busy enough with firming up the garage. All lights are now finished and I'm now tidying up other electra. As I wanted to focus on something different I took to the effort to clean the fan. It's quite dirty but with help of WD40 and some clothing it is easily removed. See below a snapshot of a partial cleaned fan. Nice to see the bright yellow again. I quite like it.

Doug DuMuro : The Jaguar XJS V12 Is the Cheapest V12 Sports Car On Earth

Parts sanding & spraying

Last saturday I brought some parts away to get these properly sanded and resprayed. As you can see these items are in a very poor state. I have no intention to make my car in a concour state but still like to get it nicely put together. Besides these parts are very visible in the engine bay. Hence I would like to have this professionally done rather than doing a bit of sanding myself and spraying with a can.

I do happen to know a company nearby who will get this done: https://www.vocor.nl/ They are only a 5 min drive from where my car is located. When bringing these parts they were interested for which car it was. Once I told them it was for a XJS they were quite enthustiac. It turns out they had some Jags in their workshop so I got a little tour. Nice!

I still wasn't sure what kind of black paint had to be applied; matt, satin or gloss. So for this I made a FB posting and got some interesting feedback:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/4185237245/permalink/10156878779562246/

So all parts will become black with satin finish. Only the bleedpipe will be done in grey satin. Due to the current workload it will take them up about 2 weeks. Which is fine because I still need to get my new waterhoses. Plus I hope to source a refurbished aircopump meanwhile ...

Veikl : the biggest online archive of automobile documents

Another nice online vault with cool car documents, including the XJS:

https://www.veikl.com/documents/jaguar/xjs?Page=1&PageSize=25&Sort=2

Auto Classics : Jaguar XJS Buying Guide

Another buying guide:

https://www.autoclassics.com/posts/buyer-guides/jaguar-xjs-buying-guide

I read this interesting remark in this article:

"The smoother Model 400 three-speed General Motors unit (fitted from 1977) and four-speed GM400 (from 1993-on) can often produce a knocking noise from the gearbox mount, a common problem after the spring holding the gearbox in place collapses. "

Perhaps it's the same issue "knocking noise" I'm hearing as well? I tend to believe it might be related to the U-joints:

https://erwinxjs.blogspot.com/2017/04/u-joint-diagnostics-propshaft-xjs.html

https://erwinxjs.blogspot.com/2017/04/u-joints-propshaft-replacement-attempt_29.html

Clearly I first need to build up the car before looking into this again, sigh.

Smooth

Thought this was a funny advert - being Dutch after all. It's only a wink to Jaguar - and not XJS related. Have to admit, I like this Daf Coupe though. Italian design (Michelotti) And the transmission is worldfamous. And recently I found out that one of the DAF co-founders was once a Ferrari 400 Automatic owner as well (http://erwin400.blogspot.com/2018/11/for-sale-nl-ferrari-400-automatic.html).