AliKelman

Dave - many thanks for the plastic part and thanks for sending me four of them. They arrived today, I trimmed one of them down so it could fit into the channel without dismantling the car (!) and it now looks perfect again. Kind Regards Alistair

Looking forward to receiving the items. The Jag is lovely and I am trying to keep it that way. Ali

Thanks - I haven't been able to find this part anywhere.

Thanks, Joe but I don't want the Roof Rail Finisher Cap. I want the plastic bit which goes inside the channel which the top of the Roof Rail Finisher Cap (the part with the lip at right angles) clicks against. The bottom of the Roof Rail Finisher Cap has a tongue which fits into a different plastic bit in the channel. This is present in my Jag. It is the plastic bit in the channel for the other end of the Roof Rail Finisher Cap which is missing on my Jag. Maybe it was dislodged in a car wash. regards Alistair

Thanks - I've temporarily put a bit of sponge in the channel to act as a kind of spring pushing the tiny rectangular cover up so that it rests level with the roof line. The plastic clip in the channel would be far better. Regards Alistair

I need the connector that this part works against. The depressed part is Jaguar X-Type Saloon Roof Rail Finisher Cap C2S20575XXX - See more at: http://www.xjkltd.co.uk/jaguar-x-type-saloon-roof-rail-finisher-cap-c2s20575xxx/#sthash.IwpSqXm8.dpuf

I've just spotted that one of the four protective covers for a roof bar/rack is depressed. The reason it is depressed is that the plastic clip it is designed to clip against is missing. So I need to get a replacement plastic socket for it to connect with. Any ideas? I'll try and upload some pictures shortly. Alistair

Thanks. Part 2 of the video establishes that it should not be a fuel pump fault because a V6 has two stoichiometric codes, one for each bank of cylinders. Since I was only getting a single code fault this would indicate that it was not a fuel pump fault. I'm going to top it up with Shell V-Power this afternoon - I used about four gallons of petrol yesterday. Let's see if it runs any better. Alistair

Thanks. What I think has happened is that the EPC in the Jaguar is making a series of measurements and calculations based upon other sensors including a knock sensor. Controlling fuel delivery and the ignition timing are high on the microprocessor's priority list. The microprocessor dictates the opening and closing cycle (pulse) of the fuel injectors, effectively regulating the air/fuel mixture ratio when making minute timing adjustments thousands of times a second. Using LPG which has a RON equivalent of over 100 has meant that I need to have petrol which is between RON 98 to RON 100 to keep the EPG within its parameters. BP Ultimate is only RON 97 but it used to be RON 98 prior to its reformulation. The entry in Wikipedia regarding Shell V-Power suggests that I may well be onto something: Alistair

I am wondering whether my 2004 x-type 2.1 v6 is particularly sensitive to BP Ultimate in its new formulation and whether I should stick to Shell V-Power. As I mentioned previously my Jaguar is an LPG conversion. Originally, just after buying it I filled it with a bit of supermarket 95 octane petrol and gave it a full tank of LPG. It ran OK at first but then the engine appeared to misfire slightly, then the engine management light came on and stayed on. I filled the tank to the brim with Shell V-Power petrol - the premium petrol and continued running on this. The misfiring greatly lessened. My garage reset the engine management light and all seemed well - for a bit. I then found that there was a Valve Saver tank under the bonnet which was empty. So I stopped running the car on LPG while I obtained some JLM Valve Saver Fluid and refilled the car with BP 97 octane Ultimate petrol. The JLM Valve Saver Fluid arrived and I refilled the Valve Saver tank. All appeared to be well - at first. I also bought my own code reader so that I could reset error codes without going back to the garage. Then when driving around on LPG the engine appeared to misfire and the engine management light came on. Using the code reader I reset it. I ran the car for a bit on petrol alone and all seemed to be OK ... until there was a slight misfire and the engine management light came on again. I reset it and ran it back home. On a 50 mile return journey on petrol alone the engine management light did not reappear. But the engine when running on 97 octane BP Ultimate petrol does not sound as smooth as it does when running on 98 octane Shell V-Power petrol. Now what I am wondering is whether the Jaguar X-Type has a learning ECU which adapts the engine to use higher octane fuel. The other potential issue is that BP Ultimate now contains a "new engine-cleaning additive pack" Those with long memories will recall the launch of Formula Shell as similar designer fuel in 1986. In a small number of cases the fuel was implicated in the burning out of inlet valves on car engines and Shell withdrew it in the same year. BP claims to have tested its new Ultimate in a wide variety of applications, including older engines and says it is safe for all including the new generation of small-capacity turbocharged petrol engines as well as supercharged, Miller cycle and Atkinson cycle engines. But frankly, I don't trust BP. Thoughts? Honest John in the Telegraph when asked about Shell V-Power and Tesco Momentum said "Put it this way, I use nothing else apart from Shell V-Power Nitro plus petrol or diesel and get the best possible performance from my engines, best possible fuel economy and no fuel system problems like the problems readers get when they run their cars on the cheapest fuels."

Hi David, In respect of a SatNav I would recommend you do what I have done. I had a Garmin Nuvi 2545 from my previous car. I got a stick on plate from Halfords to go in the centre of the dashboard. http://www.halfords.com/technology/sat-nav/sat-nav-accessories/halfords-sat-nav-mounting-disc Then the standard sucker mount for the Garmin Nuvi sits on this plate. I got Halfords to wire a Garmin charger unit into the fuse box for their standard £35 fee. The SatNav now sits in the centre of the dashboard and works perfectly. It is actually a better place for it than in the middle of the console. This type of SatNav installation is future-proof since you can swap out one Garmin for a replacement unit with better features but still using the old power supply and lead. Thus I am thinking of replacing it with a Garmin DriveAssist unit which has a built in drive-cam. You can pair your phones with it too using Bluetooth for hands-free operation. Halfords sell the Garmin DriveAssist sucker mount too so this is a simple swap for the Garmin Nuvi sucker. http://www.halfords.com/technology/sat-nav/car-sat-nav/garmin-driveassist-51lmt-d-with-full-europe-maps-5-sat-nav By keeping the systems separate your Jaguar remains unhackable - rather different from modern cars. Alistair

Drive Safe is an App that makes it safe to have an Android mobile phone in a car. It auto-senses when you are in a car that is moving. Once movement is detected it forwards all incoming voice calls to voicemail and auto-responds to all text messages with a message to say that you are driving and cannot respond at this time. Why is auto-sense better than speaking on the phone on ‘hands-free’ ? The answer is in a single word - SAFETY. In 2016 research at the University of Sussex established that drivers using a hands-free phone are just as distracted as those using holding it in their hands. Scientists found that phone conversations can cause the driver to visually imagine what they are talking about using a part of the brain that is normally used to watch the road. The study involved 20 male and 40 female volunteers who took part in video tests while sitting in a car seat behind a steering wheel. One group of volunteers were allowed to "drive" undistracted while another two heard a male voice from a loudspeaker 3ft (0.9m) away. Those who were distracted by the voice engaging them in conversation took just under a second longer to respond to events, such as a pedestrian stepping off the pavement, an oncoming car on the wrong side of the road or an unexpected vehicle parked at a junction. The study showed that asking a simple question - such as, "where did you leave the blue file?"- during phone conversations could mean a driver concentrates on an area four times smaller than normal, because their brain is imagining the room where they left the file, instead of checking for hazards in front of them. Other studies have suggested that phone conversations in a car are more off-putting than listening to the radio or talking to a passenger, A passenger chatting in a car is less distracting, the researchers argue, because both stop talking when the driver needs to concentrate. I know that this is true from my own experiences. About twenty years ago I was driving home down a narrow side street. The road ahead was clear and I was approaching a junction. Suddenly, without any warning, a young child darted out from between two parked cars and appeared before the front of my car. I braked but it was not enough - the front of my car touched the child who landed on the bonnet and then fell in the road in front of me. The child was slightly bruised but was otherwise unhurt - and very shocked. The child’s mother who came out of her house was angry with me for hitting her child. The police were called and breathalysed me, as was (and is) standard procedure. I had not been drinking. I think I must have been driving at around 5 mph when I hit the child. Everyone could see that this was a completely blameless accident and I had braked the instant I became aware of the child who was completely obscured by the parked cars. But a one-second delay in my braking could have led to serious injuries to the child. I think back to this incident almost every time I get into a car to drive it. If I had been talking on a phone when I saw the child and braked … it does not bear thinking about. This is the beauty of Drive Safe. Drive Safe is available for Android. It was written by an Irish student, Andrew Irwin, who is trying to get people driving safely and is building his name as a cool App developer. To get the App for free after installing it and testing it out you just have to recommend it to one other person. It is simple and is not bloated with features and functions which add unnecessary complexity. With Auto-Start it just detects when I am on the move and stops me taking calls or answering texts. The law currently says drivers can use hands-free phones, sat navs and two-way radios, but if the police think the driver is distracted and not in control of the vehicle, they could get penalised. It might be useful not just for keeping drivers safe but also for helping kids with ADHD. Putting a phone into Drive Safe mode would allow a child to concentrate on what is happening around him when travelling, rather than just staring at the texts and phone calls arriving. It could even save lives as kids use their phones as they cycle without understanding the risks from traffic.

Now back from the garage and problem sorted. What appears to have happened is that the car had run low on petrol and only had 95 octane fuel in it. I filled it up with LPG which is equivalent to 110 octane. This confused the engine management sensor when it next started using petrol which caused the original misfire. By filling the tank up with 98 octane to make up a full tank everything started running smoothly. The engine management light had come on but was not flashing, to indicate a continuing problem - so it just had to be reset. Everything was and is working perfectly. So I am a happy bunny again. Next time I should be able to do a readout and reset with my generic fault code reader.

Now spoken to the garage - FM Motors (GB) Ltd at 824-826 Harrow Road, Wembley HO0 3EN - and they have immediately booked it in for this afternoon for me. Should be easy to sort out. More news later ...

Thanks Joe - This is a great help. Now ordered a generic fault code reader from Amazon - should get it tomorrow. INTEY OBDII Car Vehicle Fault Code Reader Auto Diagnostic Scan Tool, Read and Clear Error Codes for 2000 or later US, European and Asian OBD2 Protocol Vehicle

First long drive today and a problem - ending up in Limp Home mode As I explained it is a 2004 x-type 2.1 v6 which was converted to LPG. I had done about 20 miles since getting it - mainly in filling up with a bit of petrol and a full tank of LPG. Today the engine appeared to misfire slightly, then the engine management light came on and stayed on. I filled the tank to the brim with Shell V-Power petrol - the premium petrol and continued running on this. The misfiring greatly lessened. The tick over seems a bit high - 750 rpm? According to the drivers manual the engine management light means that the car needs specialist attention by a Jaguar dealer and the car is running on restricted power ( which I presume is a bit like a computer running its operating system in 'safe mode'. So tomorrow morning I go back to the dealer I bought the car from - FM Motors (GB) Ltd at 824-826 Harrow Road, Wembley HO0 3EN - to see what they have to say. I think it is something pretty minor - but am hoping for some guidance from JOC members. P.S. - I've joined JOC as a Premium Member today

Collected the Jaguar yesterday afternoon so these are my early impressions. First of all getting LPG fuel for it. I had anticipated that I would be able to get this from a local BP station which was listed as an LPG garage. But I quickly found out that ALL the BP stations around me have ceased selling LPG - although the topic has not been covered in the motoring press. I found an article from February 2016 which said "A spokesperson for BP told MMM that, "We have decided to remove LPG from some of our stations. As a retailer we have to review the goods and services we provide at our sites on a regular basis to make sure they are competitive and financially cost effective. LPG sales have continued to decline over the long term as manufacturers have stopped supplying LPG cars and the number of LPG cars reduces over time. As such we are taking an approach of removing LPG on a site-by-site basis from our company-operated sites when it would no longer be financially viable to continue. There are a further 900 BP branded forecourts in the UK are operated by third party operators (‘dealers’) who independently still have the option to include LPG pumps at their sites." LPG was originally supplied at petrol stations for cars as a potential alternative to diesel and unleaded but has fallen out of favour as the government moved to provide incentives to promote the use of cleaner, emission-free electric cars." Fortunately, I was able to locate an "Autogas" at Junction 3 of the M1 at Mill Hill. The "Autogas" pump is near Pump 17. But here I found the next problem. Putting LPG into a car using the hose is not quite as straightforward as filling with petrol. The gas hose in pressurized and has to be locked into the gas intake valve of the car. So the hose is at least double the diameter of a petrol pump hose and is covered by a type of chain mail mesh covering. It is heavy and the gas passing through it causes it to get cold. The videos on YouTube of ladies connecting their LPG cars to Autogas pumps are misleading - this is not a job for delicate hands. This piece from Fifth Gear in 2013 gives a fairly accurate analysis of LPG in cars. The body panel of my Jaguar tended to flex a bit as I connected the LPG nozzle - it is on the opposite side to the petrol filler. It took a bit of fiddling but I was able to connect OK. LPG at this Autogas station was £0.609 per litre with Unleaded Petrol selling for £1.19 per litre. My Jaguar had an 80 litre LPG tank and took 63.88 litres to fill it to capacity - the rest is protected for expansion. Total cost £38.90 Next, I tried out the ION Bluetooth cassette in the radio/cassette slot. I did not like the way it worked with my Bluetooth phone since I could not use the car's own controls to answer a call. It was pointless and dangerous having to take the phone out of a pocket and swipe it to answer a call whilst driving. So I took it back to the store (Maplin) and got a full refund. Instead, I bought for £3.99 from Amazon a "DigitNow! Car Cassette Adapter, Listen to your iPod or another audio device through your car's cassette player, with a 3.5mm headphone jack". This works just fine when playing back podcasts I have downloaded from BBC iPlayer Radio on my mobile phone or tablet. Sometimes the simplest solutions are the best since taking calls while driving is dangerous. Then this afternoon when loading the car up with various possessions I found in the boot that a previous owner had had the remote 6-CD facility installed as an option - so the car could take and control six CDs. Suddenly those old CDs which I had filed away became usable again. Tomorrow (Sunday) I will be taking the car out for its first long drive.

Thanks Peter most useful. I'm turning the fact that the car doesn't have Bluetooth from a negative feature to an asset. My wife took our current car, a Hyundai i20 out last Sunday on her own on the M40. When driving in the middle lane the clutch failed suddenly and the car became undrivable. She managed to get to the hard shoulder. Here she found that Bluetooth hung on to her phone even when she was out of the car trying to get away from the threat of an impact from the careering lorry traffic. Like me she finds driving and speaking on a phone very distracting and we tend not to do it for safety reasons. But now we have a second reason - having to turn off Bluetooth before using the phone in an emergency situation is simply not sensible. I am putting the app Drive Safe on her phone (and mine). This is from a young app developer in the Republic of Ireland. It senses when you are in a moving car, sends out a message to say you are driving and cannot take the call and does the same for texts. Only if someone calls three times in succession does the app allow the call to go through - realising that this is an emergency. Drive Safe coupled with the ION Bluetooth cassette in the radio/cassette slot should make the Jaguar a very safe place to drive in all conditions.

I've uploaded a copy of the X Type Owners Handbook which should be available for any Jaguar Owners Club members by clicking on the link. Its Publication Part No. JJM 10 02 20 901

Thanks Peter I'm going to be taking delivery of the car in about a week to ten days. But I took a look into its background. It currently has 74,000 miles on it with a fully stamped service book. The last service was in February 2016 at 68,322 miles. The LPG conversion was done on 22 March 2012 when the car had 45,425 miles on it. They installed an 80 litre tank so the LPG tank is bigger than the petrol tank. It sits at the back of the boot - when I get the car I will upload some photographs. The engine has run on LPG for about 27,500 miles - at 20mpg the saving was only about £750 by my reckoning. The LPG conversion cost £2,148.64 at Lloyd Ash Garages. So the previous owner's investment did not pay off - although I think that there are reports that these cars may run better on LPG than petrol.

I today, with my wife, put down the deposit on a grey Jaguar X-Type 2.1 V6 SE 4dr. We will be collecting it in a couple of week's time once we have sold our present runabout. It had been converted to LPG back in 2012 by its previous owner. It has 74,000 miles on it. The conversion was properly done and there is an entry for the car in the official LPG register so I should not have any problems in insuring it. I checked with my insurers, Direct Line, and they appear to have taken it in their stride - nothing frightening in the premium. The Jaguar we are buying is a front wheel drive vehicle - rather than the AWD car which launched the X-Type. It has a radio cassette unit in it but no Bluetooth. So I plan to add an ION Bluetooth Cassette adaptor so that I can take calls in the car. I currently have a rather more expensive Parrot system in our present run-about but I don't see the need to transfer this across. I will be transferring a small Garmin SatNav system to stick on the windscreen on the driver's side and plan to have this wired into the fuse box. I feel that this will give me the best of both worlds - an up-to-date SatNav with bluetooth and traffic warnings with a car stereo which cannot be hacked and which will still function as a hands-free telephone and media centre.