Raistlin

Couldn't see anything amiss with the covers on Gareth, even when the car was raised and we could look underneath properly.

One of the main bugbears for the diesel engined variant of the S-Type is brake servo failure characterised by normal braking in the short term but a sudden and scary hard pedal in long term braking due to the total exhaustion of vacuum caused by a leak in the servo's diaphragm / seals. Why am I mentioning this in the XF section? Well, it became apparent today that the later, 3.0L diesel variants of the XF use the same servo as the diesel engined S-Types, albeit a different part number and I was wondering if there was any developing history of this fault in the XF range of cars, or whether the problem, said to be caused by leakage from the master cylinder, has been recognised by Jaguar and rectified. Any input would be most welcome and most useful of course, because if the problem HAS been fixed then there is a way for S-Type diesel owners to avoid this sort of thing. Thank you

Having only just got The Princess back from having her sills sorted, the infamous S-Type hard brake pedal showed up again. Now, I had this problem a year ago and had the servo replaced. What happens is that the brakes operate normally in the short term but a prolonged application completely exhausts the vacuum, resulting in a sudden and scary hard brake pedal which requires many times the normal force to control the car. If you can imagine braking gently on the slip road having left a motorway and then, just as you expect the car to stop at the entrance to the roundabout, all braking effort seems to cease. Having experienced it before I was immediately able to understand what was required and apply much greater force to the brake pedal. If you'd had no experience you'd assume total brake failure. So, last time this happened to me the servo was replaced and the failed item clearly contained a small amount of liquid which shouldn't have been there, which is responsible for destroying the seals / diaphragm. Whether this is brake fluid from the master cylinder or oil from the vacuum pump was never established but conventional wisdom suggests the former. This is a well known fault with the Diesel engined variant of the S-Type and, indeed, examination of today's failed item confirmed the presence of fluid inside. A replacement servo will set you back £500 just for the part from Jaguar parts suppliers. Even second hand items can cost up to £200... IF you can find one. There was some good news however, in my case. Again, conventional wisdom has it that there is only one brake servo that will fit the diesel S-Type and indeed, last time this happened to me, I tried three different part numbers before bowing to the inevitable and getting a direct replacement. Denis spotted some information today on the 'net though which led us to believe that the 3.0L diesel variant of the Jaguar XF is equipped with the same servo. We located a suitable XF donor at a local breaker's yard and the guy at reception was so sceptical that he told us we could have the whole servo and master cylinder for £40, but with the caveat that no refund would be given when it (inevitably) didn't fit. indeed, when we asked the question of the tech people at the local Jaguar dealership, the response was, to say the least, negative. The donor car was, I believe, a 2011 vintage and the servo and master cylinder assembly looked for all the world as if it had just been provided brand new from Jaguar. Unfortunately for Denis, the car was in the second storey, as it were, of a three storey pile of cars and the vehicle below only had a roof, floor and one side, meaning a very precarious situation for the man with the spanners. We had applied some thought and took along the item removed from my car. After stripping the assembly from the XF, Denis successfully retro-fitted mine to the car, proving that it would fit. The mounting holes brake pipes and electrical connections were spot on and, sure enough, about an hour later, the servo and master cylinder were safely fitted to the Princess, which then required only minimal bleeding to ensure a firm brake pedal. Now, if the recurrent servo problems ARE caused by leaking brake fluid, which seems so, bearing in mind my car's recent history, then the new master cylinder and servo combined should solve the problem permanently. In fact, I'll be raising a thread elsewhere to see if this sort of brake problem is common on XF models. Hopefully not. For anybody interested, the part number for the servo is 8X23-2B195-BB and is found on the later XF models with the 3.0L diesel engine, not, counterintuitively, the 2.7L as fitted to the S-Type. I'm not saying that you'd get the same sort of bargain I got today but at least there are now two alternative and proven part numbers to choose from with the added bonus that the XF based servos will be that much newer. Once again, I am indebted to Denis, for his hard work and sheer knowledge of how these cars are put together, and also to his good lady, Stacey, who, once again had her day's plans turned upside down by suddenly losing her car to the cause as the only viable transport. In closing, if I might add a subjective observation, the new servo seems much more progressive and less harsh / sharp than the item it replaced, making The Princess even more regal in her progress

Jeff, I think Denis is still able to help with what you need. Perhaps a PM to him might be useful?

The sooner you get them off, the less will be any potential corrosion Adam. If I'd left mine until next year I think there wouldn't have been a happy ending. When Denis removed the sill covers for me he didn't break any clips although, being a plastic screw head, some of the lower ones will need replacing, even though you can't see them.

Adam, I got a second hand Throttle body from fleabay as mine was damaged (cracked) and repaired anyway. The MAP sensor was included. Denis then took quite a considerable time to clean it all out internally, ready for installation. The removal of the throttle body took about an hour as we were both a bit unsure as to whether the exhaust gas pipes to the throttle body were separate or continuous. In addition, the exhaust gas pipe clamps took a moment or two to work out. The exhaust gas pipes are, in fact, separate but they are very much handed and you need to make a note of their orientation, perhaps removing and cleaning only one at a time. There were various O rings involved but they all seemed in good condition so were re-used. There are other embuggerances (with acknowldgement to the late Sir Terry Pratchett) such as the coolant expansion bottle needing to be displaced and the outlets of the throttle body needed some persuasion to let go of the inlet manifolds. Having removed the throttle body, Denis set to work to remove the carbon deposits from withinh the exhaust gas pipes which was a horrible job and I suspect that a lesser man might have given up. However, he didn't give up and completed the decarbonisation. Having gained experience from dismantling, assembly seemed much quicker. Again, the the throttle body outlets needed a deal of coaxing to go back into the inlet manifolds. A test drive proved that the time and effort expended by Denis had been well worthwhile

An update. Thanks to Denis, my car's throttle body and MAP sensor were replaced today. The originals were gunked up to the eyeballs. As a result, the delayed throttle response has been sorted :)

A couple of months ago now, Denis and I decided to remove The Princess's sill covers in order to carry out any maintenance. The only problem was... there were no sills. What we did find though, was rust so terminal that it just fell into powder when touched. There was absolutely NO indication of this when the sill covers were fitted. Trust me, the shock of seeing that made me feel quite ill. There is a happy ending however. Denis put me in touch with a local garage proprietor called Richie who, he said, would be able to bring the car back from the brink of being so much scrap. Richie came and examined the driver's side sill and we agreed a price for him to do the work if I provided a pair of outer sills which I was able to obtain from fleabay for just under £200. Denis came up trumps, lending me his beloved S-Type so that I could remain mobile pro tempore, as it were. Just over a week ago, my car was deposited at Richie's garage and since then I've heard absolute horror stories about the full extent of the corrosion. My car was, quite literally, on the brink of being so much scrap, but for Richie's skill and determination. The job entailed cutting the rotten outer sills right out of the car as we had expected but unfortunately, the inner sills were rotten as well and indeed, the floor pan itself was in danger. Richie manufactured and fitted inner sills from scratch, ruthlessly cutting back the car's structure until there was good, solid metal to work outwards from. A job of a couple of days became a job lasting over a week, including Denis giving up his free time to assist Richie. Today, I got my Princess back having been converted from, Richie's words, "As rotten as a pear" to "As sound as a pound" He didn't even charge me any more than we had originally agreed although I suspect that he did at least twice as much work as he had originally anticipated. He finished the job off by stone chipping the outer sills with a sort of rubberised armour and then painting them and the door tread areas with OEM paint, blending it in so that there is no indication that the sill covers have even been off. The following photos give some indication of what has been achieved although, as you might imagine, these are only snapshots of the overall work done. The first shows a very small part of the complete inner sill which had to be fabricated from scratch. The second shows the outer sill cut back to remove all the rot and shows the initial state of the inner sill. The third shows how the outer sill was shaped to fit. Disregard the surface rust which will very soon not be there either! The fourth picture shows the outer sill in place complete with Stonechip rubberised armour. In the near future, the interior of the sills and other areas are going to benefit from a comprehensive waxoyling and the covers WILL be removed every year to check that all is well. I am, as you might imagine, one happy bunny tonight and at this point I would like to thank Richie and Mick for their skill and dedication. Further i would like to thank Denis, for providing his S-Type to keep me mobile, and Stacey, for putting up with the inconvenience of having one of the family cars missing for over a week... and also for the tea and sympathy on the day that we took the sill cover off initially. I was genuinely in shock. As a final thought, these S-Types are beautiful cars, but now it can be seen that no matter how well they are maintained mechanically, they can be reduced to mere scrap by the unseen menace of corrosion. In my car's case, an accident involving side impact on either side would almost certainly have been fatal as the car's structure had all the strength of wet tissue paper. Think on, boys and girls... time to get the sill covers off and see what, if anything, lurks beneath. When i think of how close my beautiful S-Type came to being scrapped... well, it doesn't bear thinking about. Richie's garage is called Prestige Motors and is located in the Stafford area. Anybody local.. or further afield for that matter, who has welding to be done, is welcome to contact him via me or Denis.

Went to get some fuel today from the local garage, only to find that it had gone up 3.5p per litre. Suspicious as I am, before filling up, I went and enquired about the sudden increase in cost. Guess what I was told? "It's gone up because we're coming out of Europe". I'll wait and get my fuel from Sainsburys tomorrow.

Welcome to the Jaguar Owners Club John. Hopefully we can be of further service to you. There is a lot of information and a gold mine of experience on this forum

Hi Alan, I'm not in the charging business, preferring to give back some of the help others on the forum have shown me. I'm sending you a PM with a possible solution

Hi Paul, Welcome to the Jaguar Owners Club.

If you do that, you will be in the same boat Alan. It makes absolutely no difference where the modules go on the D2B loop, but all terminals must be populated. If you choose to have one more than you need with a view to adding more in future, you must terminate the unpopulated connector with a loop. I've got a few and can let you have one if you want. D2B cables are easy to modify though. I tend to build a cable to suit the requirements from amongst a box of D2B cables and connectors :)

Regardless of year, do please check the sills under the covers. I know of a 2006 S-Type with completely rotted sills.

Epic

Yes, of course. I'm getting forgetful these days

Peter, I'd be pleased to do so but I wonder whether there might be a bias towards the S-Type?

Can I recommend that this website is worth a perusal? http://www.thelurch.com/

In common with all S-Types, if you can, get the sill covers off and check the sills for corrosion.

I forgot that you don't have powerfolds. One of the best toys in my view. I certainly wouldn't be able to get my car into the garage safely without them.

Enjoy it Gary Audio Connectivity Module next?

Phone OK Gary? Where did you put your Bluetooth aerial?

I was under the impression that you had just fitted Voice Gary

Do you get a message on the instrument cluster when you press the Voice button Gary? Presumably, your CDC worked prior to this retro-fit?

Yes Gary, it is also used in other applications but the connection you have there is exactly right for the S-Type. Does the CDC select and does the cartridge button work? What happens when you press the Voice button?