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My car is a 1992 XJ40 3.2 "battery in boot" late production model VIN 670628 which I have owned since May 2008. This morning I was visiting the Wirral, not far from my Liverpool home. On my return trip, the car stalled at a set of lights as I attempted to move off . I was shocked to see the "petrol pump" low fuel symbol light up on the VCM and I am pretty sure the gauge simultaneously dropped to zero contents. Actual contents were just below one quarter and I had been planning to refuel on the way home. The car restarted immediately and within a minute the low fuel symbol had extinguised and the gauge was back to its previous reading. This all happened just as I was about to enter the Mersey Tunnel which would have meant a tow out! I found a garage and fully filled the tank, taking no chances. I carefully noted how much fuel this took - just over 50 litres. For the record, the gauge was now showing just under the full mark. But with the Jag's 89 litre tank, clearly she had not been anywhere near empty! I got home without further incident. Close to home I called in at another filling station just to check that the tank really was full which it was - it would only take about an extra litre. She had a new fuel filter in 2008. So did the car "think" that it was out of petrol this morning when it clearly was not? There is also a warning note in the Haynes manual: "Some 1994 models may be equipped with faulty fuel level sensor units. A tight float rod bushing may cause the float to stick and indicate high fuel levels while the tank is almost empty." I do not want the car cutting out mysteriously again - can anyone shed any light on this problem, please?
Clive.

this has all the hall marks of a failing fuel pump sadly

on late Xj40 they tend to fail at about 100-120K miles, pig of a job to change, tank out, and the fuel lines will be corroded and are NLA from Jag last time I looked

With the tank full the pump is fully submerged in fuel which keeps it cool, as the level falls the pump is exposed and will run hot and fail, leave the car a while and it will fire up again and run until the pump gets hot or you refull with fuel

The car tend sto fail with about a quarter of a tank or 150 miles on the VCM range

The problem will get worse and not go away


however there is one bit of good news before you go ripping the tank out, whip the spare wheel, tools, jack and boot back board out, you will see the wiring from the pump at the top of the tank, trace this back to a large black plug in the loom about 18 inches from the tank, this is the connector that allows the loom to be split fro taking the tank out, pull this apart and check for burning on the connections, if you see anyting but white plastic inside the black outer casing, cut it out and remake the connection, this may JUST cure your problem

hope this helps, let us know how you get on

Many thanks indeed for your long and detailed reply. It is particularly worrying to learn that the pump may now be NLA. So I obtained a part number from the pump in question from the Jaguar Classic Spares website - EBC11365. But then I found it as still in stock under this part number at one of my regular parts suppliers namely British Parts UK - www.britishparts.co.uk. It is listed as one of the pump variants for the XJ40 model. I will swiftly move to buy one if you could be so good as to verify that we are indeed talking about the right item. The alternatives seem pretty grim - scrapping the car being one! Hence my haste to bag a spare pump without delay. Also, just to clarify, would the pump failing cause the fuel gauge to suddenly drop to zero/display "low fuel" on the VCM?
Many thanks for your reply once more.

I don't believe that the pump and low fuel indication are linked, but the symptom you describe does fit with the two faults I have described, check the pump connections FIRST, easy and will take you 15 minutes maximum, you may drop lucky and find this to be the cause

the part number you quote is correct for cars to vin 679206, after that yiu need NBD6013AA, however i suspect these two to be the same!!

If you indeed decide to go for this, changing them is not for the fainthearted, the tank will have to come out, not easy, the tank has to be drained from underneath, the drain plug is probably the most inaccessable thing on a 40, apart from the fuel line connections at the base of the tank, these also need to be removed, along with the filler unit, then the tank can be withdrawn, it needs to come up and back, a tight fit at best, then the top of the tank is undone, the pump cannister is accessed through a hole big enough for one hand when you need two!!, it is held onto the tank by four clamps into a rubber mounting , this mounting needs to be released from the tank, the two pipes to the pump cannister undone and put aside, the wiring released, then withdraw the cannister through the access hole which still seems to small, but it will come through. You then need to open up the cannister and remove the old pump, rebuild with the new, and as they thet always say, re-assembly is the reverse procedure

This is one of the two jobs on a 40 I ALWAYS give to someone else to do, i'm happy to rip a tank and pump out if the car is scrap, but I just cut the fuel line drag it into the boot and then drain it

Be glad it's not a 12 cylinder car, these have twin pumps in the same tank and are even worse to do
I have one seconhand pump complete with cannister here, pm me if you want it before it goes on ebay

Once more thank you for your detailed reply. By the way, I should have given the car's mileage which is 142K so probably well into the "danger zone" for fuel pump failure! I will buy one of those pumps anyway, especially if they may be going out of production soon and as I plan to keep the car long term. I am a bit limited physically now as to what I can do on cars. So I plan to empty/strip out the boot to expose the tank and check that connector block as you recommend. Fortunately I have a very good independent garage to do my heavy work nowadays who are not phased by whatever horrendous job I saddle them with - thank goodness! Having the boot emptied and stripped will obviously simplify their task somewhat if pump replacement is required. I will certainly also print out your instructions for them - more information is always better than less. Finally, apart from the pump itself, should I be ordering any other bits for the garage to be able do this job?

best of luck with this, it is always difficult to diagnose from afar, but do check these connectors first, it could save a lot of hassle

as for other parts , you may well need fuel feed and return pipes, these were NLA last time I looked and are also quite specific part nos for certain vin ranges, you may end up having to get some made up my someone like Pirtek, but i'm sure your local guys will be on top of the job

keep us posted as to how you get on

Thanks for that. But I just need to clear up something. Re-checking the Classic Jaguar parts website (www.jaguarclassicparts.com) the EBC11365 pump actually shown as being for "LEADED" cars within my car's VIN range i.e. 667829-708757. (My car is 670628 but of course unleaded fuel. I simply missed this "leaded" business earlier - call it panic blindness!) Whereas the same Jaguar website quotes NMD6013AA as the "pump module" for UNLEADED cars in my car's VIN range. Jaguar price for the complete NMD6013AA pump module is £395.00 and currently available. I Googled the part number and several independent parts suppliers are selling the bare NMD6013AA pump for £75-£150 range. The weird thing is that more than one of the independents is quoting the NMD6013AA as being for later cars than mine i.e. "JAGUAR XJ40 - XJ6 3.2 / 4.0 FROM VIN 679207" which concurs with what you said above. I have already ordered the EBC11365 from British Parts UK but they also stock the NMD6013AA pump. Sorry about this but what do you think - should I change my order to the "unleaded" NMD6013AA ?

personally I think you will be fine with what you have ordered, others may have a different opinion

that said if you want to be 100% cahnge the order, but I have sold dozens of these secondhand, never checked which ones they are, and never had a complaint yet!

A progress report and more advice, please. As well as the new fuel pump, I was able to get the two internal rubber hoses (which attach to the pump and are "crook" shaped.) I got them direct from Jaguar Classic Parts using the part number for the hoses from a XJ12 of the same era i.e. EBC4679 as the original item was showing as NLA and they look identical. Yesterday the car went into my local garage for the job. I know them very well there and Mike the fitter later called me and asked me to come in to look at the car. He had a set of your notes and with the car on the ramp, we reckoned that the old fuel lines were probably corroded solidly onto the two tank outlets and could well break off, taking the tank fittings with them, if any attempt was made to remove them. Access is, as you said, abyssmal. And the drain plug is pretty useless (assuming you could actually get a spanner onto it) as it would dump the tank contents all over the rear subframe creating a serious fire hazard in the garage. So our plan now is to chop the old fuel lines and "rip the tank out", regarding it as expendable. I have already bought a good s/h tank on Ebay for £30 and also one of the two fuel line hoses, basically to use as a pattern for Pirtek. As far as I can tell these two fuel line hoses (the "short" one to the filter and "long" to the steel pipe) are also NLA. Will the tank drain when the lines are chopped or do these connect internally to the pump? As soon as I have had two new fuel line hoses made, we aim to try again!

Hi
How did you get on with this? I'm having a similar set of symptoms with a 1993 Sovereign, and have read your post with interest.