Classic Cars Magazine

[steveww]

This month's Classic Car magazine has a nice feature comparing the E Type, XJS and XK8.

[ptjs1]

Steve,

Not sure how you saw the mag, it wasn't due out until tomorrow! It's my XJS in the magazine, Mike Horlor's XK8 and the original V12 Road Test E-Type, now owned by the UK Head of Ford (I think). The photoshoot was done in November at Jaguar's testing ground. I haven't seen the editorial yet so don't know whether they said anything nasty about my car!

I was not allowed to write anything in our mag until it had been published in Classic Cars, so I'll be writing an article for the mag next month. I'm off to the newsagents now!

Paul

[steveww]

I have a few classic mags on subscription so I guess I get them before they hit the shelves in WH Smith

[PaulE]

For ptjs1 - your car looks good in the mag and does not attract any adverse comment. There is the usual reference to AJ6 engined cars being prone to head gasket failure and it rather grates on me, having been a sufferer, that this comment is so widely bandied about and is mentioned rather casually as if a head gasket failure is no big deal and easily fixed. If you are a home mechanic it may well be, but for the rest of us we will be facing an unplanned bill around £800 . (That's round here where labour rates are about £40 per hour.) The head needed skimming and that cost £200 (included). Does the AJ16 not suffer from this and do you know why the AJ6 does? The write-up also goes on to repeat the other often quoted comment about the engine being good for a vast mileage. I read that it was built to be well on top of the job just in case it was ever needed to function as a diesel when the comp ratio would be much higher, so what went wrong? Any clues? Paul.

[ptjs1]

Paul,

Tks for the comments about my car. The article was managed and written by Nigel Boothman who is well respected in the Classic Car press and is well known in Practical Classic, Classic Cars etc. I've got a lot of time for Nigel and trust him not to rubbish an owners car. I get contacted a lot to provide cars for photoshoots, articles etc. That's just one of the reasons why we keep banging on about having accurate information for cars in the club register, plus photos, as magazines are very specific about what they want. This time they just happened to want an AJ16-engined Sapphire Convertible from 1994-95. So we offered my car (+ Mike Horlor's Silver XK8).

As regards the AJ16 engine; I think the word "Bullet-proof" is more than just apocryphal. Many specialists talk about seeing cars with 200k, 300k even 400k on the engines. It's also why you don't tend to see many of the engines broken up as they just don't seem to wear out before the rest of the car. The bottom end of the engine is supposed to be particularly strong, perhaps because the slant-6 concept was initiated by cutting a V12 in half such that there could be commonality of components and tooling.

Having said that, we do hear about occasional head gasket failure on both AJ6 & AJ16 engines and I guess that's been a particularly painful experience for yourself. AJ16s do seem much less prone to it which might be for a number of reasons - improved ignition circuitry & fuelling being one of them.

Talking from a position of relative ignorance but having chatted to a few specialists, there doesn't seem to be an absolutely definitive answer as to why this happens. Common thinking seems to be that, if it happens, it's primarily caused by poor coolant maintenance. This can cause two problems; sludging at the back end of the cylinder head leading to heat transference disparities, and hotspots occurring in the cylinder head. This eventually causes the gasket to burn through in places. The other thought is that infrequent changes of the fuel filter causes a lean mixture which is also thought to be one of the contributory causes of the exhaust manifolds cracking.

That's just my view. I'm sure others will have opinions.

Paul

[Telsmoneypit]

PaulE, £200 for a head skim? Outrageous!! My AJ6 head was skimmed by Listers (yes, THAT Listers) for £70 and I have no problems with the HG since.
I will concede that a HG job on an AJ6 is a wallet depleting experience though...
I did all the work (apart from the skim) myself but it still cost me the best part of £400 in parts.

Tel

[PaulE]

The £200 was for a full head refurb. Does that sound more reasonable?

[Telsmoneypit]

Skim. new valve springs and shims?

£200?

Bargain