Hi Tom,

Don't panic on the oil pressure front as i,ve just spotted this on jag
lovers...

The 'true reading' oil pressure transducer is notoriously
inaccurate. Jaguar now will only supply an oil pressure
switch to replace them (equivalent to an 'idiot light')
which gives a mid-gauge reading providing you have _any_ oil
pressure at all.

So there is hope yet, and I know in general the bottom end of these
engines is good for at least 200k miles.

As you say it runs well so that make sense.

The jag mechanic you mentioned doing a de-carb, or as we know it a de-
coke, on the engine could well have hit the nail on head. Deposits of
carbon and other nasty substances will build up in the combustion
chamber over the life of a vehicle. It gets on the valves especially
the exhaust ones and can cause flow and combustion tempurature/
pressure problems.

A good thing to do would be to have the head off and clean her up
after a compression test or leak down test as confermed or denied any
possible probs. Its not as bad a job as it looks though nearly and can
be done in the garage at home with the minimum of tools.

It just occured to me that you may want to flush your engine coolent
as these heads are prone to corrosion in the water ways if it is not
done every two years and replenished with at least 50% anti freeze. As
an aside the brake fluid also comes under the two year change rule,
though there is a special way to bleed the system on these cars,
explained in the haynes manual.

Hope this is not to confusing! Mr Smooth