Stripped Naked

The last couple of days I have been working on my 1988 XJS.  The turn signals have not been working the last couple of times I have driven it so I decided to figure out what the problem was.  To begin with, I checked the fuse, not an easy one to get to either.  It was blown.  I replaced it and that one blew as soon as I turned on the ignition... sigh... I then got out the book to see what all was on that circuit.  The wiring diagram can be a bit confusing.  I tested a few things with no luck.  Curiously, the emergency flashers worked but the turn signals didn't, in checking though I discovered that my brake lights didn't work either.  At that point I solicited the help of my electrical engineer friend Stuart.
We started checking circuits and deciphering the wiring diagram. There are 3 or 4 different wiring diagrams for the XJS in the shop manual, covering different models.  There is also a big fold-out one in the Owner's Kit.  Turns out that the one that came with the car isn't exactly right.  Stuart located one in the shop manual that seemed to be right, at least as it applies to this particular circuit.

One relay is right under the 2 white plugs on the right.

This car has a number of relays and complex circuits so we had a lot to check.  One of the pertinent relays was under the center console, so we removed the console...  the wood veneer on the console was already cracked and chipping, when we took it out, it started falling off in big chunks.  This is a common problem with Jaguar wood after it's been exposed to sunlight for a long time.  The wood on the dash does the same thing.  Anyway, the relay under the console wasn't the culprit.  We explored further and finally decided to call it a night around 10:00.  I had a job in Mobile the next day so I wasn't able to do anything on it until the afternoon.  When I got home, Stuart was already here and had successfully found the problem.  I'm ashamed to say that it was something I had done accidentally.

You can see the squeezed insulation.

When I replaced the Throttle Position Sensor a few months ago, I had inadvertently pinched a wire on the adjacent kick-down switch as I tightened the throttle body down.  This caused the wire to short to ground and blow the fuse.  What a fluke. We replaced the fuse and everything is now working.

But by now the car's interior had been stripped of a lot of its interior pieces and I decided to not reinstall the chipped and split wood pieces.  I called Saul Chaplin at British Autowood and made arrangements to send the pieces to him for refinishing.  His work is amazing and probably exceeds the original quality of the Jaguar wood which was awesome in its own right. 

 
In a program about Jaguar manufacture that I once saw, the announcer stated that the "guys in the Jaguar woodworking shop were convinced that Jaguar built cars just so that they could show off their beautiful wood".  I kinda doubt that's the case, but the wood in a Jaguar (except the E-Type which has no wood in it) is well known for its beauty. I removed the rest of  the wood from the dash and the door panels and have them packaged and ready to send to Saul.  Hopefully I'll get back on the E-Type this weekend.

This morning I cut the yard...  SPRING IS HERE!!