The picture frame

An E-Type's front frame assembly is three bolted components rather than one. Two tubular engine side frames run forward from the bulkhead and carry the engine. A folded sheet steel crossmember closes their front ends and ties them together. Ahead of that sits the bonnet support frame, the tubular trapeze that carries the radiator and the front of the bonnet. The middle item, the sheet steel crossmember, is what everyone calls the picture frame.

The name, and what it does not mean

Picture frame is trade and owner usage rather than factory nomenclature. Jaguar Land Rover Classic Parts catalogues the component as a front cross member assembly. Moss Motors and Terry's Jaguar Parts now print both the catalogue term and the nickname on the same listing, which is how the two have come to sit side by side. This archive has not seen a factory spare parts catalogue page using the words picture frame, and does not claim the factory used them.

Two loose usages are worth separating. The term is sometimes stretched to mean the whole front frame assembly. The xkedata guidance to car numbers places the number on the top of the engine picture frame next to the right front wheel, which is the correct place but invites the wider reading. Separately, the term is sometimes borrowed for the front bulkhead. It never means that. The bulkhead is the structure at the rear of the engine bay that the side frames bolt to. The picture frame is at the opposite end of them.

One point has since been settled. The archive originally recorded that it had not seen the words picture frame in any parts documentation. It has now seen them in Martin Robey's printed E-Type catalogue, which describes the component as PICTURE FRAME/CROSSMEMBER on the Series 1 plates and PICTURE FRAME CROSSMEMBER on the Series 2 plate. Martin Robey manufacture the part, so this is the nearest thing to an authoritative use of the term the archive has found. It is still not Jaguar's own spare parts book, so it does not establish factory usage, but it does move the term from spoken to documented.

What it carries

It is folded sheet metal rather than tube, and it looks slight for its job, but it is a loaded structural member. It takes front suspension and steering loads and feeds them into the side frames. Owners who have had one apart describe it as three layers of metal sandwiched together at the damper mount, with only the outermost layer continuing to the mount itself.

• The upper front damper mounts.
• The anti-roll bar attachment points, which is where cracks are most often reported, particularly on cars fitted with an uprated bar.
• The bonnet hinges, and through them the position of the bonnet.
• On Series 1 cars, a cooling fan bracket. The Series 2 replacement part is supplied without one.
• The car number, stamped into the upper face near the right hand front damper mount.

The car number

That last point matters more than its size suggests. The number stamped here is the identity of the car, and the identification plate calls it a car number rather than a chassis number. A car with no number in that place is most often a car whose frame has been replaced at some point, which is a common and legitimate repair, rather than a car with something to hide. Reputable makers will stamp a new frame only against documented proof of identity, and Martin Robey sells the stamping as a separate service on that basis.

The paperwork position in the United Kingdom has changed. Magneto reported that the DVLA clarified that replacement of the front frame assembly, including the picture frame, is not a modification requiring the allocation of a DVLA identity, and that the front frame assembly should not be treated as a chassis component. Hobby writing predating that clarification says the opposite, so an owner reading older advice will find a contradiction. Anyone acting on this should confirm the current DVLA position directly rather than rely on any archive, this one included.

Why so many are damaged

Jacking is the cause named most often in first hand accounts. The lower member is a channel section and was never intended to take a jack pad directly. The documented method places a hardwood strip across it to spread the load, quoted in owner discussion as roughly sixteen inches by one inch by one and an eighth. Without it the flanges deform, and restorers report frames arriving bent and wrinkled along the bottom from decades of jacks placed straight onto the channel.

Cracking is the second cause, and it appears in two places. One is near the anti-roll bar attachment. The other is at the right hand damper mount, where the layered construction means a fold across the bend leaves only the outer layer carrying load. Owners who have had that happen describe it as terminal for the frame rather than repairable, on the grounds that the fold has already destroyed its integrity.

Corrosion is real but less prominent in the record than the archive expected. The component sits low and forward, behind the nose and ahead of the front wheels, in full road spray, and first hand accounts of the front framework do record corrosion confined to its lowest sections. What this archive could not find is any source describing an enclosed cavity in the picture frame that traps water. Inspect it for both rust and distortion, but do not repeat the claim that it is a moisture trap as though it were established, because as far as this archive can tell it is not.

Bonnet fit, and the shim that should not be used

Because the hinges are carried here, the bonnet's position depends on this component. That makes shimming the picture frame itself a tempting cure for a bad bonnet gap, and it is the wrong one. Steering geometry depends in part on where the frame assembly sits, so moving it shifts the rack relative to the steering knuckles and alters the wishbone mounting points at the same time. The gap gets better and the car gets worse.

The adjustment belongs at the hinges. Shims on top of the hinges move the bonnet up and down, shims behind them move it forward and back, and the target is an even gap at the bulkhead and an even horizontal gap where the bonnet meets the sill. Owner discussion puts the practical limit of a shim stack at about seven sixteenths of an inch, or eleven millimetres, beyond which tightening the bolts starts to distort what they pass through.

Repair or replacement

Both are practised and both are defended. Damage confined to the bottom member is repaired, and one owner's account of reinforcing a bent lower rail with steel angle bedded in panel adhesive and tack welded along its length records the car subsequently passing concours judging without the repair being spotted. Damage at the damper mount and the car number area is the case for replacement, and the labour figures owners quote for that work run into three figures of hours.

The component is bolted rather than welded, so it is removable in principle. In practice it comes off with the engine out and with the bonnet support frame still attached to it, the two coming away as a unit. Two points recur in owners' assembly notes and are worth carrying into any such job. Nothing is tightened until every frame section and every bolt is on the car. And the suspension mounting holes are not symmetrical left to right, so components can be bolted on the wrong side and still look properly seated.

The part numbers

Most of these come from supplier catalogues. Several are now confirmed against Martin Robey's own printed E-Type parts catalogue, which lists Jaguar part numbers alongside Martin Robey's manufacturing codes across three plates: Series 1 3.8, Series 1 and 1.5 4.2, and Series 2. Where that catalogue confirms a number it is noted below. It is a manufacturer's catalogue rather than Jaguar's own spare parts book, so it is considerably better evidence than a web listing and still one step short of a primary factory source.

• Picture frame crossmember, Series 1 3.8 and Series 1 and 1.5 4.2: C15014. Martin Robey's printed catalogue gives their code MRE92 against Jaguar number C15014 on both the 3.8 plate and the 4.2 plate, described as PICTURE FRAME/CROSSMEMBER. Jaguar Land Rover Classic Parts, Moss Motors and Terry's Jaguar Parts all give C15014 as well. Martin Robey's own website, however, lists MRE92 against C25368. That is the same manufacturer's code carrying two different Jaguar numbers in two of that manufacturer's own publications, and it is worth stating plainly, because it means the confusion in circulation does not originate with owners repeating each other. The archive treats C15014 as the number, on the strength of the printed plate and three independent suppliers, and records C25368 as an unexplained discrepancy in Martin Robey's web listing rather than as an alternative part.
• Picture frame crossmember, Series 2: C28922, confirmed by the Series 2 plate against the description PICTURE FRAME CROSSMEMBER. The Series 2 part is supplied without the cooling fan bracket the Series 1 part carries.
• Engine side frames: C15029 right hand and C15030 left hand, confirmed on all three plates. The Series 1 3.8 plate prints this as C215029/30, which is a misprint for the same pair.
• Bonnet support frame: C20352, confirmed on all three plates under that description. Jaguar Land Rover Classic Parts catalogue the same number as a front frame sub-assembly, which is a genuine trap, because owners use the phrase front frames for the side frames instead.
• Bonnet hinge, aluminium: C19326, confirmed. The bolt securing the bonnet to the hinge is UFB137/18R, the nylon bush is C16804, four per car, and the steel bush is C19330.
• Hinge shims, which are the correct adjustment for bonnet fit: aluminium shims BD20950/1 at 0.036 inch and BD20950/2 at 0.128 inch, and steel shims BD18951 and BD18951/2. The thicknesses come from the Series 1 4.2 plate.
• Series 3 cars use a different design, in which the lower suspension fixings anchor into separate blocks fitted into the bottom rail. Martin Robey list C32385 and C35447 for it. The archive has only that one source, and the printed catalogue it holds does not cover Series 3.

Common questions