Have I done the right thing???

Morning all!

Only had the RR (1999 2.5DT) for 2 weeks and already have a problem!

Had planned to go away for the weekend in the caravan using the RR for towing. I had checked and topped up oil and water etc. and went to pick up the caravan from storage. She towed like a dream the 20miles from storage to home, or virtually. One mile from home I suddenly lost power and she over heated very very quickly. I pulled over and let her cool down for a while. She started fine and was sitting just above half way on the temp gauge. I only got another 500 yds and the temperature began to rocket again so pulled over and called Green Flag.

The guy who came out was very helpful (Freelander owner) took a look and diagnosed a thermostat problem. As you look in to the engine bay, the right hand side radiator pipe was heating up and felt a little firm, however the lefthand pipe was cold and soft. He said he had seen problems like this before, was probably the thermostat (said didnt look like a dreaded head problem), but was too big a job to do at the roadside. He reckoned just to remove the thermostat and it should cure the issue along with a good cooling flush. Since I was meant to be going away in a couople of hours (didn't want to disappoint the kids), I got them to tow me the last mile home, parked up the RR and used the trusty (!) Citroen to tow with.

I have booked the car in to the garage tomorrow to have the thermostat removed and have a cooling flush, but have been reading different posts on here and not sure if i've done the right thing now.

My concerns are:

Has the problem been diagnosed correctly. My temperature gauge normally sat at 12 o'clock, possibly a little above before the issue. People on here seem to have different readings, anywhere from the blue to just below 12 o'clock, so was mine running a little hot to begin with?

Should I actually replace the thermostat, however people have said they have even had the 'proper' ones fail on them. Would it not be better just to leave it out and avoid the risk again in the future.

Some people have said they did it themselves in 30 mins, others say it was a pig of a job, so i bottled on trying myself. The garage have quoted £110 for removal and £40 for the flush.

Many thanks in advance for any help.

Check the viscous cooling fan, common failure item. With the engine hot & idling, shove a rolled up newspaper into the blades (careful with your hands) If the fan stops it's no good. If the car has aircon, I can give you a mod to use the electric fans for engine cooling.

Hi Datatek

Thanks for the reply - I'm going to give it a try now. If it was the viscous fan, would this cause the two top pipes to be different temperatures too?

I saw mention of your mod with the A/C fans (yes its is fitted to mine) in some of the other posts and that would be great too if you could give me the details

I'll let you know how the fan goes soon.

Thanks again

John

Right then....

I have been out and performed the viscous fan check, and yes the fan worked fine, it didnt stop when I pushed rolled up newspaper into it.

I didn't take it too far from my door just in case, but a slight revision from my original post. I got the car up to temperature driving round the block and didn't seem to be over heating, but when i checked the hoses, this time it seemed to be the top hose on the right (looking from front of car) that was soft and empty and the left hand hose felt firmer and had water in. This is slightly different from Friday, although I was very stressed at the time! Does this suggest a blockage or a knackered thermostat then?

Thanks again

Altius said:

Right then....

I have been out and performed the viscous fan check, and yes the fan worked fine, it didnt stop when I pushed rolled up newspaper into it.

I didn't take it too far from my door just in case, but a slight revision from my original post. I got the car up to temperature driving round the block and didn't seem to be over heating, but when i checked the hoses, this time it seemed to be the top hose on the right (looking from front of car) that was soft and empty and the left hand hose felt firmer and had water in. This is slightly different from Friday, although I was very stressed at the time! Does this suggest a blockage or a knackered thermostat then?

Thanks again

Click to expand...

Take the cap off the expansion tank and run it up to temperature with the cap off, you should see a dribble of coolant coming from the little pipe from the top of the RAD. If nothing, could be air locked, but could also be the water pump or stat or even a blocked RAD. Because the entry and return pipes both go in at the top of the RAD they do silt up over time especially if the anti freeze is not changed regularly.
Time to take it to bits methinks and check the lot. Regular overheats will crack the cylinder head
If you want my aircon fans mod, PM me with an email address.

Ok then - the problem persists and now I'm worried its the head.

Had the local garage remove my thermostat (which i tested and was duff - only opened very slightly) and flush out the cooling system. Picked the car up yesterday and all seemed to be well - running very cool which is what I expected (hoped).

My wife went out today, drove around some and all seemed fine. Then suddenly BAM! It went in to overheat again. I just drove the car home from where it got dumped (I checked the radiator hoses before I started the car and they were soft and empty but the water level was fine), about 3-4 miles, and it was doing something strange. After a couple miles it started to heat up very quickly, heading for the red zone. The last stretch to the house is a slight uphill, so i put my foot down in an effort to get home before it boiled and guess what? The temperature dropped!! Got back to our estate and as I pootled through the estate it began to heat up again, so I went back out to the main road to try 'booting' it again, but this time it didnt work and the termpaerature rocketed.

I re-did the rolled up paper test on the viscous fan and that's fine. I checked the radiator hoses and they were both firm and full of water. The water system seems to be full of water, I cant see water in the oil or oil in the water.

I'm wondering could it just be a blockage, is the water pump on the way out or could this be a head issue now?

Many thanks in advance

John

The rad is a top flow system, I.e. the water enters at the top and exits at the top....

To prevent coolant just crossing across the top of the rad without circulating it there should be a baffle plate in the middle.....often times with older rads this baffle loosens and falls over.....to check is to take out rad, and use a marble to see if it rolls from onside to the next.....

Similarly top flow rads do get heavily silted up and the bottom....ensure you have even temp across the whole rad surface!!!

Water pumps are a know failure point on these engines. If you have a pump with a plastic impeller, they are known to break up or become detached form the pump shaft. Also check the rad as Ant says.

I had similar thing happen to me towing our van,up a motorway hill it went into red and blew top hose apart,as there was no hard shoulder I had to drive around 800yds with it overheating limping around 20mph thinking the engine was capput (167k) eventually pulled over and got it back home for my mechanic to find the water pump had collapsed (common) changed that and put a new rad and stat on for piece of mind and all good now..that was last August and still going and never go's past half.. Could be your problem? so well worth checking before spending money or expecting the worse like I thought...

wammers said:

Water pumps are a know failure point on these engines. If you have a pump with a plastic impeller, they are known to break up or become detached form the pump shaft. Also check the rad as Ant says.

Click to expand...

+1 on the wate pump and if you replace it get one with a metal impeller