Better not compare a
radiator cap which is in direct contact with colant with an
expansion tank cap which is a completely different thing with other purpose
I wasn't comparing it with anything, I was simply putting it up so peeps could see the internal works of a two way valve cap. It does say quite clearly that it is a Rad cap!
To my mind there would be nothing wrong with fitting a two way valved cap to an expansion tank at all. In fact, if it also was piped up to yet another tank with spare coolant in it, it would work the way that one was originally intended to work, i.e. the vacuum would suck spare coolant in from the expansion tank. Or "Reservoir" as it used to be called. You will note the connection on the left hand side of the drawing.
In fact the modern method, although simpler, is not, in many ways as good. I'd rather have one on my D2 to protect the tank and the rest of the coolant system from being overpressurised by the atmospheric pressure in the case of massive loss of coolant. Then you would not see flexible pipes collapsing!
I think they are just saving a bit of money, but then you'll tell me the modern expansion tank is a lot more complex than the simple expansion tank used to be.
I built a system with a plain rad cap on the rad, no valve at all then with a two way valved cap on top of the expansion tank. This was normal back in the seventies, see Morris Marina for instance! This worked constantly to allow pressure to escape but coolant to re-enter the system under vacuum when things cooled down. Not that different at all from the system on the TD5 except that it allowed vacuum to draw air back in. LR could have done it but they must have saved a few pennies on the single valve expansion tank cap.
You only have to work for 5 minutes on kit-cars to discover that cooling the blasted things is one of the major problems with them, especially the ones that are copies of 1930s Roadsters etc! some even use computer fans!