I hope my first post here doesn't start as badly as my first land rover purchase.
Ill try to keep it short (After writing the post I realize it didn't succeed with keeping it short).
I bought my first Land Rover Discovery I 300 TDi 1998 with about 220000km on the meter a few days ago in the south of Sweden, I myself live in the north part of Sweden. The car was owned by a older man and he had owned it since new. The car looked good, expect for more rust than I expected and some minor issues. It had just passed a inspection so it was drivable. It had been regularly serviced and engine ran fine. Did a quick check of the oil but nothing fancy before I started the drive home, a drive of approximate 1000 km. Now afterwards I realize it would have been a good thing to check coolant level which I forgot. It was later on the day and fairly cool outside so no need for AC. I had just done minor readup on the 300 TDi and knew I should look out for overheating so keept an eye on the engine temperature meter which stayed around center the whole trip.
After a while it started to get colder outside so I cranked up some heat and the fan, to my disappointment the heater only gave me semi warm air. But I managed and thought to myself that its probably an easy fix. Cruised at around 100-110 km/h most of the trip and everything went just fine all the way home. Calculated that during the trip the car consumed about 10 liter / 100km which I think is fairly ok. The next day I drove the car to my parents about a 200km drive. The last maybe 50 km I started the AC and the drive went just fine. Until I parked the car at my parents and it idled for maybe 3 minutes. I hear something pouring out underneath the car, so I shut the engine of popped the hood and saw that the header tank had split. Just felt like **** My Life. Didn't remember to check the temperature gauge before shutting the engine off. Did a quick Google and found some possible issues and was hoping for the pressure valve on the header cap. Started by ordering headertank and cap and replaced these.
When I removed the cap on the thermostat housing to fill it I noticed it was really wear out but it was sealing as it was suppose to. I filled up everything with the car parked up hill and then filmed with a thermal heat gun to check that the radiator was working and not clogged up. Looked good, still had trouble getting heat into the matrix but decided that maybe it only need to be driven a bit. It ran and no overheating after a drive but still no heat in the matrix, but it was warm so didn't bother with it. Really needed to move my trailer which was the reason I went to my parents house in the first place so hooked it up and turned on the AC and drove maybe 40km and decided to do a quick stop and inspection just to see that coolant was staying in the right places. To my disappointment I found coolant dripping from the header cap, drove 2 more kilometers to a friend and the engine was overheating.
Parked car in a steep up hill and took the cap of the thermostat housing and there was no coolant in there. Started filling it up and noticed it was slowly dropping and found a leak somewhere behind the water pump. Started Googling and the more I Googled I realized that the more I had ****ed up...
Heater matrix hoses are located high and because the coolant had dropped around the level of the waterpump no coolant had entered the matrix. But whats worse is that the matrix is connected in series with the head so probably no coolant running through the head. And if the coolant has been below the waterpump perhaps no coolant pumping around the engine. Temperature sensor is high so probably not submerged in coolant so always showing way to low... Now I really felt like FML. I came to the conclusion that most likely a leaking P-Gasket. Filled the coolant system up and quickly closed the cap on the thermostat housing got the heaters to work so no air stuck there anymore. Drove to my parents with the heating on so that I could notice if the cooling dropped to much. No problems. Parked the car and ordered new p gasket and some other stuff.
I will start by replacing P-Gasket and inspect waterpump. Later on I plan to replace headgasket and mill it.
Conclusion
But now I'm worried that I have made substantial damage to my engine running it for a long period with coolant low? I would assume that I have been driving it at least 1300km with low coolant, and how much previous owner has driven it with low coolant I don t know. And perhaps the coolant wasn't able to boil because it was to low except for when the AC was on? Don't know if the AC could make it run hot or if that was just a coincidence? The engine runs fine but is there any checks I can do to see if any damage has been done? Don't want to start pouring in money and time on a engine that I have damaged beyond repair?
Perhaps there is nothing to worry about, if the engine runs fine its fine?
Ill try to keep it short (After writing the post I realize it didn't succeed with keeping it short).
I bought my first Land Rover Discovery I 300 TDi 1998 with about 220000km on the meter a few days ago in the south of Sweden, I myself live in the north part of Sweden. The car was owned by a older man and he had owned it since new. The car looked good, expect for more rust than I expected and some minor issues. It had just passed a inspection so it was drivable. It had been regularly serviced and engine ran fine. Did a quick check of the oil but nothing fancy before I started the drive home, a drive of approximate 1000 km. Now afterwards I realize it would have been a good thing to check coolant level which I forgot. It was later on the day and fairly cool outside so no need for AC. I had just done minor readup on the 300 TDi and knew I should look out for overheating so keept an eye on the engine temperature meter which stayed around center the whole trip.
After a while it started to get colder outside so I cranked up some heat and the fan, to my disappointment the heater only gave me semi warm air. But I managed and thought to myself that its probably an easy fix. Cruised at around 100-110 km/h most of the trip and everything went just fine all the way home. Calculated that during the trip the car consumed about 10 liter / 100km which I think is fairly ok. The next day I drove the car to my parents about a 200km drive. The last maybe 50 km I started the AC and the drive went just fine. Until I parked the car at my parents and it idled for maybe 3 minutes. I hear something pouring out underneath the car, so I shut the engine of popped the hood and saw that the header tank had split. Just felt like **** My Life. Didn't remember to check the temperature gauge before shutting the engine off. Did a quick Google and found some possible issues and was hoping for the pressure valve on the header cap. Started by ordering headertank and cap and replaced these.
When I removed the cap on the thermostat housing to fill it I noticed it was really wear out but it was sealing as it was suppose to. I filled up everything with the car parked up hill and then filmed with a thermal heat gun to check that the radiator was working and not clogged up. Looked good, still had trouble getting heat into the matrix but decided that maybe it only need to be driven a bit. It ran and no overheating after a drive but still no heat in the matrix, but it was warm so didn't bother with it. Really needed to move my trailer which was the reason I went to my parents house in the first place so hooked it up and turned on the AC and drove maybe 40km and decided to do a quick stop and inspection just to see that coolant was staying in the right places. To my disappointment I found coolant dripping from the header cap, drove 2 more kilometers to a friend and the engine was overheating.
Parked car in a steep up hill and took the cap of the thermostat housing and there was no coolant in there. Started filling it up and noticed it was slowly dropping and found a leak somewhere behind the water pump. Started Googling and the more I Googled I realized that the more I had ****ed up...
Heater matrix hoses are located high and because the coolant had dropped around the level of the waterpump no coolant had entered the matrix. But whats worse is that the matrix is connected in series with the head so probably no coolant running through the head. And if the coolant has been below the waterpump perhaps no coolant pumping around the engine. Temperature sensor is high so probably not submerged in coolant so always showing way to low... Now I really felt like FML. I came to the conclusion that most likely a leaking P-Gasket. Filled the coolant system up and quickly closed the cap on the thermostat housing got the heaters to work so no air stuck there anymore. Drove to my parents with the heating on so that I could notice if the cooling dropped to much. No problems. Parked the car and ordered new p gasket and some other stuff.
I will start by replacing P-Gasket and inspect waterpump. Later on I plan to replace headgasket and mill it.
Conclusion
But now I'm worried that I have made substantial damage to my engine running it for a long period with coolant low? I would assume that I have been driving it at least 1300km with low coolant, and how much previous owner has driven it with low coolant I don t know. And perhaps the coolant wasn't able to boil because it was to low except for when the AC was on? Don't know if the AC could make it run hot or if that was just a coincidence? The engine runs fine but is there any checks I can do to see if any damage has been done? Don't want to start pouring in money and time on a engine that I have damaged beyond repair?
Perhaps there is nothing to worry about, if the engine runs fine its fine?
