Westwood8055

Active Member
Hi all
My defender 90 Has a 300 disco engine conversion but seems underpowered. Turbo doesn't seem to kick in early enough through the gears, checked turbo for play but seems fine, it has been fitted without air filter so the airflow goes direct from snorkel to turbo, it's struggling to pull up hills in fourth, not mechanically minded enough to know what to look for or alter as yet so any suggestions would be appreciated

Cheers
 
For starters, get an air filter! Even if it's just a cone one on the snorkel.
Have you driven any other 300TDis to compare it to? It could be a lot of things, when you say the turbo doesn't kick in I wonder if the diaphragm on the fuel injection pump is sticking so that your turbo is fine but your fuelling isn't keeping up.
 
Got an air filter and housing, just need to find suitable place to try and mount it! Not driven another 300 but a friend drove mine and said it was slow compared to his.

The turbo is working but it isn't kicking in until the top end of the gears, how do I check the diaphragm? Cheers
 
Lots of possible causes - is there any smoke from your exhaust when you're driving under normal circumstances? What about when you deck the pedal to accelerate?

Start with the easiest and cheapest things:

Swap your fuel filter, don't buy ****part, complete and utter ####ing bollocks. I've had one disintegrate in my old 90 in the past - filled the inlet banjo on the injection pump with mush and got inside the pump.

Crack the 8mm bleed bolt on top of the fuel filter housing and start the engine. Do you get fuel surging out? If not, lift pump is knackered and will not be supplying the injection pump with an adequate supply of diesel for harder engine work. There might be a few bubbles of air that come out too, this is quite normal but there should not be a continuous stream of bubbles. Air in the fuel at this point would suggest a leak in the fuel line from the tank and this will cause performance problems. It'll also show as white smoke from the exhaust (usually more obvious from a first start) and you might notice it takes a few turns of your engine before it fires up after being stood.

Check boost pipes between the turbo outlet and the inlet manifold (there's only two). They can delaminate internally and are sucked flat as the engine draws air in. It's got to suck before the turbo blows remember.

Check the turbo waste gate isn't stuck partially / completely open. A pair of mole grips on the actuator arm from underneath rocked back and forward should give you a good indication as to whether or not it's working properly. When it seats back in its resting place it should have a good firm stop as metal meets metal, not a soft / tight close.

Check boost pressure pipe from turbo to injection pump for splits / cracks. The injection system relies on a pressurised feed from the turbo to increase the fuelling as boost increases. You might also want to take the top off your aneroid chamber (top plate on injection pump with four flat head screws holding it in place) and check that the fuel pin moves freely. Make a note of the punch mark on the diaphragm, rotate the diaphragm through a full 360 degrees (either direction) and pull it out of the recess being careful not to loose the spring or the plastic shim. Find a small flat head screw driver and place it down the recess. Look down the recess and start the engine. A black pin should move out towards the back of the injection pump from the front as you rev the engine. If not - it'll be gummed up. Filling the recess with penetrating oil and then running the engine might free it off - will require a strip down if not.

Failing that, come back here! Should give you a few things to work with!

-Tom
 
Lots of possible causes - is there any smoke from your exhaust when you're driving under normal circumstances? What about when you deck the pedal to accelerate?

Start with the easiest and cheapest things:

Swap your fuel filter, don't buy ****part, complete and utter ####ing bollocks. I've had one disintegrate in my old 90 in the past - filled the inlet banjo on the injection pump with mush and got inside the pump.

Crack the 8mm bleed bolt on top of the fuel filter housing and start the engine. Do you get fuel surging out? If not, lift pump is knackered and will not be supplying the injection pump with an adequate supply of diesel for harder engine work. There might be a few bubbles of air that come out too, this is quite normal but there should not be a continuous stream of bubbles. Air in the fuel at this point would suggest a leak in the fuel line from the tank and this will cause performance problems. It'll also show as white smoke from the exhaust (usually more obvious from a first start) and you might notice it takes a few turns of your engine before it fires up after being stood.

Check boost pipes between the turbo outlet and the inlet manifold (there's only two). They can delaminate internally and are sucked flat as the engine draws air in. It's got to suck before the turbo blows remember.

Check the turbo waste gate isn't stuck partially / completely open. A pair of mole grips on the actuator arm from underneath rocked back and forward should give you a good indication as to whether or not it's working properly. When it seats back in its resting place it should have a good firm stop as metal meets metal, not a soft / tight close.

Check boost pressure pipe from turbo to injection pump for splits / cracks. The injection system relies on a pressurised feed from the turbo to increase the fuelling as boost increases. You might also want to take the top off your aneroid chamber (top plate on injection pump with four flat head screws holding it in place) and check that the fuel pin moves freely. Make a note of the punch mark on the diaphragm, rotate the diaphragm through a full 360 degrees (either direction) and pull it out of the recess being careful not to loose the spring or the plastic shim. Find a small flat head screw driver and place it down the recess. Look down the recess and start the engine. A black pin should move out towards the back of the injection pump from the front as you rev the engine. If not - it'll be gummed up. Filling the recess with penetrating oil and then running the engine might free it off - will require a strip down if not.

Failing that, come back here! Should give you a few things to work with!

-Tom


Cheers for the informative post tom, I will look at what you have suggested, when started first thing there is a little white smoke but goes as soon as I drive but it does take a couple of cranks to start from cold, fires up fine after though, I will firstly change filter and see if it improves,
 
as above, but also check your accel cable is adjusted properly and you are opening it up with your pedal down.

also check your lift pump, disconnect pipe from pump to filter, unplug the fuel cutoff so the engine doesn't start and crank it over.. you should be getting a nice squirt.

when you sort it, have a look at a small pump tweak :>
 
I have a complete lack of power from my 200tdi disco for the first 500 yards of driving but only in the mornings even if i let her idle for a few minutes before driving off or if i hold the revs just about 1000rpm before driving off could this be due to the lift pump? It boosts fine, or at least i can hear the turbo start whistling. I do get a little puff of white smoke on first start but it clears straight away

sorry to :hijacked:
 
When was the timing belt done, I did mine a couple of weeks ago as I had just bought my defender 200tdi about a month before and it made a right difference :)
 
I had the same problem and it was bugging me for ages.

I thought it was some insa turbo tyres I'd put on however thinking back the problem started a few days before that.

I started with what has been suggested, testing all air pipes on air intake and turbo side. Also the pipes for the intercooler. Perhaps worth pressure testing your intercooler at this stage, if it's full of wee holes then the turbo will be spooling but will not be as effective due to loss of volume. All this was ok on mine. Tested fuel lift pump - all ok. So I replaced the fuel filter next and gave her a full oil change with filter. Still no improvement.

I then decided to take the fuel pump apart, it was pretty clogged up with oil on the top diaphragm (seemed to have collected at the end of the pipe from the turbo). So I stripped it down and cleaned everything, reassembled and test drove. Problem seemed to be solved! It was so easy to take apart the fuel pump that I tweaked the fuelling as per the thread on here afterwards. What a difference.

I hope you manage to sus it out.
 
Now now, Bandit!

Don't start asking folks to follow you round watching your rear end wiggle uphill. :D:D:D

There's some steep hills round there, and I would be happy to get 35 going up some of them ;)
 

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