If you can find the leak, may be worth a punt. Heater o rings and throttle body heater are good places to start. If not - leave it.

I'd put some of that uv dye in the header tank and get a uv torch off ebay. Check the dipstick after a few days and then check the rest of the engine.

Given the time it has been doing it I suspect the rad.
 
Our 1996 4.6, now on 185k on original engine and owned for 16 years, uses a pint of coolant every 2 to 3 weeks and has done for years.
Valley gasket renewed 3 years ago improved oil consumption, but water consumption remains the same!
Cylinder heads have never been off.....but a close eye has always been kept on under bonnet goings on......
Peter.

I'd say you've a good-un there, the 4.6 being the most notorious for the dreaded slipped liner. An 'insider' once told me that the early one's were apt to do this at mileages as low as 20k & treated at main stealers as failed head-gaskets - this was before LR itself realised the root cause o_O
 
+1 thats a good un. Mines on nearly 182k & on 3rd engine & it's an '02 last off the production line.
 
As I said, the bonnet is up on a regular basis, and a close eye kept on levels, particularly coolant, after many previous years of experience with the 3.5 V8 in various saloons and a 1988 Classic, in fact the bonnet release lever broke in two recently! I've now driven Rover V8s continually since 1974 (starting with a 1969 P6 3500) which may be a record......
My interpretation of all the trouble with the P38 was firstly, the lack of a low coolant light (invaluable on the Classic), secondly, the extension from six to twelve thousand miles for servicing (could anyone have expected this to prolong the life of the old Buick engine??), and thirdly the fact that those who could afford a new RR were hardly likely to be the sort of people who would carry out regular underbonnet checks!
Our old P38 was serviced for the first four years of it's life by Rocar Moores at Huddersfield and at six thousand mile intervals, contrary to LR's stated twelve thousand miles.
Before buying the vehicle (from a non franchised dealer in Leeds) I phoned Rocar Moores and was assured that if it had a servicing stamp, then the oil would have been changed, and that was the deciding factor in buying it.
Regarding the comment above about failed head gaskets, that may well have been the initial diagnosis, but what had caused this? Surely the gradual loss of coolant leading to overheating, gradual or sudden, must have been the cause?

Peter.
 

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