200Tdi - Viscous Fan / Overheating Question

Do you go off road in the Landy? If so check that your rad is not choked with dust, mud or sand. My 300TDi Disco overheated albeit only when towing up long hills. I got a piece of copper pipe, crushed the end and bent it at rightangles and attached a water hose to it and squirted it between the rad and A/C condenser, you should have seen all the sand etc that came out. It runs alot cooler now.

Peter.

Indeed... And my 200tdi is still running too hot!!!

Have it booked in for a compression and leak down test later this week though, so hopefully that will show something up...or down, but hopefully nor spinning around!!

Jon

Well, engine chuffs away nicely from the oil filler cap (when its removed), not noticable though from the dipstick.

Also, breather pipe breaths a bit too much oil vapout for my liking, thus top of air filer box is full of the wet black stuf!

When its warm I can also see oil vapour coming from around the oil filler cap.

Is this as bad as it sounds???

I have got it booked in for a compression and leakdown test later this week so fingers crossed I could at least have some numbers to confirm / diagnose the problem.

Do you still lean towards head gasket Richard?

Thanks Jon

One other thing...

Ive just done 210 miles in it today, 50 of those where off-roading, the rest at 60-70mph. Allthough the engine was hot all the time, it never got dangourously hot.

J>

Well, are we betting ?

Steve

Yes - I'd bet a cup of tea that there is a small blow though from No. 3 or 4 cylinder to the push rod hole. This woudln't in itself lead to the overheating, so it may well have another small leak into a waterway. Your compression test will indentify this.

Richard

Well Ive just come back from the garage after having a compression test and leak test done on the engine.

I am told all is perfectly fine (at least from a compression / leakage point of view). All four cylinders where more or less at the same compression and nothing appeared to be leaking on the leak test. He also checked the injectors - all OK and also checked the water for the prescence of carbons to check the head gasket from the coolant side - all clear.

The man did say though that he though the enqine was "too quiet" and the the exhaust smelt a little retarded. He has advanced the fuel pump a little (watching him do this I would say probably about 1-2mm over the length of an 8" ratchet). The engine doesnt seem any noisier and is still not producing smoke but does seem more responsive, albeit still too hot!!

His parting words of wisdom where try it and see, fuel pup can be advanced a little more before it starts to pink and smoke.

So the question really is what now?

My thoughts are:

1. Ggo to Maplins / RS and get hold of a temperature sensor that i can slide under the top hose at the radiator end and determine the exact water temperature.
2. Advance the fuel pump a little more to see if it makes a difference.
3. Replace the water cap?? It doesnt blow water out but could it still be knackered??

or... Accept that it runs hot an Live with it (dont like this though because I still dont know WHY its hot!

Thanks Jon

I still suggest you hose out the outside of the rad, it could be clogged with sand etc from offroading

Peter

Peter, Unfortuantley its definatley not a radiator blocked inside or out.

I have also ruled out de-laminated hoses as it runs hot when its on tickover as well as at 60mph.

J>I still suggest you hose out the outside of the rad, it could be clogged

I had a play with my thermocouple this weeked and inserted into the top hose.

Thermostat begins to open at about 80-83°C (strange considering its an

88° Stat!). Even on a 75mph run for about 2 mins (longest road I could find close to home), temperature never got higher than 88°C.

So I think I am happy that the engine is not getting too hot. My only reservation about those temperatures is that I could not get a pressurized system as when the thermocouple was in-between the thermostat housing and hose I had a slight leak around the jubilee clip. That said though I dont think this would cause a problem as a pressurised system increases boiling point (as per another recent thread).

Does anyone know where the 2 black wires that connect to the grub screw on the back of the temperature guage go? Mine go into a mass of black electrical tape and beyond somewhere! I think they are a means of voltage reduction before the gauge gets to the sender unit...???

Jon

so Jon was, like...

Sounds painful.

An 88° stat should be fully open at 88°, so starting to open at 80-ish sounds about right to me. Try it in a pan of boiling water if you want to be sure.