1. Home
  2. Land Rover 4WD vehicles
  3. V8 coolant loss

V8 coolant loss

well, new head gaskets, new valley gasket...

... and it's still using coolant.

not at a huge rate, but faster than I'd prefer bearing in mind that 25% of it costs money.

When I had the heads off, I didn't investigate 'em very thoroughly, but all pots looked pretty similar - in particular, there was nothing obviously different about the colour or deposits on any one; I'd probably have noticed and thought "hang on..."

so, bearing in mind that I can't see any obvious leaks, is it possible for a head to be dodgy in such a way that water from the jacket escapes through the engine in such a way that it's not visible as contamination in the oil and causes no obvious problems with running. I've not actually done a compression test yet, but it runs nice and smooth at idle now it's had new head gaskets, so one pot, for example, isn't a long way down on compression.

hard to get a definitive answer for the rate of coolant loss, but I'd say that it's about a litre every 100+ miles, which is way more than it should be, but not really enough to be obvious. I'm going to try running it unpressurised and see if it leaks faster, slower, whatever over the next day or 3.

Reply to
Austin Shackles
Loading thread data ...

"Austin Shackles" schreef in bericht news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com

At the risk of coming up with something all too obvious... There are coolant pipes underneath the inlet manifold. These have been known to develop leaks, dropping the coolant onto the hot valley gasket where it vapourises, leaving little or no signs of leakage. Especially when it's a small leak...

But you probably would have seen that when you had the manifold off...

Reply to
aghasee

Check the back of the water pump for a pinhole between the two heater hoses, there is a possibility of erosion from the inside of the pump allowing water to drip then run down to the valley where it evaporates.

Took me ages to find the problem in the Rangie.

Repaired it with some good epoxy and a set of burrs to remove the porous metal (better than having to replace the timing cover)

Somewhere around Tue, 04 Nov 2003 07:53:09 +0000, Austin Shackles coughed up this:

Reply to
JoE

On or around Tue, 04 Nov 2003 08:46:19 GMT, "aghasee" enlightened us thusly:

yeah, I did, and they ain' leaking, AFAIK. there's no obvious water leak - it's sneaking out somewhere you can't see it. The odd thing is that there's no sign of water in the oil, which I'd expect if the water was getting into anywhere inside the engine where the oil goes.

Reply to
Austin Shackles

Hoses to the heater matrix?

Out the downpipe from the expansion bottle?

Just two ideas that quickly come to mind.

P.

Reply to
Paul S. Brown

On or around Tue, 04 Nov 2003 09:56:41 GMT, JoE enlightened us thusly:

found the leak, looks like a minor crack in the head in the general area of the outer-row bolt adjacent to the dipstick. I guess it may have been overtorqued in the past. I haven't, but they aren't supposed to be so tight as the main head bolts. Lobbed some Bars Leaks in it today, will see if that cures it.

Reply to
Austin Shackles

The four outside ones only now need to be tight to stop them falling out. The new block don't have them drilled out even. i speak as one who has has two 4.2's crack inside there bore so replaced them with a brand new 4.6.

0123456789112345678921234567893123456789412345678951234567896123456789712345
Reply to
john

On or around Thu, 6 Nov 2003 18:28:10 +0000 (UTC), "john" enlightened us thusly:

mind you, the original engine (buick/olds versions, I think) has another row on the valley side - latest lot of head gaskets have holes for them. since the gaskets that have failed on mine invariably end up blowing through into the valley, perhaps they were there for a reason...

Reply to
Austin Shackles

MotorsForum website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.