Rover

Any coolant loss perchance?

An L reg 216 will have the Honda D-series engine, not the K-series. The Honda engine doesn't have the same reputation for head gasket failure as the K-series.

Brian.

What year does the D-Series end and the K-Series start?

--Nick.

Nick ( snipped-for-privacy@spamcop.net) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying :

In the 216/416, it'd go with the change of shape. from the angular re- badged Honda to the current 25/45 shape. For the 400, that was '95, and about a year later for the 200. The early 416 autos, though, continued with the Honda motor.

IIRC, the old-shape 214/414 was the K, though.

How common is this problem? It even seems to be mentioned in one of the secondhand price guides yet these Rovers are very common and you don't seem to loads by the side of the road with the bonnet up.

My Mrs wanted a 25 or 45 but on the strength of the reputation I said 'no'. I know that the 1.8 litre Rover 75 has the same reputation, but does it apply to the 2 or 2.5 litre? i quite like the look of a 75.

The issue is one of coolant capacity. A slight loss of coolant in a K series motor causes it to overheat, so a split hose, or other leak or just poor maintenance leads to overheating which leads to gasket failure. As mentioned here, regular checking (I would say check oil and coolant every time you fill with fuel, others would say less) will prevent most head / gasket problems.

I've had a 414 and a 75 2.0V6. The 414 had the early top hose which would (and mine did) split. The 75 had no problems at all related to head gaskets / coolant.

The 1.8 Freelander (same engine) unsurprisingly suffers similar headgasket / over heating problems, and the upto 01 V6's do too, though strangely it doesnt affect the same engine in the 75- or at least I've not heard of any problems.

Tim..

1.8 Freelanders are not a clever idead anyway because a small, hard working petrol engine driving a big car around means huge fuel consumption. The BMW TD4 motor is way better.

Could the very desired feature of rapid warm up and thus expansion I assume, be contributing to the problems do you think ? E-mail address, hopefully self-explanatory Andy Pandy

Very. it was on watchdog not long ago as it is still affecting new freelanders which have the same engine. I would never buy another Rover after our head gasket problems...

My dad had a 75 and the build quality was crap on that too...