US car longevity

But how do you know? It's a bit like saying eating an apple a day will make you live to 100, because your mother did this.

Of course it shouldn't cough and splutter. It's faulty. And the 1275 has noticeably more pull than the smaller ones - without sacrificing smoothness. Which in this case is relative. ;-)

Well I've had more than one 2.0 VAG over 200,000miles without the head coming off or the cam changing.

see above post

I would say that along with the orl (texas for oil) change that a key element on keeping that family sedan for 30 years would be to change the coolant (anti-freeze) regularly and completely, hasnt that got to be good for the radiator/waterways/water pump.

Of course with an oil change arent you helping to keep compression up, and with a plug change and airfilter change etc you are keeping the various bits unified, as opposed to letting things deteriorate gradually and individually thereby reducing efficiency and possibly increasing wear.

Just an idea, be nice, be VERY nice ;-))

n the referenced article, "Dave Plowman (News)" writes:

My 1969 Ford Galaxie was built like a tank, and could probably have been turned into at least 15 Suzuki Altos!

Ran it dry one summer over there, so hot the motor wouldnt stop and I cooked a steak on it. Got another radiator from a Scrapper for ten bucks, fired right up, NO cracked block, cos it was a cast iron block.

The message from snipped-for-privacy@bath.ac.uk (J A Sims) contains these words:

You can crack cast iron blocks, you know - I've seen it done. Admitedly it was stupidity - but filling an engine which is still going "Plink tink tink"[1] as it cooled with water from a cold river wasn't wise.

I knew of a Fiat 126 that seized due to overheating on a regular basis so this is certainly not unique. I wouldn't like to try it with a modern alloy head though. FWIW my 4.2 Toyota engine is iron. The new Jaguar and Land Rover V6 diesel is also cast though in this case I am not sure of the head material.

Huw

One of my engines melted a piston last Summer with the result that it cracked a bore in two places and broke a big chunk off the cast head. This one had no water at all, being oil and air cooled.

Huw

" dojj" wrote >>

Just as I thought. None.

Huw

what do you drive? how much bhp/litre does it produce? how do you drive it? and how often do you change your oil? i got mine for free i changed it and only had to worry about getting the short filter but even if i had to pay £30/40 for it i would have done so for the peice of mind, if that doesn't compute then thats fine, but compared to the oil chnage i did th eother day on my other sierra, the stuff that came out of there was like gloop, and it had been in there for 14 months but i'd only done 5000 odd miles in it horses for courses

So it is a highly modified engine used for racing? What has this to do with normal service intervals for normal road cars?

Huw

The old Landrover diesels really didn'y appreciate being overheated. Actually maybe it was my engine reconditioners that didn't appreciate being given the block to sleeve afterwards.

so you ride a push bike then :) older engine designs, espcially those of yank origins, tend to have bigger tolerances than the same japanese engine so if they have to use thicker oil to stop it pissing out of every seal it would make sense to change it more often i had a blueprinted engine rebuild and everything was fine but you are dodging the question leveled at you or do you REALLY ride a push bike and eat lentil burgers and wear snadals?

What has that to do with running a modified car at short service intervals, which itself has no relevance to normal service intervals in road cars.

I was not aware that you had asked this question and cannot see its relevance.

For your information, some of the cars I have owned are

Golf GTi, Audi Quattro, Jaguar XK8, various Range Rover and Discovery, various Japanese 4x4's, various pick-up trucks and vans, a large fleet of plant and equipment both large and small and presently own a new Range Rover, Toyota, Mitsubishi, Isuzu, Nissan and Land Rover and recently a Mercedes and BMW X5. I also have access to a small supplementary fleet of Renault, Mercedes, Toyota and Nissan, Vauxhall, Peugeot and Ford vehicles. A friend also recently sold an Audi with 200,000 miles on it which ran sweet as a nut with oil changes at Audi's 20,000 mile intervals. One of the Vauxhalls, an Astra which does short drop work, also has 200,000+ miles on it and has never had any work done to its engine. Similarly a recently sold Vectra, both serviced loosely as per official schedule. What was the question again?

Huw

Keep those lights dipped if you ever get another Jag please!

Aren't those lights a work of art. The whole car is a work of art. I especially miss the tick-tocking of the indicator lights working.

Huw

Okay, this is the response that makes most sense to me. Petrol engines that scream at 3,000 rpm, redline under 6 yet sound smooth as silk under 2k do kinda sound like olde worldey technology.

Chandy