Leaking 2a

[Dante]

Hi guys,
after returning from a 8 month holiday overseas I was getting my 2a (ex-Army, 2 1/4 Petrol) ready to bring back from Central Queensland to Brisbane.

At the shops I notice a big green lake under the car, open the bonet and find a waterfall ;-) coming out of the RH rear of the engine block.

Some sort of plug seem to have gone missing, I can not detect any thread and strangely enough the hole is not round. Well the hole itself is round, but whatever fits in there has to be the figure of an eight.

I found in the forum a picture of an engine block and have circled the plug which is missing. (I apologize to the owner of the picture for using and altering his picture without authorisation).

Now ... what kind of plug am I missing here. Any suggestions on how to fix this temporarly. I tried a 50cent piece with putty to the outside of the hole, it lasted about 500m.

All I know it is not a welsh plug ;-)

Any thoughts ?
Thanks,
Dante

[Dante]

Ok .. replying to myself ... looking at information

Land Rover parts - WELSH PLUGS - 2.25 PETROL (http://www.roverparts.com.au/welsh_plugs___2_25_petrol?b=1)

I deduct that part 527269 is still in place (that is why I don't have a thread) put it has a hole.

I am now worried that it has a "Whitworth" thread. How easy would it be to find a replacement in the middle of the night. Provided I can get it out

Any thoughts on this ?
Thanks,
Dante

[Dinty]

G'day All, The plugs you are refering to are of an alloy construction and the thread is 1" x 16TPI Conduit, the plugs are readily available thru the usual suspects. You will have strip down parts of the engine like in the picture and job made easier by removing LHS guard have fun cheers Dennis:wasntme:
PS I have taps and I would suspect someone in that part of the world will have them as well.

[Dante]

Hm .. won't be able to do any of that for now.

I think I will get a high tensile bolt (short), and weld it into that plug. This way I should be able to undo it when needed.

Not sure I would be able to remove it the easy way as the one of the extractors is quite rust and on the other side I am not sure I would be able to remove the plug that easy.

Let you know how it goes.

Thanks,
Dante

[Beckett]

mate whereabouts in central qld are you? close to emerald?

[Dinty]

G'day All, I'm no welding expert but I'm certain you cannot weld steel to cast iron, so best of luck mate Dennis:wasntme:
PS and you will really bugger up your block.

[UncleHo]

G'day Dante :)

That looks very much like the "Plug for Redundant Heater Hole" (Part No 527269) an alloy plug that screws into the Block and yes, it has 2 lugs in it which makes it look like a figure 8 when corroded away.

BUT that looks like you have a hole in the block alongside the plug:( if so the block is a throw away:mad: is the hole in the block???


That plug should be available from FWD motors in Brisbane (07 3848 9323) or British Off Road at Forrest Glen Qld (07 5445 1094)

cheers

[UncleHo]

G'day Dante :)

Sorry :( I misread your post that is NOT YOUR BLOCK:(:( but a sample photo:whistling:

cheers

[Blknight.aus]

you cant "weld" it but you can braze it up however thats a one time fix and not something you want to do unless you have plans to pull out the engine and rebuild it in the near future.

epoxy and alfoil also works but the same criterea apply.

[Dinty]

G'day All, That red circle wasn't there when I posted earlier either, otherwise I would have said it is 1 1/8" dia plug and I knew it wasn't your block and others have said fix it properly or why bother asking for advice

[Dante]

All,
thanks a lot.

Rather than jumping the (welding) gun, we went to the local bowls club for dinner. If you ever pass through Moura, I can recommend the risoles.

Decided against welding (man ... I am itching to try my 12/24V MIG gun). After cleaning it up I saw that it was alloy and I didn't have the right welding wire with me.

Someone suggested QuckieSteel ... great stuff ... used the whole sausage ... even molded a little twist handle ;-) Just in case I get brave and want to unscrew that thing

The good news for me is that Quckiesteel will set in 4 mins and even under water. So even if the filling blows out while driving, I can have it back on the road within an hour. Just need to have enough water with me.

The whole is definitely in the plug, not the block and I have no idea how it got there. It is alloy, so it shouldn't have rusted away.

Will wait until tomorrow morning before I feel the cooling system and go for a test run through town.

Again .. thanks for all your input and suggestions. It has brought me closer to my graby (green baby).

Dante

[JDNSW]

........
The whole is definitely in the plug, not the block and I have no idea how it got there. It is alloy, so it shouldn't have rusted away.
.........
Dante

If you have cast iron and aluminium alloy in electrical contact and immersed in water (which is exactly what you have here) you have an electrochemical cell or battery, which will dissolve the alloy, which is the lower metal in the electrochemical series. How rapidly this occurs depends mainly on the conductivity of the water in the system (and the temperature).

It can be prevented almost completely by the use of corrosion inhibitors present in all modern coolants - but this was not the case for the 2a -- "Use soft water wherever possible; if the local water supply is hard, rain or distilled water should be used" (Series 2a Owners Manual Part No 4482). Most owners would have used whatever water was available, especially if it was using a bit of water.

John

[Aaron IIA]

I would prefer to have this plug corode away rather than the block itself. It is in this case working as a sacrificial component. The plug is for the redundant heater core hole. It should be a BSP plug, which uses a Whitworh threadform. A hardware store or plumbing centre will have a plug for this. Mine is now brass, as there other threaded plugs that are aluminium to sacrifice themselves elsewhere.

Be careful when purchasing a new plug, as BSP is measured by the nominal internal pipe diameter, not he external diameter of the thread. Thus 1/2" BSP measures more than 1/2" accross the thread.

The 1" British Standard Conduit Thread (16 TPI) plugs are the two to the left of your broken plug, and above the cup welsch plugs. These are also aluminium and prone to corroding through.
Aaron.

[Dinty]

G'day All, Aaron just for your info on the early 2 1/4 blocks (as fitted to S2) the plugs on the side of the block are 2 different sizes, the one closest to the front is 1" x 16TPI Conduit, but the other closer to the redundant heater plug is a different size again (much larger than 1") and I had to make my own tap from silver steel to rethread it again, the aluminium plugs were available but no taps, anyway that problem has was fixed 3 years ago and so far so good it doesn't leak cheers Dennis:wasntme:
PS The plugs in question are the same sizes 1" x 16 TPI in the later model S2A and S3 2 1/4lt engine.