101 V8 Died (3.5l)

[101RRS]

The fuel return hoses on my Freelander diesel have perished so it it off the road. So I have been using my 101 to run around in get bits.

The temp gauge on the 101 normally sits on 80 and when outside temp is in the 30s it rises to 90 and sits there. Yesterday with outside temp around 40 ran around town trying to get bits I needed. This morning started up to to get more bits and about 300m from home the engine started missing then very thick pure white smoke came out from the exhaust and there was the smell of coolant. The engine was still running roughly and then I shut it down. It would not start.

Coolant was down so I refilled it and noticed the drip of coolant from underneath - looks like I have either split a lower hose or seals in the water pump have gone - haven't checked yet. When the engine cooled it would start with no steam but dies about 30 secs later with steam coming out the exhaust - the oil looks OK. Looks like the leak started yesterday when I was running around in the heat and maybe the engine got cooked then.

So for those in the know - obviously the head gasket/s have gone so given the above what are the chances of damage to the rings/bores etc. Also when I lift the heads will I be able to tell by looking down the bores if the the rings etc are Ok or do I need to remove them to be absolutely sure.

If it is just a head gasket job then i will stay with the 3.5 but if more terminal then I need to consider other options. I have a dead 3.9 (serpentine belt) on my engine stand that needs rebuilding so I might as well get it built.

Any ideas from those in the know.

Garry

PS - I need to put on some plastic line on the diesel fuel return line on my Freelander as a temporary measure so that I can drive to the shop and buy the correct stuff to fix it. No other transport. Fish tank air hose worked a treat so I was able to buy some of the proper pipe - like all things freeloader - was a pain to get the little pieces of pipe back in but at least I have transport to get things for the 101.

[lambrover]

that is a stroke of bad luck mate, before you remove the heads do a compression check if you want to check the rings as this is the indicator for worn rings, although if you have a blown head gasket or slipped liner you will be low on compression on those cylinders.

If you cant check the compression, if it ran allright and had little blow by the rings should be ok, so work out if its the water pump or head gasket, get them machined as they will most likely be warped.

[Blknight.aus]

compression test followed by a leak down test. you might get lucky and have only done one head.

providing the block/head isnt RS and you dont take too long getting the rework started you might get away without ring problems.

in the mean time rip the plugs out and drop some oil down there.

[101RRS]

I drove it home late yesterday and was driving OK with no indication that there was a problem - the temp was a little high but where it sits on a 40 degree day. Started this morning no problems then 300m later when doing a U turn she started missing and the white steamy smoke appeared. It will not run when hot but will start fine and run OK when cold - as it warms up it starts to run rough and the exhaust starts to become white. It is only then that the coolant starts to drip down from the engine.

The leak is not actually from radiator hose or the water pump but from the back of the engine on the passenger side so, have now checked where the leak is from - not from the pump or radiator hoses but is coming out of the LPG bit that delivers the gas to the air intake but it has no direction connection to the cooling system. On pulling a few things off, the coolant is coming through the gas hose from the thingy that heats up the gas which is connected to the cooling system. So as the engine is sucking coolant into the the engine via the air system - this sort of explains the symptoms of a blown head gasket as water tends to extinguish the fires inside the engine and come out the exhaust as steam.

I disconnected the gas hose so the coolant would not go into the engine and started up - after a bit of cranking it started and ran fine with no white smoke - however there does seem to be more blue smoke than usual but the engine was only warm and it does blow a little smoke when cold due to worn valve sealing.

So is the $64,000 question is whether the engine was actually damaged due to low coolant levels when running on a 40c day. I will plug off the coolant to the LPG heater tomorrow and go for a run - I guess the absence of a smoke trail will indicate all is OK and if I smoke everything out well I need to look further. I will try to do a compression test but it is hard to get at the spark plug holes with a a gauge.

Garry

[350RRC]

Hi Garry,

How much coolant did it lose originally? If it was only a litre or so and you weren't flogging it I wouldn't worry about doing a compression test (they always seem to cause depression :)) if it runs the same as it did before and is not pressurising the cooling system.

Gas convertors are pretty cheap. What sort is it? I think a new big Impco one for my POS is only about $150.

Your findings are making me think I should get a newy because the current one has done about 400,000.

cheers, DL

[101RRS]

Hi Garry,

How much coolant did it lose originally?

Gas convertors are pretty cheap. What sort is it?

Not sure exactly as I used the hose to fill the radiator backup but my guess is nearly empty.

Not sure what sort of converter as I have never actually seen it - it is hidden in a compartment up in the front wheel arch. I will remove both components and get the LPG guy to put kits through them.

Thanks

Garry

[Blknight.aus]

Id do the compression and leakdown tests...

if your lucky the worst youve done is shorten the life of the headgasket.

if unlucky youve started the process for the softening of the head/block.

[101 Ron]

Garry
You have a Impco gas convertor and they have a bad habit of
corroding though if coolant has not been used at some stage of the motors life.
Remove the two cooling system hoses running to the gas convertor at the gas convertor end and join them together with fittings and another hose.
Top up the cooling system and test drive.(On petrol)
If the convertor is corroded though, there is usually water drop lets present in the lowest parts of the large gas vapour supply hose to the gas mixer.
I hope it is the problem as it is a easy fix.

[justinc]

Garry, It is lucky you had a 3.5, can't kill them with a big stick:twisted:

Drive it a bit more before making a decision, steam will clean heaps of carbon etc from the engine and the exhaust system, I would guess that the residual smoke could be that?

Good luck:)

JC

[101 Ron]

A radiator pressure tester pumped up to 13 psi and look for leaks as well as water in the bores by pulling the sparkplugs and cranking over and see if water vapour comes out the plug holes when cranking.
the pressure tester will hold pressure for a long time if every thing is OK.
The pressure test will also check the convertor if you disconnect the vapour hose from the convertor and inspect for water.

[PLR]

Hi , one of the beautys of lpg is that when there is a lack of warmth to the convertor they stop running .

The converter problem you have described matches your symptoms .

The reason for stopping and not restarting when warm is that the converter is icing up , which stops the gas flow .

The white smoke is the coolant inside the hot engine and the coolant out the exhaust is the same both from the converter coolant jacket failure both via inlet manifold entry .

So long as it was running on lpg when it got hot and stopped running there is unlikely to be any damage done if it was running on petrol when it stopped it most probably would have stopped differently and would be damaged because petrol doesn`t care if there is coolant there or not but your description says to me it was on lpg .

Replace the converter and other than the loss of some carbon it should be similar to how it was .

cheers.

[101RRS]

Garry
You have a Impco gas convertor and they have a bad habit of
corroding though if coolant has not been used at some stage of the motors life.
Remove the two cooling system hoses running to the gas convertor at the gas convertor end and join them together with fittings and another hose.
Top up the cooling system and test drive.(On petrol)
If the convertor is corroded though, there is usually water drop lets present in the lowest parts of the large gas vapour supply hose to the gas mixer.
I hope it is the problem as it is a easy fix.

Thanks Ron - I think that is exactly what happened - as the diffuser is much lower than the converter with a U turn in the air intake being the lowest point and the coolant pooled here and was sucked into the engine. I think I will get both the converter and the diffuser reconditioned or replaced.

Garry

[101RRS]

So long as it was running on lpg when it got hot and stopped running there is unlikely to be any damage done if it was running on petrol when it stopped it most probably would have stopped differently and would be damaged because petrol doesn`t care if there is coolant there or not but your description says to me it was on lpg.

The day before it was running on LPG. On the morning when this all happened I was on petrol as mine has to start on it. I had switched the petrol/lpg switch to the no fuel position and was about to switch it to LPG. The engine had only been running for about 2 minutes so would not normally have been hot - however with no coolant I guess the block would have still been cold but the pistons/liners would have been quite warm.

Garry

[101 Ron]

If it is the gas convertor, you will need a new one.
If you pull the old gas convertor apart they normally have a pin hole from the water tube inside the convertor though to a diaphram chamber.
The Impco gas mixer....you call it a diffuser should be unaffected by the water going though it and there is really no need to play with it.
Garry if you give me the model number of the Impco gas convertor I can most likely get one to you at trade price .

[101RRS]

Bypassed the converter and checked the gas mixer. It was full of coolant as was the air intake plumbing. I am surprised how much the gas mixer restricts the airflow into the engine - must have an impact on engine performance.

Anyway - put it all back together and after some cranking the engine fired and seemed to run OK - as soon as I revved it up it died and white smoke poured out and my depression increased. It would not start hot but when cooled started Ok - this time did not die or have white smoke.

So went for a drive around the block (so I could roll it home - had to call the NRMA yesterday). Drove Ok until power was required - died and white smoke but did recover and no smoke (no blue stuff at all). Each time I drove around the block it coughed and spluttered but was starting to run better - pinged on the thought the engine was OK and every cough and splutter was in fact clearing its throat of the coolant that must have been hiding in all sorts of places.

So drove up a big hill and it pulled OK - no smoke or steam or spluttering and the engine was beginning to sound like its old self. So after driving about 10km all seems to be OK. I will go for a 100km drive tomorrow just to make sure - I am going to Bendethra this weekend and I want to make it back.

An engine low water alarm was on my list of things to do so I will get one next week. As far as the LPG system is concerned, the converter is hard to get too so I will pull that out next week (I have turned the gas off).

So - for the moment all seems OK.

Thanks to everyone for your input - I can assure everyone that water in the air intake system does mimic a blown headgasket - particularly when it is a 40 degree day and that water is coolant draining from you cooling system.

Garry

[isuzurover]

Glad to hear all seems well. An oil and filter change may be a good idea after the 100k drive. Even if no water got into the sump, it has likely dislodged a lot of carbon, not all of which will leave via the exhaust.

[101RRS]

Good point - thanks Ben.

Garry

[101RRS]

Finally managed to get all the coolant out of the air intake system and the engine is back to running like it should. No smoke at all so it seems that all is OK for the moment. The engine did over heat so I guess time will tell if there will be other problems later.

Thanks to everyone for your input.

Cheers

Garry

[101 Ron]

Good result.
the gas convertor would have stopped the motor before any damage occurred to the motor.
It happens alot in my game the forklift trade.........gas convertoes freezing up after a radiator hose has blown has saved many a motor.

[justinc]

Good result.
the gas convertor would have stopped the motor before any damage occurred to the motor.
It happens alot in my game the forklift trade.........gas convertoes freezing up after a radiator hose has blown has saved many a motor.

That is a good feature :), but also worth mentioning that if the corroded through converter problem happens, disconnect the converter to inlet pipe and check for coolant in the manifold BEFORE starting engine. I have seen hydraulic lock occur after the converter failed, and the vehicle was left sitting for a while, and then attempted to start it with an inlet manifold and 1 cylinder (with an open inlet valve), full of water:(
Glad all is up and running again, can't stop that mighty little 3.5:)


JC

[101RRS]

Went to Bendethra this weekend - had about 4" of rain on Sat afternoon - don't know what all the hassle is about getting out of there after rain - piece of cake - except for the last water crossing which I went a bit too fast and killed the engine electrics and they failed to respond to air blowing, WD40, Lanotec and waiting for the engine to dry - result was a tilt tray ride from Snowball back to Canberra via Cooma - it seems the coil failed.

But otherwise the engine performed really well and does not seem to have suffered from its little bout of overheating.

Fog on the way out of Bendethra
http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e334/gazzz21/P1040931-1.jpg

Big Puddle
http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e334/gazzz21/P1040933.jpg

Broken in the puddle
http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e334/gazzz21/P1040934.jpg

Photos by Peter Mercer

Garry

[101 Ron]

I have learnt the hard way.
No bonnet means dead slow though the water.
I think you will find the coil OK. as the first thing to get wet is the coil.
the fan picks up any water though the fan tunnel and flicks it around the engine bay in line with the coil.
The coil is not easily moved to another spot or is it easy to dry out.
The dist is in the same area.
As you know I have looked at this problem long and hard.
garry you will also find the extra altenator you have fitted like my 101 is low and flicks the water to the electrics too including the coil.
Remember I removed the fan on my altenater to prevent this.
regards

[101RRS]

I am glad I have Premium car road service - the cost of carting my 101 back home was about $1000. Well worth considering for the extra price.

24 hours later the truck is still dead - so something else is going on - the waterproofing equipment has been sabotaged by a previous owner with shielded wires cut and joined with other wire and just taped up with electrical tape. Likewise some of the water proof connections into the coil and dizzy do not seem to be waterproof any more. The coil is still in its waterproof container as is the dissy but leads going in and out may be compromised. If the water gets in it has little chance of getting out - we even filled the small gap between the dissy cap and the aluminium outer case with WD 40 but still did not work.

We have low tension power to the points (too much spark so the condensers may need replacing), there is weak high tension spark to the dissy cap but no spark to the plugs. I had a new rotor button with me but that did not do anything.

As I have not touched anything on the ignition system since I have owned the 101 I will start with the spark plugs and rebuild the ignition system from scratch making whatever improvements are required as I go.

The water proving system is a double edged sword - maybe harder to stop but when it stops it stops in a big way and is difficult to remove water - I have no idea how to get the water out of the shielded coil). A standard car system is easier to stop but can be mobile again with a few squirts of WD40.

In the 101 water hits the front diff and is thrown up into the front of the engine an thrown around by the fan etc - including the low slung alternator - I think some home made rubber/plastic shielding placed in key areas may assist in reducing the amount of water that is flung around.

Any ways - rest today - start fixing tomorrow.

Garry

[101 Ron]

Compressed air and a nozzle is your friend.............:D

[101 Ron]

May be we should move this thread to the F/C section.
I have a roll of old fashion copper high tension wire used on igition systems of every old cars and trucks.
My idea with the standard suspressed leads is to run new copper lead though them and reuse all the porcelian ends and fittings.
The other plan was electronic conversion of the suspressed 24 volt dist.
I have not rushed into this as my civie dist converted to electronic and NGK motor bike water resistant spark plug boots is working OK....but could be improved water wise.
Look at the first pic going though the water.....see the water building up right in front of the grill and fan tunnel.
Crawl though the water and you will go up to the top of the tyres with little trouble.
The top of the tyre equals the bottom of the engine fan and the sparkplugs where you will find trouble with out water proofing.
Was that the water crossing up near the cooma road at snow ball ?

[101RRS]

Was that the water crossing up near the cooma road at snow ball ?

That was the one.

[bee utey]

Looked like a decent size hole to stop in! I hope the Bosch distributor I sent you has got you back on the road.:)

[101RRS]

Thanks for the dissy - and the note.

I have re-water proofed the original system and ran it with the hose on it for 10 minutes with no issues. The problem (as happened with mine) is that if water gets into the spaces between the outer casings and the dissy or the coil (where mine failed) it does not come out without dismantling the relevant component. As leads are screwed in - in tight spots - you cannot just pull the leads off and give it a squirt with WD40.

A no waterproof system may stop sooner but when it does it is easy to pull the bits off - squirt with WD40 and your on your way.

The coil you sent me runs on 9v so with the ballast resistor should work as a direct replacement for my coil (is a 10v coil) without any additional work so I will carry the lot in the box for a spare at the moment and later if I have any issues change the lot over.

Thanks

Garry