Thread: Buying first discovery 1, any things to take care of asap on it?

Might help if you give a few more details - Petrol or Diesel, Auto or manual, year model, ABS etc

Cheers,
Tom.

yes of couse. its a v8 3.9. automatic. Should be 1998. im not sure about ABS.

Vent noise: probably leaves in the heater fan. Stick your head in the LH foot well and look upwards, you should see the heater fan motor just there. Unscrew it and empty it.

Brakes: If they work well when hot then its the brake compound. Try some different pads. Sometimes though the brakes are no good because the brake booster is cracked and you lose vacuum. You will have to find another booster if that is the case.

If you're doing anything to the brakes a fluid flush may be a good idea too.

Rear windows, could be the kiddie switch engaged, or door switches full of dust. There could also be soldering faults in the circuit board for the windows, do a search on the forum for that one.

When correct, the D1 has a brick-wall pedal feel.
any spongyness indicates a priblem.

There is no spongyness, but it just needs a bit of force to actually brake. Then again, maybe it's just me, because the holden i had before had very sharp brakes (compared to the car i had before the holden itself). So maybe i just got used to that and now land rover feels a lot weaker.
Brakes dont improve when pumping, so at least there should be no air in the system. Ill have a good look at the brake booster and see if there's anything wrong with it.
The kiddie lock was turned off. I haven't checked the fuses yet, maybe it's just a broken fuse.
Sadly, previous owner couldn't find the plates for it and i have to wait till monday until i can start figuring out the problems.

Ill let you know what i found out when time comes. Also if i discover some new issues with it.

thank you guys

Weird problem. Coolant is boiling in expansion tank, but engine temp indicator is not even half way up. My friend had similar issue, but he had to replace the expansion tank cap. But the one on the land rover is completely diffrent than his was. doesn't look like it had any significant part in it. Any more ideas? Im going to bleed the system and see if the problem goes away.

Originally Posted by K3nny

Weird problem. Coolant is boiling in expansion tank, but engine temp indicator is not even half way up. My friend had similar issue, but he had to replace the expansion tank cap. But the one on the land rover is completely diffrent than his was. doesn't look like it had any significant part in it. Any more ideas? Im going to bleed the system and see if the problem goes away.

If it has been sitting for a considerable time, sediment can settle to the bottom of the radiator restricting flow, and you may have a blown head gasket/s, have you found this problem on the test drive or have you already purchased it.
If you now own it, remove the radiator and take it to a Radiator shop and have them"rod" the cores, ask what % was blocked.
If the cooling system is OK you may have blown head Gasket/s or worse the bore sleeves may have moved and you are getting combustion pressures into the cooling system, the radiator shop can also test for these gasses, good luck, Regards Frank.

Originally Posted by Tank

If it has been sitting for a considerable time, sediment can settle to the bottom of the radiator restricting flow, and you may have a blown head gasket/s, have you found this problem on the test drive or have you already purchased it.
If you now own it, remove the radiator and take it to a Radiator shop and have them"rod" the cores, ask what % was blocked.
If the cooling system is OK you may have blown head Gasket/s or worse the bore sleeves may have moved and you are getting combustion pressures into the cooling system, the radiator shop can also test for these gasses, good luck, Regards Frank.

Headgasket is done for. I took it for a short test drive, because it had no licence plates on at the time. During that run, everything was normal. It was about 2-3km run only.

Under the oil cap i can see old dried mayo-like stuff and as i opened the expansion tank cap it was clear - smell of burned gasoline. As much as i hope that headgasket is not the case and i could really start enjoying my first 4x4, everything refers to it.

Other than that, cool car. Brakes improved after some driving. Gearbox is a bit rough when put in reverse.
Anyways, im pretty sure ill just get my money back on this deal and hopefully someone else is able to fix this wonderful car.