Thread: would you buy a TD5 with 280,000km?

At this age, it's not the kilometres, it's the care its had.

Does it have a service record? Can you get it inspected by someone who knows their stuff? Can you find out what the orange light is? Post a pic perhaps?

The most common potential expensive problem with it would be a head gasket. Do you know if it's been replaced? If not, you could be up for a big bill, particularly if you can't do the work yourself.

There are a number of other common problems, and I think rather than list them, you're best off spending some time reading this forum. It's a bit daunting, but time well spent, and every potential issue has been addressed here, with diagnoses and solutions.

Personally, mines done over 230,000km and its got years left in it,but it is regularly serviced and maintained (by me). There are plenty here with more kms than mine. Without seeing the vehicle, price seems okay, but as with any used car, you need to keep some cash in the bank for unexpected repairs.

Hard to say without looking at it personally.

It's cheap wich may indicate it needs work so factor in if your any good on the tools otherwise you may end up paying some serious $$$ at a mechanic/workshop.

We bought ours at 215K kms with a full service history and we saw it in person. She now has around 248K and has had a number of fixes and replacements (inline with age and kms) which if your comfortable on the tools can be done at home using information on this site and various other resources.

We originally were looking at a td5 disco interstate and lucky we paid an independent mob to perform a pre purchase inspection. Best $300 spent as we avoided buying a lemon.

Good luck.

so pretty well the usual milky oil inspection for headgaskets?
take her for a drive and let it warm up and see if she runs rough..

and hunt for service history, no history and the oil is black i will walk away haha.

thanks all, off to inspect

TD5 headgaskets are not normal when it comes to what we are talking about here.
You need to watch for coolant useage this usually happens when its under pressure the gaskets are a shim type of gasket and will not blow completely everytime.

Diesel vehicles have the oil go black pretty quickly due to the soot. There are ways to tell if the oil is contaminated by diesel (diluted) or if it is in need of a change, the most reliable is an oil analysis but that takes time.

The forum search tool is not real useful.

Got to Google, and search for
TD5 "head gasket" +site:aurlo.com

Auto or manual?
The autos can give problems around this km.
Mine has done 330K with no motor issues.
$3800 sounds too good to be true in my books - I would be suspecting something has to be wrong with it.

Originally Posted by Pinelli

The forum search tool is not real useful.

Got to Google, and search for
TD5 "head gasket" +site:aurlo.com

Or use the google custom search that's at the bottom of every page.