Beware of the Not serviced 300tdi and the $2.16 that fails

**madmagpie05** · 12th April 2008, 05:54 PM

Sit down and I will tell you a sad and expensive tale. I have a 95 White series 1 Disco, 300tdi manual with 360k on the clock. I got her 12 months or so ago, have done 2 oil changes and some other jobs,(indicator switch, wiper motor) but nothing major. Have been off road several times with her and she have performed faultlessly.
Last Sunday 6th April, coming home traveling along the Eastern Freeway at speed, little man with hammer started to try and get out of the engine

, loss of power and lots of smoke, switched her off and side of the road. Rang the missus and got her to come and pick me up.
Collected the mate Dave and Hired a trailer Carching $86. Picked her up and brought her home. By this time it's 10.30 and had enough of the day.
Monday, get her in the shed, drove it in, blowing compression back into the air cleaner. Bottom end sounds ok so I'm thinking somethings let go in the head, dropped a valve or something like that. So Off With Her Head.
Get her apart and yep, because of lack of servicing, Lash Cap ripped apart, valve not closing fully and blowing compression back into the air cleaner.
Head to to Onger in Bayswater, New set of lash caps @ $2.16 each. Clean, pressure test, new set of exhaust valve guides, valve regrind, new 1.5 ml head gasket and VRS set, $780. 1 New Glow plug $45 as it had a broken on. Balance pipe that goes from the top of the Thermostat housing to the top of radiator to the surge tank (original about the consistency of Bakelite and shattered) $70. New Coolant. Fuel overflow/bypass pipes that takes the excess fuel from the injectors back to the injection pump fell to bits, chasing them found they cannot be brought from parts suppler have to buy the WHOLE assembly for $160. Buggar that and went to ENZED, 4 pieces of 4 ml fuel line for couple of $

. A week off the road

. Getting to know my car intimately

, I am pleased with the results

.
SO the moral of this story. If you think it needs a service, even if it doesn't, do it anyway
Thanks for reading and hope I didn't waffle too much.
Madmagpie05

P.S. all i gotta do is sort out second gear.

**Blknight.aus** · 12th April 2008, 06:27 PM

good story with an important moral. Dont worry too much about the length of it, its a big internet with plenty of storage.(sorry Inc) Some of my posts can go more than 1000 words just doing the introductory insult before actually getting anything like near getting close to making a point.

**seqfisho** · 12th April 2008, 06:29 PM

After reading recent posts on 300tdi head gaskets what sort of condition was yours in when you pulled the head off. Do you think it was the original gasket.

**long stroke** · 12th April 2008, 06:32 PM

Man i bet you were sh***in bricks when you sore smoke coming from under the hood

I no i would have

CHEERS

TIM...

**justinc** · 12th April 2008, 06:38 PM

Originally Posted by Blknight.aus

good story with an important moral. Dont worry too much about the length of it, its a big internet with plenty of storage.(sorry Inc) Some of my posts can go more than 1000 words just doing the introductory insult before actually getting anything like near getting close to making a point.

Good one Dave!

JC

**madmagpie05** · 12th April 2008, 06:54 PM

Originally Posted by seqfisho;

After reading recent posts on 300tdi head gaskets what sort of condition was yours in when you pulled the head off. Do you think it was the original gasket.

Hi fisho, the head gasket would have been in really good condition if I known the trick with cable tying the back to head bolts together

, which I did to put it back on. Back to the head gasket itself. No it wasn't original. Yes it was in good condition and had been there a while. The head was in good nick, except the exhaust valve guides which were in very sad condition. The bores are in good nick, just a minor amount of ridging but nothing excessive, so I am reasonably confident of a fair amount of trouble free motoring, with the correct servicing.

My next Major fix with the vehicle is second gear. There is NO synco with second gear and it makes her very difficult to drive in city traffic.
Catch u round the site
Madmagpie05

P.s. I am amazed that there is 4 different head gasket thickness for these engines and why in the hell did they use those B stupid head bolts with needing a degree plate to pull the down

Engineers

**madmagpie05** · 12th April 2008, 07:01 PM

Originally Posted by long stroke;

Man i bet you were sh***in bricks when you sore smoke coming from under the hood

I no i would have

CHEERS

TIM...

Yeah hi stroke, the smoke didn't worry me initially as much as the sound of the little man with the Hammer, the one whom we all fear and dread the sound of. There is something about metal hitting something it shouldn't at speed that sends that Special kind of fear down the spine
Madmagpie05

**loanrangie** · 13th April 2008, 10:11 AM

In all fairness i believe 360k is getting up there so you expect things like that to wear out and not a design fault. Do the lash caps have a replacement timeline from LR ?

**p38arover** · 13th April 2008, 10:25 AM

Originally Posted by madmagpie05

Hi fisho, the head gasket would have been in really good condition if I known the trick with cable tying the back to head bolts together

, which I did to put it back on.

Umm, is this "two" otherwise it doesn't make sense, I'm afraid?

mcrover · 13th April 2008, 11:46 AM

To stop this from happening I would concentrate more on your valve clearances more than servicing which most people think is just an oil and filter change and that is usually all a normal mechanic (not a specialist) will do.

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