Thread: Engine oil leak

This morning I decided to take off the plastic tray at the bottom of the DS engine bay and see if I could spot any reason for a steering-related squeak that has developed. What I actually found was oil where it shouldn’t be. The absorber in that that tray is very black.

There’s a coolant pipe which runs from the left of the radiator or possibly inter cooler and heads down under the interface between engine (right) and gearbox (left), to the back of the engine and then up. Near the front, right down where it bends to go under the engine, there is oil dripping off the bottom of that pipe.

The oil seems to be spraying from somewhere down low on the side of the engine towards the front of the car. There’s a pretty localised patch of it on the side of another coolant hose that’s just adjacent to the first hose I described. Maybe a sump seal or something. Hopefully not a crack.

I’ll have to take this one to the dealer, sadly. They’re not a lot of fun to work with when you need something other than a routine service.

BTW, this is the older 2.2L SD4 engine. Not Ingenium.

Diagnosis was quick enough yesterday – I was right, there was oil leaking from the "bottom turbo pipe". Part had to be flown up from Melbourne of course, and they got it replaced today. The car drives better, I reckon. I'm glad I went poking around under the car... blowing a turbo out on a track somewhere would have really ruined a weekend.

To give Brisbane LR their due, they did go a bit out of their way to provide a loan car for 24 hours, they fixed the rattling A pillar trim, and they gave the car a pretty good clean inside and out. The repairs were no cost to me of course under LR warranty, but the dealer did add some real value to the process.