Thread: TD5 head failure

Originally Posted by stealth

My Defender has been leaking deisel into the sump and after having O rings and washers replaced the symptoms continued and the fault was traced to a crack in the head on one of the injector ports. It is barely discernible on the attached photo so I have highlighted it with black texta. The replacement head is an improved version so I'm informed with a thicker wall on the injector port. This failure occured after 180,000km. Apparently it is not uncommon on the TD5.

Bad news, sorry to hear This is unfortunately not uncommon, last one we did on initial inspection had no discernable cracks, at the end of 1 week with the new Orings and seals it was worse, after pulling the injectors again, the crack, almost exactly where yours is, was clearly visible.

JC

Thanks Justin. Yes it is disappointing as the head shows no other sign of wear and the bores look fine after 180,000kms. Have you heard of any upgraded heads failing?

Originally Posted by stealth

Thanks Justin. Yes it is disappointing as the head shows no other sign of wear and the bores look fine after 180,000kms. Have you heard of any upgraded heads failing?

No not yet, and TBH we work on heaps of these engines, and this particular failure rate is really very low. When I said not uncommon I should've phrased it differently. I meant that failure area is a common place to crack, have had 2 do this. We have several hundred Td5's as customers.

You'll be pleased to know that these bottom ends will easily do over half a million Km's, if looked after in the air and oil filtration department, and not overheated.

JC

Just got the bill. $7300. Does include an overhaul of cooling system but still a big 'Ouch' after so few kms.

Discovery 2 TD5A 2003 Engine. After fitting all new fuel-injector-unit o-rings and copper washers, then 5 new fuel injector units themselves, I also finally had to replace the cylinder head with a Turner UK supplied Spanish AMC Cylinder Head.

As previous photographs show in this thread, the alloy around the fuel-injector-unit housings are twice as thick on the AMC head than the original LR head. My LR cylinder head was not cracked, but the alloy was so thin, it had become porous.

Also the original cylinder block bore cross-honing marks are still clearly visible, even after running with diesel diluted sump oil.

The good side to all this is, with the new cylinder head, and complete removal of the 2003 EU3 EGR junk, the D2 is much more lively, and has improved fuel consumption.

After many hours spent in the garage, the smile is back on my face once again.

Originally Posted by justinc

No not yet, and TBH we work on heaps of these engines, and this particular failure rate is really very low. When I said not uncommon I should've phrased it differently. I meant that failure area is a common place to crack, have had 2 do this. We have several hundred Td5's as customers.

You'll be pleased to know that these bottom ends will easily do over half a million Km's, if looked after in the air and oil filtration department, and not overheated.

JC

Heya, i've worked on heaps of these too, and we've had 1 recently that cracked the fuel journal, it was nearly 12 months to the day since we did the head gasket on it. we had replaced the orings and washers 3 times thinking that we'd pinched them each time. the last time the fuel leak into the area adjacent to the injector was quiet fast which increased our suspicions. The crack was tiny but we did find it and our machine shop fitted a sleeve to the injector port in the head.(The head had to come off again much to the customers dismay) we put it back together and as far as i know it's still going fine. i have noticed a lot on these heads that there are wear marks usually on the rear side of each injector port where the injectors look like they have been rubbing. and yeah these bottom ends will go forever if they don't loose oil pressure from the oil pump bolt falling off!!

Excellent news that a sleeve has fixed a cylinder head diesel leak. Ok, as you say, the head had to come off, but it must have been a lot cheaper than a new head.

We are finding a much higher proportion of post-2003 EU3 (single-fuel gallery) than EU2 2-gallery cylinder heads need replacing.

Thanks for photos, I think I have same problem. Already O rings and washers replaced.