during the week i picked up a new tappet rubber gasket seal thing, three new washers and an o-ring as there was a bit of an oil leak on the driver side

this is the first time i had removed the tappet cover with only the local repairer being the only ones since i have owned it

i did a search and came up with a pdf file of instructions, thanks forum

when i removed the breather cover i was amazed to see it all sealed up with some sort of black silastic stuff and no o-ring, when i removed the tappet cover the second shock was the holeopening that the breather fits into has been welded up covering 2/3 of the hole, i had a close look and could not see any cracks........has anybody seen this before??

i'm guessing this may have been done to reduce the amount of oil going through the breather, who knows

i like the add up to nine method of checking the tappet clearance, they were all spot on and the valve caps appeared to be in good nick......i looked at removing the glow plugs but thought i would try a 22mm socket on the alternator, worked a treat, definetly don't need to remove the glow plugs

right.... back to the mess in the tappet cover, i removed the breather all together to check the mating of the it and the tappet cover, there was no fouling, when i slipped the o-ring over the tube and mated it with the cover part of the o-ring at the top does not get compressed an with the bolt only pulling down on one side it doesn't look like the best sealing method, maybe this is why silastic is used

it only took the seal to fall out once when refitting for me to get the 401 out to hold it in place

cleaned the area up and headed off to the park with the boys, popped the bonnet only to discover i had not reconnected the other breather hose, clean off the oiley mess, didn't check for leaks when i got home, i reckon there is going to be a bit of a leak/weap due to the o-ring setup

will ring the repairer re: tappet cover as when i picked up the o-ring they said thats all you need, whay didn't they fit ine and why didn't they mention the welded up tappet cover, they are not likely to remember as they worked on it 2 years ago.....

pulled the deep cycles out (1 x 120amp and 1 x 80amp), what a PITA it is, have to remove the rear seat and carefulle undi the cables without arcing them out.........which idiot designed this area, topped the batteries up, reasting voltage was 12.89V happy with that, what a PITA to put them back in, yep managed to do a bit of welding in the process, what idiot designed this system....anyway they are out of site for another six months

dropping all the oils on tuesday so she will be good for thursday when i leave for the expo