Zigzagsky
Member
- Posts
- 96
- Location
- Sandhurst, Berkshire
Thought I would post my initial thoughts and experiences having recently joined the 'green oval' club with a 2003 1.8 petrol ES 5 door. The car was bought as an occasional load logger and transport for me to follow my passion for fishing where venues are often down long, muddy and rutted tracks.
The previous owner had replaced the head gasket with an updated one, replaced the exhaust system from the cat back, replaced the water pump and cambelt and fitted new discs and pads up front. So lots of necessary work done and it was cheap!
Having had a 1.8 MGTF for a number of years, I was aware of the head gasket weakness but it's been done and I'm always careful to run the engine gently until fully warmed up and keeping a watchful eye on the coolant tank.
As far as I can tell, the VCU is ok as it seems to move quite smoothly on full lock both forward and reverse but as the car has done 90k I will change it soon for peace of mind.
For a 4x4 it drives very much like a car. In all honesty my wife's X3 handles better but the Freelander seems to sit you much higher up so you feel that you're in a more commanding position and it's great being able to see over the hedges.
Coming from years of BMW ownership, it does seem to suffer from quite a lot of surface rust underneath which even on my BMW 1999 car is far less pronounced.
However the small physical size of the engine implies that working on her should be reasonably straightforward since ther is plenty of room under the hood (to get blowtorches and angle grinders at stubborn and rounded off bolts).
So far I have suffered from a small water leak from the metal pipes going to the IRD cooler which I fixed with some metal weld and I have had to replace one of the camshaft oil seals but not bad on a 10 year old car.
The front tyres were badly worn and no two tyre brands were the same so she's had new boots front and rear.
Having been following this forum for a couple of weeks now and being a person who likes to tinker under a car, I think the Freelander may reward me in spades
The previous owner had replaced the head gasket with an updated one, replaced the exhaust system from the cat back, replaced the water pump and cambelt and fitted new discs and pads up front. So lots of necessary work done and it was cheap!
Having had a 1.8 MGTF for a number of years, I was aware of the head gasket weakness but it's been done and I'm always careful to run the engine gently until fully warmed up and keeping a watchful eye on the coolant tank.
As far as I can tell, the VCU is ok as it seems to move quite smoothly on full lock both forward and reverse but as the car has done 90k I will change it soon for peace of mind.
For a 4x4 it drives very much like a car. In all honesty my wife's X3 handles better but the Freelander seems to sit you much higher up so you feel that you're in a more commanding position and it's great being able to see over the hedges.
Coming from years of BMW ownership, it does seem to suffer from quite a lot of surface rust underneath which even on my BMW 1999 car is far less pronounced.
However the small physical size of the engine implies that working on her should be reasonably straightforward since ther is plenty of room under the hood (to get blowtorches and angle grinders at stubborn and rounded off bolts).
So far I have suffered from a small water leak from the metal pipes going to the IRD cooler which I fixed with some metal weld and I have had to replace one of the camshaft oil seals but not bad on a 10 year old car.
The front tyres were badly worn and no two tyre brands were the same so she's had new boots front and rear.
Having been following this forum for a couple of weeks now and being a person who likes to tinker under a car, I think the Freelander may reward me in spades
