So today I collected my 90 Defender 200 TDI back from Glencoyne Engineering. For those of you who don't know, Glencoyne is owned and operated by Richard Hall (of Land Rover Monthly "Our Man in Norfolk" fame) who is an expert on Series and 200/300 TDI's.
Its taken me 4 years to get to this point, many so called Land Rover specialists, who though professing to have the knowledge and skill set to diagnose and solve 200 TDI issues, quite simply didn't. I suspect TD5 onwards was their cup of tea, but the analogue nature of the early cars just stumped them all, whilst I stumped up the cash.
I had a couple of persistent issues, one being I couldn't get over 56mph, the other being I was getting about 11mph out of each gear.
Bare in mind at this point, I had an Allards VNT, Allisport Intercooler, Fourby boost pin/ring, Pipercross air filter, Griffin custom made 3.5 straight through exhaust.
Then to add to my woes, in August whilst driving up a fairly steep hill, I slowly lost power, to the point I pretty much stalled, this happened continuously from this point onwards, so I went to a non specialist, to get a diagnosis. They concluded I had fried the turbo and the cartridge. Despite many many attempts, Allards were unreachable, so I had to fork out for a new Bell Auto VNT Turbo (very helpful and answered the phone!!). This also involved getting the exhaust refabricated to fit the flange of the new turbo, as the Allard one was top mounted like a 300 TDI unit, used Rich's Fabrication near Abingdon, bloody fantastic, does a lot of Landy's, should have got my exhaust made there in the first place, but he was not setup well in terms of social media.
Turbo, attached, new pipes, all fluids changed. No joy, same issues, so then compression tests, smoke tests, no joy. Eventually I told them to give up.
I'd been in dialogue with Richard at Glencoyne for a while, trying to get booked in, during the process he had been reviewing possible causes, getting me to check serial numbers of the transfer box, to check the ratios etc, running through the setup and checks we had done. Eventually we agreed that I needed to take it up to Norfolk.
I had to trailer it up Banham (it had covered more trailer miles than road miles at this point!). Met Richard, went through a few things started it up, he played with the throttle, said it looked like a fuelling issue, leave it with him and he would come back to me. At this point I had factored in a complete rebuild.
I got an email the next morning from Richard, he had found the issues, dialogue below;
Not quite, he had noticed oil trickling on the crank seal and I had asked him to thoroughly check everything before I collected it.
He had the engine out to remove the flywheel casing, unbolted the starter motor and spotted a line of rust running down the block, after cleaning it off with brake cleaner, it was a hairline crack down the block. New engine required!!!
Luckily, I had saved up for this event, so had the funds reserved, but still a massive pi55er! On inspection the internals were spotless, so theoretically its previous owner hadn't managed the coolant and the frost did the rest!
So now to the good bit!!
There was a bottom end from a 200 TDI at Glencoyne, so that got sent of to the machinists to be skimmed and bored, +0.20 Kolbenschmidt Pistons.
Block refaced, painted, new bearing cap bolts, crank polished and balanced, Glyco bearings, Corteco front and rear seals, Flywheel refaced and balanced, major components cleaned, checked and reassured (camshaft, conrods etc).
Turner Engineering gas-flowed performance head, Elring head gasket, new head bolts, Injectors overhauled with new tips, new glow plugs, Dayco timing belt, OEM tensioner, new water pump, oil pump, thermostat, lift pump, vibration, damper, engine mounts. Additionally a new AP Driveline clutch.
The final thing to do, was to set up gauges etc. Having struggled to get VDO gauges for everything, partly due to Covid and partly due to normal cottage industry snail pace, I opted for a Madman multigauge, as it covered importantly EGT, boost pressure and oil pressure, but also oil temp, engine hours and RPM.
So this after a 4 hour train journey, I collected it, in the fog. It needs to be run in, so slow and steady and 60 max, but after a 3 hour drive, my initial thoughts are;
> Quiet, its so quiet, much less agricultural
> Smoother, much more linear power delivery and much less jerky
> The power is definitely there, not yet tapped into it, but you can feel its there and wants to pull
> Speed, I was easily at 60mph, spend most of my time trying to keep it below 60, so much better to be able to faster than lorries! Will work out where it can get to once its run it.
Just generally feels a lot more special and massively more useable. But I still have 1800 miles to run it in and even though it will take a couple of months, its going to be great to be able to drive it properly.
I'll post some pictures tomorrow, but so far I'm really chuffed. That's stage 2 done!!
Its taken me 4 years to get to this point, many so called Land Rover specialists, who though professing to have the knowledge and skill set to diagnose and solve 200 TDI issues, quite simply didn't. I suspect TD5 onwards was their cup of tea, but the analogue nature of the early cars just stumped them all, whilst I stumped up the cash.
I had a couple of persistent issues, one being I couldn't get over 56mph, the other being I was getting about 11mph out of each gear.
Bare in mind at this point, I had an Allards VNT, Allisport Intercooler, Fourby boost pin/ring, Pipercross air filter, Griffin custom made 3.5 straight through exhaust.
Then to add to my woes, in August whilst driving up a fairly steep hill, I slowly lost power, to the point I pretty much stalled, this happened continuously from this point onwards, so I went to a non specialist, to get a diagnosis. They concluded I had fried the turbo and the cartridge. Despite many many attempts, Allards were unreachable, so I had to fork out for a new Bell Auto VNT Turbo (very helpful and answered the phone!!). This also involved getting the exhaust refabricated to fit the flange of the new turbo, as the Allard one was top mounted like a 300 TDI unit, used Rich's Fabrication near Abingdon, bloody fantastic, does a lot of Landy's, should have got my exhaust made there in the first place, but he was not setup well in terms of social media.
Turbo, attached, new pipes, all fluids changed. No joy, same issues, so then compression tests, smoke tests, no joy. Eventually I told them to give up.
I'd been in dialogue with Richard at Glencoyne for a while, trying to get booked in, during the process he had been reviewing possible causes, getting me to check serial numbers of the transfer box, to check the ratios etc, running through the setup and checks we had done. Eventually we agreed that I needed to take it up to Norfolk.
I had to trailer it up Banham (it had covered more trailer miles than road miles at this point!). Met Richard, went through a few things started it up, he played with the throttle, said it looked like a fuelling issue, leave it with him and he would come back to me. At this point I had factored in a complete rebuild.
I got an email the next morning from Richard, he had found the issues, dialogue below;
- Lift pump had failed even though it was nearly new. This is a common problem on 200TDis and I have pump spacers made to my own design to stop it happening. Vehicle now has a new lift pump and spacer kit.
- Banjo fitting on the fuel return line had the wrong union. Some idiot had fitted a feed line union, with the result that the injection pump could not maintain internal pressure even before the lift pump failed.
- Throttle not opening fully due to your new floor mats. I have removed the over mat as there was a danger of it catching on the pedal and jamming it open, and cut away a small rectangle from the edge of the carpet for the same reason.
- Maximum speed screw setting was a bit conservative. You have to be careful with this one to avoid overrevving and blowing up the engine, but I have wound it out a couple of turns.
- Ditto the full power fuel screw, which made the vehicle very sluggish at low revs. Again you have to be careful not to overdo this setting otherwise you get loads of smoke. As set up now, if you accelerate from low revs there is a puff of black smoke until the turbo spools up, after that it is pretty much smoke-free.
Not quite, he had noticed oil trickling on the crank seal and I had asked him to thoroughly check everything before I collected it.
He had the engine out to remove the flywheel casing, unbolted the starter motor and spotted a line of rust running down the block, after cleaning it off with brake cleaner, it was a hairline crack down the block. New engine required!!!
Luckily, I had saved up for this event, so had the funds reserved, but still a massive pi55er! On inspection the internals were spotless, so theoretically its previous owner hadn't managed the coolant and the frost did the rest!
So now to the good bit!!
There was a bottom end from a 200 TDI at Glencoyne, so that got sent of to the machinists to be skimmed and bored, +0.20 Kolbenschmidt Pistons.
Block refaced, painted, new bearing cap bolts, crank polished and balanced, Glyco bearings, Corteco front and rear seals, Flywheel refaced and balanced, major components cleaned, checked and reassured (camshaft, conrods etc).
Turner Engineering gas-flowed performance head, Elring head gasket, new head bolts, Injectors overhauled with new tips, new glow plugs, Dayco timing belt, OEM tensioner, new water pump, oil pump, thermostat, lift pump, vibration, damper, engine mounts. Additionally a new AP Driveline clutch.
The final thing to do, was to set up gauges etc. Having struggled to get VDO gauges for everything, partly due to Covid and partly due to normal cottage industry snail pace, I opted for a Madman multigauge, as it covered importantly EGT, boost pressure and oil pressure, but also oil temp, engine hours and RPM.
So this after a 4 hour train journey, I collected it, in the fog. It needs to be run in, so slow and steady and 60 max, but after a 3 hour drive, my initial thoughts are;
> Quiet, its so quiet, much less agricultural
> Smoother, much more linear power delivery and much less jerky
> The power is definitely there, not yet tapped into it, but you can feel its there and wants to pull
> Speed, I was easily at 60mph, spend most of my time trying to keep it below 60, so much better to be able to faster than lorries! Will work out where it can get to once its run it.
Just generally feels a lot more special and massively more useable. But I still have 1800 miles to run it in and even though it will take a couple of months, its going to be great to be able to drive it properly.
I'll post some pictures tomorrow, but so far I'm really chuffed. That's stage 2 done!!
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