300tdi problems 95

picked up the wife sunday night and parked the disco on drive all running well and no problems then went to start it up monday morning and was reluctant to start had to give it a lot of throttle it started and i left it idling for a while but when i pulled out of drive way the engine had no power at all and smoked a lot white smoke then died it was then rluctant to turn over managed to start it again and reved it up but sooon as you engaged gear it just wanted to die again any ideas as to problem

Don't like the sound of that, white smoke......two things associated with white smoke and both are not good news I'm afraid, one is head gasket, and the second is turbo seal failure. I don't suppose it will run long enough to see if it is losing water, it would be good to get it pressure tested or use a head gasket sniffer. If all Ok then I would suspect the turbo.

White smoke is also un burnt diesel, i.e timing! If the timing belt was too slack it might have jumped a tooth for example!