4.6 hse 1997 boiling water in radiator tank.

Recently I became an owner of Range Rover 4.6 hse. The car looked ok
when I was buying it (checked in a Land Rover service before purchase)
but after 450 km I got strange symptoms. Engine is running fine with
temperature sensor pointer verticall and suddenly without any obvious
reason temp goes in seconds all the way to red zone and coolant is
boiling out from a radiator tank. Nothing is coming out from expansion
pipe on the tank, water goes out from a cap instead. I don't have "mayo
look oil" so hope it's not a loose cyl liner (am I too optimistic?).
Thinking of thermostat valve, water pump, radiator tank cap itself,
cooler dirty/chocked or cyl head gaskets. Any suggestions how to narrow
my search? I live in Poland and as far as I know my Rangie is a first
one in my place so there is no garage with a Range Rover experience.
Please help the pioneer
Rgds
Miki
RR 4.6 HSE, 1997, 192 000km

This has all the symptoms of a blown head gasket.

In message <[email protected]>
[email protected] wrote:

> Recently I became an owner of Range Rover 4.6 hse. The car looked ok
> when I was buying it (checked in a Land Rover service before purchase)
> but after 450 km I got strange symptoms. Engine is running fine with
> temperature sensor pointer verticall and suddenly without any obvious
> reason temp goes in seconds all the way to red zone and coolant is
> boiling out from a radiator tank. Nothing is coming out from expansion
> pipe on the tank, water goes out from a cap instead. I don't have "mayo
> look oil" so hope it's not a loose cyl liner (am I too optimistic?).
> Thinking of thermostat valve, water pump, radiator tank cap itself,
> cooler dirty/chocked or cyl head gaskets. Any suggestions how to narrow
> my search? I live in Poland and as far as I know my Rangie is a first
> one in my place so there is no garage with a Range Rover experience.
> Please help the pioneer
> Rgds
> Miki
> RR 4.6 HSE, 1997, 192 000km
>

That does't sound good at all. It could just be a blown head gasket,
but it is also classic symptoms of the dreaded porus block. If you can
rule out anything like a failed water pump etc then the heads are
going to have to come off. It's just possible that the head gasket
may be at fault, but if the old one looks undamaged then the block
is suspect. Please don't panic just yet, but be prepared for the
worst.
I don't suppose you have any warranty from the seller? If you do,
take it back and get them to fix it or refund you, after the
amount you've used it it is highly unlikley the vendor was not
aware of the problem.

All in my own personal opinion of course.

Richard
--
www.beamends-lrspares.co.uk [email protected]
RISC-OS - Where have all the good guys gone?
Lib Dems - Townies keeping comedy alive

beamendsltd napisal(a):
> That does't sound good at all. It could just be a blown head gasket,
> but it is also classic symptoms of the dreaded porus block. If you can
> rule out anything like a failed water pump etc then the heads are
> going to have to come off. It's just possible that the head gasket
> may be at fault, but if the old one looks undamaged then the block
> is suspect. Please don't panic just yet, but be prepared for the
> worst.

I'm trying to be Already manage to order cooling system repair
compund
called K-seal from Kalimex ltd. as I read on this group it might work
on a porous block.
The strange thing is the engine was running fine for 450km since I
brought the car from a city I bought it in to my place, and suddenly,
bang! I have a kettle under the bonnet
Though I noticed that when damn needle goes all the way to red and tiny
red light comes on it tends
to drop a little bit (a needle, not a light) when I pressed a gas
engine revs increased. Viscious fan
maybe? Of course I didn't experiment to much as the engine was boiling.
And one more thing:
I can see air bubbles coming out of rubber hose (about 1/2inch) into a
header tank. Is there
any chance that the system is heavy aerated and needs just to bleed the
air off?

> I don't suppose you have any warranty from the seller? If you do,
> take it back and get them to fix it or refund you, after the
> amount you've used it it is highly unlikley the vendor was not
> aware of the problem.

Nope. No waranty from the seller. Not yet in Poland
Head gaskets are on their way, fingers crossed Thanks for all advice.
miki

ChavScum napisal(a):
> This has all the symptoms of a blown head gasket.

Is there any way to find out which bank of the engine is it or two
gaskets have to go together?

<[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
> beamendsltd napisal(a):
>> That does't sound good at all. It could just be a blown head gasket,
>> but it is also classic symptoms of the dreaded porus block. If you can
>> rule out anything like a failed water pump etc then the heads are
>> going to have to come off. It's just possible that the head gasket
>> may be at fault, but if the old one looks undamaged then the block
>> is suspect. Please don't panic just yet, but be prepared for the
>> worst.
>
> I'm trying to be Already manage to order cooling system repair
> compund
> called K-seal from Kalimex ltd. as I read on this group it might work
> on a porous block.
> The strange thing is the engine was running fine for 450km since I
> brought the car from a city I bought it in to my place, and suddenly,
> bang! I have a kettle under the bonnet
> Though I noticed that when damn needle goes all the way to red and tiny
> red light comes on it tends
> to drop a little bit (a needle, not a light) when I pressed a gas
> engine revs increased. Viscious fan
> maybe? Of course I didn't experiment to much as the engine was boiling.
> And one more thing:
> I can see air bubbles coming out of rubber hose (about 1/2inch) into a
> header tank. Is there
> any chance that the system is heavy aerated and needs just to bleed the
> air off?
>
>> I don't suppose you have any warranty from the seller? If you do,
>> take it back and get them to fix it or refund you, after the
>> amount you've used it it is highly unlikley the vendor was not
>> aware of the problem.
>
> Nope. No waranty from the seller. Not yet in Poland
> Head gaskets are on their way, fingers crossed Thanks for all advice.
> miki
>

Couldn't a stuck thermostat have similar effects? It could be heating up the
water to such a degree it cant get cooled by the radiator? I might be
talking crap though! I'll have a look on my RAVE cd tonight

Also, you can get a tester to check for exhaust gas in the coolant, this
will confirm any present.

The main way the head gaskets go is on the outer water gallery on the front
& back of the heads/block & normally that just leaks the water away onto the
road. But they can leak all over the place i believe too!!

<[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
> ChavScum napisal(a):
>> This has all the symptoms of a blown head gasket.
>
> Is there any way to find out which bank of the engine is it or two
> gaskets have to go together?
>

Do both at the same time, you will need to have them skimmed also. When you
have the heads off look at the pistons, do any look 'cleaned' by water at
temperature? Or do they look like the should. Another easy way to check
before ripping the heads off is to take out the plugs, if one looks very
'washed' clean it can tell you more about the areas affected by block/gasket
problems.

Usually when you take off the head gaskets you can see the leaks, i could on
mine.

Nige napisal(a):

> Couldn't a stuck thermostat have similar effects? It could be heating up the
> water to such a degree it cant get cooled by the radiator? I might be
> talking crap though! I'll have a look on my RAVE cd tonight

That's my next step Nigel. I've just got RAVE manual from the web and
trying to get it to work
(I seem to be very incompatible as on a top of Range Rover, my computer
is Macintosh)
But anyway I'll go through that Rave thing and maybe some idea will
come to me.
I did some more test with my Rangie. Now it behaves well. I poured the
coolant mixture in a header tank,
ran the engine with tank cap off and then stopped and refilled the
system. After that I let the engine idle for 30 min. Nothing.
Temperature was ok. I did 5km and still ok. I've checked the hose to a
radiator, when the engine is cold (idle) hose is also cold and not
pressurized. After some time hose is getting warm and stiff but I
suppose it's normal as colant expand and works in a system under water
pump pressure. What looked strange for me, was the axial play on a
water pump. Anyone of you guys know is it supose to be like that? It's
5 mm reciprocating axial travel of pump pulley and fan attached to it.
Looks strange for me (I'm an engineer but I work on a huge diesel
engines only). And another thing was those two electric fans at the
front of radiator. By tracing the system they look like A/C condenser
fans, but with A/C on or off both fans wouldn't start. Are they A/C
fans, support fans for viscious fan or both? The A/C itself also
sometimes doesn't cut in when I start a car and it's running ok next
time I turn ignintion key in.

> Also, you can get a tester to check for exhaust gas in the coolant, this
> will confirm any present.

I ran the engine with a header tank cap off and couldn't smell any
exhaust gases. Would I smell them if they were present? There is a lot
of bubbles constantly coming out of pipes attached to a header tank but
nothing smells like exhaust.

> The main way the head gaskets go is on the outer water gallery on the front
> & back of the heads/block & normally that just leaks the water away onto the
> road. But they can leak all over the place i believe too!!

This doesn't seem to be a case. I lost water couple of times because it
came out of an expansion tank cap while it was boiling. (sighs)
Such a nice machine that Rangie but why it costs me so much troubles
from a very beginning?
Thank you all for help. If, eventually I find out what's wrong I let
you all know. Maybe I got a lemon?

> Couldn't a stuck thermostat have similar effects? It could be heating up the
> water to such a degree it cant get cooled by the radiator? I might be
> talking crap though! I'll have a look on my RAVE cd tonight

I had that on a Beemer in France. It was absolutely fine, then the
needle would hit the red, a couple of minutes later it would drop back
to normal. After a few goes at this it eventually overheated on the
autoroute. I managed to limp it to a provincial garage who filled it up
with coolant for me and pointed me in the direction of the BMW garage
(about 20km away) I got all the way to the BMW garage with it doing the
same thing - stopped outside the garage, started to reverse into a
parking space when there was a huge bang, and lots (and lots) of steam!
The thermostat was sticking - housed in a plastic manifold on the
front of the engine, the pressure had blown the plastic manifold to
pieces! The whole process had taken the water pump with it (plastic
blades that had knackered because of the heat I guess?).

Guess the OP could try removing the thermostat, and see what happens,
but as others have mentioned, it sounds like the classic P38 4.6 V8 problem.

Matt

"ChavScum" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> This has all the symptoms of a blown head gasket.
>

Miki:

I have too agree with the above post. This is easy to diagnose without
taking the heads off. Get your self a compression tester (around $25 US).
Pull all the plugs from the head and inspect. Do a compression test on the
cylinders with ALL the plugs removed and note the pressure. They should all
be about the same. Around 130 - 150 psi or 10000 kPa give or take (if memory
serves me right). If two cylinders are much below this and next to one
another then a blown head gasket may be the culprit. Easy to change out with
standard hand tools, just time consuming. Check your oil for signs of water
too.

My wife's '99 RR goes through 1 gallon of coolant every 6 months.I cannot
find any leaks or problems with the plugs. I've checked the "dreaded" unions
to the heater core with no luck either. Rugs and floor boards are dry. There
is no diminish in performance or smoke from the tailpipe. I am stumped. So I
routinely inspect the level and top off as needed.

Good luck.

Jack