could the head gasket be gone already?

Hi there. After a good bit of research I plucked up the courage to buy a freelander. I found one which needed a bit of work but nothing to major. All faults seem to be common faults and reasonably straight forward to fix. This one in particular already had the head gasket replaced and the guy i bought it from told me of the expansion tank needing replaced.
All fine except I can keep water and coolant in it.
Reading up on most forums point to head gasket. until now i've dismissed it because it was supposed to have been done.
There is no mayo in oil filler cap.
dipstick is fine and oil is fine.

I do have white smoke and I've discovered a drip from the exhaust downpipe join.
it is leaking from the gasket of the exhaust.

It is of course the 1.8 petrol.
Any ideas?

Well, have your coolant tested for hydrocarbons definitely. But a more likely culprit is the intake manifold gasket if you're just loosing coolant. Luckily they are pennies and dead easy to fix.

But if there's no mayo, then even if it is HGF you will have caught it early and it will be alot simpler to correct.

Welcome to K series ownership ! Lot's of useful links for you in my signature, you will benefit from reading them .

Will.

thanks for that. i'll check that out.

whilst you have the inlet manifold off. knock the ball bearing out of the jiggle valve

Welcome to the site btw

it looks like this




in case you think i'm planking you

I had to look it up. lol. will do

ok then, I've just removed the inlet manifold and the amount of water coming back at me is astounding.
Is this normal?

duh of course it is. i didn't drain all the water did i. clown

this is well worth doing, if not only to eliminate it from your investigation.

hope it works for yer

here's an up date,
replaced the gasket to the inlet manifold. although the old one didn't look too bad there was a fair bit of silicone on it which obviosly the pevious owner used to try and seal it.
Now no water coming down the exhaust.
BUT white smoke still coming and the dreaded mayo in the dipstick.
expansion tank still clear of oil.
I'm expecting the worst but kind of hoping that the water that had maybe gone into the engine from the inlet leaking is causing the smoke and the mayo. But i suspect the head gasket is gone.

water pump gasket ?

I'll check that out. thanks

edge said:

water pump gasket ?

Click to expand...

There's an O-ring, not really a gasket. I don't think it's the water pump as this doesn't account for the mayo.

Laois, change the oil (when it's a bit warm would be best) and then check if you have mayo again after a few days. If there's no mayo in the header tank then that's something.

I take it i'd need to do a flush first

Maybe I'm not sure to be honest, if it's not bad then you should be able to change it and then change again in about half the normal interval. It's a real bastard, especially if it turns out it is HGF.

Will.

maybe it wasn't flushed out properly from a previous hgf!

dump the coolant and refill with water and 4 dishwater tabs (powdered)

run for 15 mins at temp and dump out, then refill with water, run for 5 mins at temp, then dump out and refill with coolant.

just been out again and i have taken apart the exhaust at the downpipe join and there is a drip without the engine running. Its not a bad drip but an annoying one. I've checked the bolts on the inlet again and they are the correct torque. The loss certainly isn't as bad as it was before

A quick update.
gave the coolant system and engine a flush and changed fluids. everything seems fine, no oil in water and the oil although theres a hint of condensation i think thats now sorted. Thank god.
took it for a spin and its now idling a bit funny. engine managment light flickers and i think its burning the fuel a bit rich, hence the steamy exhaust. certainly not water now.
Any ideas.
Checked plugs and they seem fine
There is a small hole in the exhaust downpipe just above the join and below the lambda. Could that be didturbing things

Another update. decided to bite the bullet and remove the head to see if the previous owner had in fact replaced it. He had but hadn't torqed it correctly. 6 were ok the other 4 were no where near it. lifted the head off and cylinder 2 was full of water. on the underside at the between 2 of the valves a lovely little crack.:jaw:
Any one know where in ireland i can get a replacement engine?

Ebay mate, you should be able to pick up a decent k seris for under £300 . You could even get a not so great one and rebuild it with all new bits.

You gonna fit an EWP like me then ?