Freelander 1 TD4 engine numbers

When I asked how I could date or identify my car's engine number before I did not get very far - so let's try to throw a little light on TD$ engine numbers.

Firstly it is not where Rave says it is.
Stick a mirror or a camera down the back of the air filter housing - towards your right hand side as you lean into the bonnet from the front - rest your camera along side your heater hoses and you should see a barcode label just under the bottom of the air filter housing - that's what is used during engine manufacture.
The 8 digit number will appear on your log book as your engine number.

The thing that interests me is the RG or LRG number - and the age of the engine
Now My Daughter's '02 plate manual has LRG7030 and 82555092 - and the 8 digit agrees with the log book.

My '05 plate TD4 Auto has 80885896 as the 8 digit engine number both on the logbook and on the build spec.
- however it has a note in the service history saying "engine changed - supplied by customer"
It is labelled RG7159 82555652
- so would I be right in guessing that the LRG**** is Land Rover build and the RG**** is a Rover build?

- and I have I got a Rover 75 engine?

Also note that the '02 plate has a numerically larger engine number than the '05 plate so the first part of that number may be type rather than age or build number - can anyone enlighten us?

dfossil said:

When I asked how I could date or identify my car's engine number before I did not get very far - so let's try to throw a little light on TD$ engine numbers.

Firstly it is not where Rave says it is.
Stick a mirror or a camera down the back of the air filter housing - towards your right hand side as you lean into the bonnet from the front - rest your camera along side your heater hoses and you should see a barcode label just under the bottom of the air filter housing - that's what is used during engine manufacture.
The 8 digit number will appear on your log book as your engine number.

The thing that interests me is the RG or LRG number - and the age of the engine

Click to expand...

Ooops
Sorry - forgot the picture of the barcode label on mine - my Daughters has an LRG****

Does your daughter's label have R40 in the top right? R40 is a code for the Rover 75.

Hi GG - no - read again - my Daughter's is original fitment as per her logbook (don't have a photo) - it's mine that has the funny engine - and that does have R40 as top right - so that would that confirm it's a Rover 75 engine? - my next question is can any Rover 75 owner tell me the approximate age of my engine - 82555652 RG7159

dfossil said:

Hi GG - no - read again - my Daughter's is original fitment as per her logbook (don't have a photo) - it's mine that has the funny engine - and that does have R40 as top right - so that would that confirm it's a Rover 75 engine? - my next question is can any Rover 75 owner tell me the approximate age of my engine - 82555652 RG7159

Click to expand...

That's why I asked because yours has R40 and you suspect its from a 75, wondering if hers has something else.

An original Land Rover M47 engine should have L20 on the barcode instead of R40

td4van said:

An original Land Rover M47 engine should have L20 on the barcode instead of R40

Click to expand...

Thanks mate - Do you know if the R40 indicates that mine came out of a Rover 75 - or what?

- and where do you guys get this information? Grumpygel - tdvan ? The current Land Rover contacts I have can't tell me other than the barcode label is the reference during the build.
Can you date our engines from the information on this barcode label?

Yes the R40 signifies it is a Rover 75 engine

R40 was the development code under BMW for the Rover 75 and L20 was the Freelander code.

The engine number can be decoded but based on info on Google it's only a sequence number not tied in to a day/month/year

I only suggested checking the R40 bit because that is the code for the Rover 75 and google searches were bringing up M47 R40 engines "always" for the Rover and "often" for the Freelander - ie gave the appearance that they are for the Rover but also can be used in the Freelander. I hadn't picked up on the L20 bit, that's why I suggested checking what was on your daughter's label. Does she have L20 there?

So, from my part its just deduction/guess work!

If they are sequentially allocated, I suppose your best bet to getting its rough age would be on the Rover forums and asking what year and engine number people have - you'd have to be careful those giving the info have not had engine replacements themselves!

OK - Thanks Guys - I am a little further forward in as much as we believe my mill is from a Rover 75 - I just hope it was a nice low mileage unit when the previous owner sourced it.
Actually it runs very well........ so what the hell
Would there be any significant differences? I have no idea how much of the peripheral gear was swopped with the engine. Could the injectors for instance be different from standard Freelander?

GG - I found a photo of the Daughter's engine label and it is L20 LRG7030 82555062 - so that is exactly what you would expect to see

I think its pretty sure that your engine came from a 75 then - not that it matters as it sounds like its been very reliable for you

It does look like there are some differences between the engines in Freelander and 75, from this thread it looks like the injectors are different...

https://www.landyzone.co.uk/land-rover/rover-75-injectors-or-freelander.262352/

However, the injectors may also have been different between different model years and specs of Freelander - I seem to recall different output specs (HP) for TD4 Freelander.