Help 2.5 DSE - Packed up / any ideas ?

hw2002 · Mar 24, 2010

Hi all, any ideas grealy appreciated, ok 1996 RR 2.5 DSE auto, BMW engine, 208k, suddenly lost all power totally, temp guage shot thro the roof and came to a grinding halt, the vehicle did not blow steam out(on the M4 of all places, cost me 200 quid recovery), moving on.......when the recovery chap looked, seemed vehicle was very low on water, topped up, but would not build up pressure, seemed to think the fault may be the head gasket, how would I know ?, said this could be proved by compress test ?, no idea....anyone advise if this is an expensive job ? - will it be worth doing at this milage ?, rest of car is great, runs fine till this happened, .......
Again many thanks and all assistance greatly appreciated - thank you.

oh, I have not owned this long, the recovery chappie noticed that the heater has been bypassed, dont know if that may have any bearing on this situ - thanks

bart2181 · Mar 24, 2010

i,m no expert matey but it does sound like the head gaskets gone.not sure of a price but i,d be guessing maybe £400 independant l/r garage.if the car was running fine before this then yes i would say it would be worth doing.where abouts are you based theres some cracking lads on site who may be able to point you in the right direction they might even tell you that its not the head gasket and i,m just talking bo**ocks but thres nothing on tv and i,m bored out my brains.

j the range · Mar 24, 2010

i,am no sexpert but its been sold with, know water problem. cracked head would be my shot at your problem..

stefanw · Mar 25, 2010

A friends dse had a similar thing happen to it, in his case it was the coolant hose that had a really small hole just outside the clamp on the head under the intake..it would loose coolant but only when driven so it turned out to be a bit difficult to find.

As for the heater being bypassed....leaking o-rings and previous owner didn't bother fixing them?

Datatek · Mar 25, 2010

hw2002 said:
Hi all, any ideas grealy appreciated, ok 1996 RR 2.5 DSE auto, BMW engine, 208k, suddenly lost all power totally, temp guage shot thro the roof and came to a grinding halt, the vehicle did not blow steam out(on the M4 of all places, cost me 200 quid recovery), moving on.......when the recovery chap looked, seemed vehicle was very low on water, topped up, but would not build up pressure, seemed to think the fault may be the head gasket, how would I know ?, said this could be proved by compress test ?, no idea....anyone advise if this is an expensive job ? - will it be worth doing at this milage ?, rest of car is great, runs fine till this happened, .......
Again many thanks and all assistance greatly appreciated - thank you.

oh, I have not owned this long, the recovery chappie noticed that the heater has been bypassed, dont know if that may have any bearing on this situ - thanks

How much had you driven it before this happened, did it drive with no problems like the temperature going up or dropping suddenly?
Heater bypass is as others have said probably just "O" rings at the matrix, but I'm just wondering, if you have not driven it much and as the heater has been bypassed it could just possibly be an airlock in the cooling system, especially as it did not blow out steam when it failed. Head gasket failure might pressuise the system or not depending where the failure is. Not sure what you mean though when you say it "would not build up pressure"
Did the engine run after it cooled down?

hw2002 · Mar 25, 2010

Many thanks for your input, I had not driven too much, due to broken leg, but previously all had been ok, only just bought the damm thing too, - the car did not steam as I pulled over when the guage hit the red, and it did start and run when it had cooled down.
The point of not reaching pressure, was mentioned by the recovery chappie, in respect that he seemed to think that when the car was topped up with water, it would have got hotter much quicker, however, the water ws cold and the car was not being driven......but anyway he removed the filler cap after some 10-15 mins of running at tickover and that water did not burst out of the tank, - think that was what he meant.
Thank you - Paul

Datatek · Mar 25, 2010

hw2002 said:
Many thanks for your input, I had not driven too much, due to broken leg, but previously all had been ok, only just bought the damm thing too, - the car did not steam as I pulled over when the guage hit the red, and it did start and run when it had cooled down.
The point of not reaching pressure, was mentioned by the recovery chappie, in respect that he seemed to think that when the car was topped up with water, it would have got hotter much quicker, however, the water ws cold and the car was not being driven......but anyway he removed the filler cap after some 10-15 mins of running at tickover and that water did not burst out of the tank, - think that was what he meant.
Thank you - Paul

Might be lucky and it was just an airlock after the heater pipes were bypassed, they are buggers to bleed the air out of, so it would be worth trying to refill and bleed, run it with the expansion tank cap off at idle with the occsional rev, sqeeze and release the hoses to aid pumping the water round and keep topping up as necessary.
Other causes of overheating problems include the water pump, the impellers fail and the thermostat. Rads can be a problem too, make sure it gets hot at the bottom as well as the top, ther is a curious flow arrangement whereby the hot water enters at the top, goes down one half of the rad and up the other half, if the bottom doesn't get hot it could be the baffle in the top header tank has gone

Anything is better than a head gasket or cracked head

Help 2.5 DSE - Packed up / any ideas ?

hw2002

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bart2181

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j the range

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stefanw

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Datatek

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hw2002

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Datatek

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