Help please, TD5 engine (head gasket?) trouble!!

Hi all, got what appears to be an expensive problem

Was driving up the M1 yesterday and saw my temperature gauge start to rise on the Disco.

Started to pull over before it went all the way but it carried on and cut out.

Looked under the bonnet and realised that when I had last put coolant in I hadn't quite tightened the filler cap and lots of steam coming from there.

Limped the rest of my journey without further incident and after it had cooled filled it up (6L ).

Started no problem but began knocking loudly on the return journey.

Got a mechanic friend round today and he said that it was probably the head but could be coming from the bottom end.

After he spoke to someone he knows who deals with Landies a lot he came back and said he had been told that most of the time the heads on these crack instead of just warping and people didn't bother trying to skim them for this reason.

He also said that if the knocking turned out to be from the bottom end it would mean replacing the engine so left me with the dilemma of whether to try and get the head fixed in the hope it wasn't the bottom end, get a new engine, or just scrap the car and start again.

None of these are particularly pleasant (or cheap) options so wondered what peoples experience of this on here was.

Any help most gratefully received.

You should be able to find a reasonable second hand motor for between £1000 and £1500. The labour side combined with all the bits and bobs (such as oil and replacement gaskets) will probably push the total to around £2500.

You don't mention the value of the vehicle. Obviously if it is a later Td5 it may be worth doing.

However, do check the head and block first before making a decision on it all.

Well, I ended up buying another engine from a 2001 Defender for a grand that the guy swears has only done 40,000 miles (not sure about that but can only take his word for it).

My mechanic says he will fit it for £250, so all in all sorted for less than £1,500

And if what the guy says IS true then I have an engine with less than a third of the miles of the old one.

will a td5 out of a defender fit? engine mounts etc?

disco2shaun said:

will a td5 out of a defender fit? engine mounts etc?

Click to expand...

Apparently so, supposed to be exactly the same or so I'm told.

Not really any point in making the same engine with different mounts if you can help it I guess from a manufacturing point of view.

as i understand it the td5 in a defender has less power than a disco

955i said:

Well, I ended up buying another engine from a 2001 Defender for a grand that the guy swears has only done 40,000 miles (not sure about that but can only take his word for it).

My mechanic says he will fit it for £250, so all in all sorted for less than £1,500

And if what the guy says IS true then I have an engine with less than a third of the miles of the old one.

Click to expand...

Did you get the Def ECU with your 'new' engine, or are you going to use your existing Disco ECU? If you are going to use the Disco one, I trust your mechanic knows that the injectors in the 'new' engine will need to be coded to the ECU - hope he has the kit to do it?


Dave