New meat!

Hello all,
I owned a defender 90 about 10 years ago and regretted selling it ever since, so yesterday I finally bought another defender 90 1994.
Unfortunately on the way home it started making a chuffing noise and after inspection looks like it's blowing from the head gasket at the back onto the bulkhead! So thought I would join this forum and ask for some advice and help from people who obviously have a much better knowledge and experience than me.
Would it be advisable to take on fitting a new head gasket? I have relatively good mechanical experience at a diy level, but I've never fitted head gasket apart from on an old mini! Any dos or don'ts?

Welcome, try posting in the defender section mate you should get some helpful advice from there

Ah ok thanks

Welcome to the forum.

Yeah N0.4 on a 200Tdi is very common on an elderly engine.

Not a hard job, if you can, photocopy the pages out of the Haynes manual and laminate them, makes it easier to do as you can read it off as you do it without getting oily prints all over your book
You do need an angle gauge for the final tightening sequence but perfectly doable.

DO NOT GET A LAMINATED STEEL HEAD GASKET make sure you get the proper composite Elring gasket or you'll end up with oil leaks all over the engine where it doesn't seal the galleries properly.

Ok thanks. I've also been told by Land Rover that there are three thicknesses of gasket! How do you know what gasket to use?

Big Black Dog said:

Ok thanks. I've also been told by Land Rover that there are three thicknesses of gasket! How do you know what gasket to use?

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If in doubt, use the thickest one.

If it's the same as the 300 then faceing motor from front ! left hand side of eng (injector side) there should be a sticky out bit of gasket that has holes in it ! 1/2/3 , 3 being the thickest ! BUT i think you can get a 0 hole that is thicker still !

Big Black Dog said:

Ok thanks. I've also been told by Land Rover that there are three thicknesses of gasket! How do you know what gasket to use?

Click to expand...

On the injector side of the head there will be between 1 and 3 holes stamped through it. Buy the identical replacement ideally Elring or similar but definitely a composite one.

Magicgrotto said:

If it's the same as the 300 then faceing motor from front ! left hand side of eng (injector side) there should be a sticky out bit of gasket that has holes in it ! 1/2/3 , 3 being the thickest ! BUT i think you can get a 0 hole that is thicker still !

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He types faster than me......

beat yu !!!

Magicgrotto said:

beat yu !!!

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That's what happens when you've got 12 fingers, are you from Norfolk???

Cheers guys