Freelander 1 Some Coolant oddness!!

Hi all. I have searched but can't seem to find quite what i'm looking for...

I am after some advice re our newly acquired 2 door Freelander. Its a 1.8 54 plate and has a habit of being perfectly happy until you start cuising at 60 + during which the coolant disappears after about ten or so miles...but if i just cruise about town i havn't had to touch it in over a week?! Not new to Landrovers or Engines but as there is so much info regarding these engines i can't seem to find this particular problem. Is it a HG starting to fail or does this match any other experiences.

We would like to keep the car so any pointers to refurbed engines, kits or companies are welcome.

Cheers, Nick.

First checks I'd do it look at the coolant header tank. Look around the pressure cap for evidence of cracking. This is common giving the disappearing coolant syndrome. The other check would be the inlet manifold gasket. This is a thin synthetic rubber affair that can leak coolant into the inlet tract. It cleans the piston beautifully, but causes coolant loss. These are the two checks I'd be doing before delving deaper.

Hi...Thanks for that, already changed the header tank as it was cracked...i will check the inlet gasket next week. we don't want to get rid of the car as we both love it...which says quite a lot as we have a range and a disco too.

I had a dodgy hose caused a similar issue. It was one of the heater hoses where it connected at the front of engine bay.
Whatever you do get it fixed or you'll be replacing the HG very soon.

my wife has the 1800 and they are a devil to get all the air out my wife's car had the head down earlier this year and we have only just got all of the air out and it does not use much water now but you must check the water every week also check the header tank for and "black" around the top this can be head gasket also if it is not a genuine header tank it might be leaking from the cap as a few have seen

Hi all, to continue Monty is an 04 1.8 petrol...Fitted new Bearmach header tank, finally managed to break through what must be K-seal (judging by the powdery type bits in the old tank that suddenly appeared) in lower air bleed by block...whossh of air and then water. opened top bleed screw and more air...
Trouble is, once started I see no movement in header tank water in comparison to my other landies which kind of have flow through the expansion/header tank. Is this normal?
I can do a couple of days and then the system feels pumped but no water loss but it will have temp rise on long hills on the motorway at about 55-60 mph and then settles again.
Pulls well for a small engine and starts first flick of the key. It has had apparently had multi layer gasket and is 95,000 miles.
I have swapped thermostat just in case...do i just change head gasket now? Just done the 4.4 l322 cam chain and guides so quite able to do it...

Cheers, Nick.

I think you really need to rule out other things first. Do you see Mayo on the dipstick or oil in the header tank. If not the HG could still be gone leaking down the back of the block, but so could several other things, including hoses, water pump and inlet manifold gasket.
BTW my last K series had what I thought was K seal in it. The expansion bottle had a linseed oil smell from it similar to putty and the water was full of tiny copper strands.

Hi...Thanks for your reply...definately looks coppery...I'm sure it's K seal...I've used it to get me home.
There is no mayo anywhere, no other signs i can see, pipes all seem solid as they hold pressure, inlet manifold shows no signs of cross border contamination and I have to say I was erring towards water pump as it doesn't lose coolant and only heats up on long hauls or hills when hot and has taken longer in this cooler weather between coolant blips.

If you don't know when the water pump, timing belt and tensioner were last changed then they need changed anyway. Don't assume they were changed with the HG last time it was done.
The water must be going somewhere so if you drive it on a dry day, then check for wetness you should be able to spot where it's leaking. If the HG is gone there should be tell tale stains. You'd feel a right Charlie if you replaced the HG and it didn't fix the fault because it's a dodgy hose.
Oh and you should see a stream of water going into the expansion tank from the little hose.

Ok...thanks for reply...so theres no stream of water movement in the expansion tank as i said, can't find any water or dampness anywhere except around the cap on the expansion tank so it seems to me that water isn't circulating properly and this is causing it to get too warm. if the pipes are holding pressure when it's hot i'm not sure how they would let water out when it's cold. Seems most likley to be a water pump next i think...

There are guys around here with way more experience of K series cars than me but my other K's had a flow from the wee pipe. If your not getting that then I'd be concerned there is a blockage somewhere. K seal can do all sorts of harm to K series engines by blocking important water ways, it might be the jiggle valve which is in the inlet manifold. Google it and you'll find lots of conflicting advice but a jammed jiggle valve is probably bad. I could be talking rubbish there but worth checking.
It might also be worth releasing the wee pipe and jam a hose into the top of the expansion tank to try and force any blockage through.
Good luck with it.

Sorry to say, but to me this sounds like coolant pressurisation from leaking fire rings on the cylinder head gasket.

You can test the coolant in the expansion tank (most garages will have a sniffer device that'll detect products of combustion that shouldn't be detectable in the coolant.

Fingers crossed I'm wrong!!!

K seal in the K series is bad news. If the giggle valve is blocked, then air can't bleed out of the coolant.
There are also multiple tiny coolant passageways that can get blocked by K seal.
It's unlikely to be the water pump, but the thermostat can fail shut.

Don't suppose it would do any harm to blast the hose down the wee pipe too as it might free up the Jiggle/Giggle valve.

Alibro said:

Don't suppose it would do any harm to blast the hose down the wee pipe too as it might free up the Jiggle/Giggle valve.

Click to expand...

I'm not sure of the correct spelling but after all the fun I've had with them in the past, I call it a giggle valve.

Methinks Nodge spelled it that way deliberately.

Thanks all...i will look at all of the above and report back later...

Cheers, Nick.

Alibro said:

Methinks Nodge spelled it that way deliberately.

Click to expand...

Maybe. It can be a bundle of laughs unblocking one, that's for sure.

Going to have a fiddle with the giggle in a mo....At the back of my mind and having read a really interesting article posted on here I'm kind of thinking that I should wait till the l322 is back from the garage and then just strip down the engine, clear out the k-seal crud and rebuild. unless anyone has had any luck flushing with the hose??
I am going totake off individual pipes today and just make sure they are clear and allow flow.

Cheers, Nick.

You are using an L322 as the reliable alternative?
It's a pretty simple engine to strip down.