New to this forum and new to Discovery ownership and excited for both even with what I am about to share. I bought a 1997 Discovery with almost 150K miles. No problems the first two months and this week driving home I pulled into a drive-thru and the engine stalled. I restarted several times, but each time I put the car in gear it would stall again. I pushed it out and on opening the hood I could hear the hissing coming out of the coolant overfill. Once i got it open it was bone dry. I added a gallon of coolant and got it restarted for the remaining two mile drive home.
I've never noticed a leak and the temp gauge never indicated an issue. Since then, I've checked coolant levels and added another gallon but upon starting the car, it has a bit of a shudder when it idles in gear and the dreaded white smoke comes out of the exhaust for the first few minutes.
Upon further research, it's clear i have at least a head gasket issue and at worst a dropped or cracked piston liner. I've contacted four highly reputable specialty rover repair shops closest to Davis California and have done considerable research on this site.
One shop is telling me it sounds like the gasket and is quoting me around $2,000. Another shop is saying it sounds more like one of the middle piston liners is cracked and that I need a new engine bloc. A used fully installed is around $5,500, a new fully installed is $9,000. The shop owner also mentioned that I could upgrade to a 4.6L and the shop would do all the conversions and modifications. Apparently he did this in his Disco and it has really made a difference.
So here are my questions for the many wise forum participants. Does this sound like a gasket issue or more of a liner issue and is there an easy way for me to diagnose the problem better? If the issue is the liner, what do you all recommend? Is there any way to repair the liner or is that asking for trouble down the road? And finally, if engine replacement is the only option, then is it worth the $5-9K investment in a car that cost less then half that amount? I don't want to give up on my Disco so please voice any advice, experience, etc. Thanks.
How have they determined what is wrong with the car?
I assume from your mention of white smoke out of the exhaust that you believe that coolant is getting into one of the cylinders. Pull the sparkplugs and have a look if one is noticeably cleaner than the others. this should indicate whether you have such a problem or not.
Adding cold water to a hot engine while it is not running is not a brilliant thing to do. Doing this can warp the heads. If it has, you will need to get the heads machined.
Just getting hot would not normally stall the engine. I am just wondering whether it got that hot that it actually seized up. Or maybe the thing that made it stall is the same thing that is making it idle rough now.
Unless you do it yourself, putting a new motor in is not financially viable as it cost more than what you can buy another car for.
One final thing, a temp gauge actually needs coolant in the system to give a correct reading. If you put 2 gallons of water into it, there was not much coolant left.
What year is your Disco? If a shop is not sure as to if the head gasket has failed or a sleeve has dropped, you have to pull the heads to be sure.
If your crank case has 2 or 3 quarts of water in it then it could be the sleeves, if so, go buy a good guaranteed used engine.
Most head gasket jobs run between $1400 and $1550 plus any head work and new plug wires.
Let us know what you hear.
__________________
Mike
Retired service manager, member of Solihull Society, SCLR, NCLR and the Santa Barbara 4Wheelers clubs.
99 D2, 3" lift, CDL with Detroit,T.T. lockers, 4:11's,H.D. axles, custom ft/rear bumpers with sliders, a 9500 HSI Warn winch and 5 HID's.
Nobody will know if it's the liner until it's tore down period so don't let that shop work on it because they will skin you. Slipped liners are becoming a common symptom on 1999 DII's motors and above for a couple of reasons; type of coolant which corrodes if not properly maintained and factory tooling issues, yours is not of that generation. Not to say it's not possible but it's not the norm with yours. Original head gasket failures are common in your case especially with as many miles as yours. A block replacement is not a guarantee that it wouldn't happen again by the way. Go with the garage that suggested head gasket replacement if you are not able, capable of doing this yourself. If you are capable you can save in the neighborhood of @ $1500. The stumbling your experiencing is because your engine timing is being interfered with by steam pressure in the cylinder with the leak.
It's a 97 Disco 1 and the only diagnosis the shops have done is based on what I've told them which is the same as what I posted above. I live in Davis CA, about an hour northeast of San Fran which means I'm having the truck towed 70 miles to the closest Rover specialty shop. If I go that route to have it diagnosed, my concern is they pull it apart and find a liner drop or crack, which commits me to working with and paying that shop or having the car with disassembled engine towed back home.
I'll pull the plugs and see if I can notice a difference, but otherwise I guess I'm looking at pulling the engine apart to self diagnose or going to the shop that suggested head gasket replacement.
I see where your coming from, towing is additional cost. The shop that mentioned head gaskets knows Disco's. I personally would trust them. Before you tear in be sure to have a shop that can do the decking (if needed) and machine the heads. Have an idea of the cost and trust. That way if you go for it on your own you'll be a step ahead. I'll lay 1000 to 1 odds on you not having a cracked liner, any takers?
So I spent some time under the hood with the engine running for about 10 minutes. I don't have the manual downloaded yet so I dont know all the terminology but will do my best to explain and have attached pictures to help.
Some white smoke continues to come out of the exhaust when running. It took about 10 minutes with the engine running for it to top red on the temp gauge before I shut it off. There seems to be a faint clicking sound coming from one side of the engine and not the other but hard to tell.
Photo of the side of the block where there was some white smoke coming out where the exhaust pipe meets the engine.
Photo of the inside of the oil cap after the engine cooled back down a bit. The white residue wasn't there prior to starting the engine.
Photo of a house coming out of the plenum, that apparently had been taped on in an attempt to fix it but is clearly separated now.
pull the dipstick with the engine off, if it looks milky, coolant is in the crankcase
most likely, the rough idle is due to the cylinder the coolant is leaking into isn't firing.
sounds like you have nothing to lose by pulling the infected head off your self, not mant tools, if you have the time and location to do it
you are obviously motivated, so wtf, go for it,,,,,,,,shove shove
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Coolant rarely shows up in the pan with a bad head gasket. Conversely, it almost always shows up if the liner has loosened, or (and pretty common, the intake manifold isn't properly tightened.
The reason water and oil don't mix on these when a head gasket fails is that the gasket failure is almost always related to one of the two center cyls, either side. The block-to-head coolant pathway is at the back of Cyls 7 & 8. the oil passage ways from block to head is between 1 & 3 on the left side, and between 2 & 4 on the left. Much of the time, thee head gasket failure allows combustion pressures to overpressurize the cooling system, causing the coolant to be forced out, THEN the engine overheats. When the engine is shutdown, and begins to cool, the overpressureized cooling system allows coolant to then go back into the cylinder.
Worn rocker shafts and lifters are the most common ticking noise (and manifold to pipe gasket leak) By the time you are able to hear a noise related to a loosened liner, it's too late to do anything. Liners, when they become loose, Don't drop. They go UP, the thickness of the headgasket (brilliant engineering of head gasket I.D. being larger than liner O.D. ) the continual up and down hammering will leave a mark on the heads, but they pound the counter bore in the block and eventually the liner drops. Worst case is it completely pounds the counterbore, the liner drops further, the rod comes around and snaps it off.
There are many Good machine shops capable of boring, ounterboring the top edge, and installing Top Hat liners. They don't move, but it's more expense than the average engine is worth. I'd do it if I were building a new engine, but not if I was thinking of saving an old one.
Doing a quick forensic by pictures I'm sure everyone noticed in the first picture how pristine clean that head is? Looks brand new doesn't it. For an engine with 150k that head is amazingly clean and bright especially after seeing the carbon inside the oil fill cap. I'm wondering if the truck has had the gaskets replaced by the previous owner, literally? Seeing how the PCV hose was electrical taped and the PCV device is missing makes me think the PO wasn't much of a detail person, cut corners probably. Hopefully it's a simple re-do.
so I bought a 96 disco with 190k on it that the previous owner told me overheated on his wife, and obviously the tank is where all the coolant came out from. The engine has no odd noises, and runs like a top. The radiator tank is black, does that mean it's an aftermarket tank, and is it possible that replacing the bad tank, and not doing head gaskets is the solution. I have seen the radiator tanks new from $38- $180, need 1 anyways, was thinking of installing 1 and drive it around and seeing what happens. What do u guys think?
I pulled all 8 plugs and am including the photo for reference. On either side of the block, both the second and third (middle two) plugs appear as the one in the photo on the left. A little grimy and oily. The front and back two plugs on each side were more like the one in the photo on the right. Not oily and mostly dry.
I guess this means it makes it a little more obvious where the crack in the gasket will be.
I pulled all 8 plugs and am including the photo for reference. On either side of the block, both the second and third (middle two) plugs appear as the one in the photo on the left. A little grimy and oily. The front and back two plugs on each side were more like the one in the photo on the right. Not oily and mostly dry.
I guess this means it makes it a little more obvious where the crack in the gasket will be.
If you had 4 plugs looking the same, it is unlikely that you have done a head gasket affecting all 4. A head gasket will most likely affect one of the rear two cylinders in regard to sucking coolant.
By the amount of oil on the middle 4, you may have head issues with oil being sucked down the valve guides.
Do you have access to a compression and/or vacuum gauge?
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Head Gasket or Dropped/Cracked Liner? What to do?
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