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[tunnie]

my 2.2 is on 102k, and thats going to get regular coolant changes!

99% sure its HG

The compression test should be conclusive.

[TheBoy]

my 2.2 is on 102k, and thats going to get regular coolant changes!

99% sure its HG

The compression test should be conclusive.

but you'll have the head off before then.....

[Marks DTM Calib]

Right.....lets get some common sense into this thread shall we!

1) Petrol Fumes in the header tank.

More than possible, The first piston stroke pulls in the fuel air mix with the inlet valve open, the second stroke squashes it....if the gasket is suspect, some of this petrol air mix can get pushed through the fire ring on the head gasket and into the water.

2) Compression test

If you think this will conclusively show headgasket failure, think again. Its likely to show absolutely nothing particularly given that this is not a complete gasket failure (like some K series engines suffer). You might at best see a slight drop but, this may only be within the allowed tolerances between cylinders!

3) Header tank pressure.

The header will be being pressurised slightly by the compression stroke and more by the firing stroke.

4) Is it common

No, this is indactive of a poorly maintained engine which has not had the required coolant changes and the 50:50 antifreeze mix maintained. The lack of inhibitor in the system will be affecting the head casting and the composite head gasket material. Stick to the correct mix and change intervals and you wont get a failure of this sort.

[size=72]5) GET THAT BLOODY HEAD OFF AND GET IT SKIMMED![/size]

[Craig_R]

Yep As I have already said in this post if you dont look after your coolent (anifreeze and change it every so often the anifreeze degrades and the coolent will in time eat away and corrode the head where it joins the block, it only needs to do it slightly as then the pressure forces a small gap between the head and the gasket.

Mine went like this as the coolent was not changed with old owners, now for the price of a bottle of anifreeze i change the coolent every year to be on the safe side its not as if its a hard job and take as long as it does to wash the car.

Just make sure you take your plugs out for the skim, The guy who did mine never and i cant get number 4 plug out now but lucky for me they were brand new so ill worry about that later when it comes to changing them

[TheBoy]

Yep As I have already said in this post if you dont look after your coolent (anifreeze and change it every so often the anifreeze degrades and the coolent will in time eat away and corrode the head where it joins the block, it only needs to do it slightly as then the pressure forces a small gap between the head and the gasket.

Mine went like this as the coolent was not changed with old owners, now for the price of a bottle of anifreeze i change the coolent every year to be on the safe side its not as if its a hard job and take as long as it does to wash the car.

Just make sure you take your plugs out for the skim, The guy who did mine never and i cant get number 4 plug out now but lucky for me they were brand new so ill worry about that later when it comes to changing them

Yes, I agree, I change coolant very frequently (about every 2 yrs in MV6, even though its 5yr Red), and at least annually in the Rover (in the vain hope it helps with the K series HG)...

[ians]

I've not checked but I have a feeling that coolant change is not specified in the service booklet that comes with the car (pre facelift anyway).  Does this mean that any vehicle which is serviced accordingly (eg at Vx ) in its early years (I suspect most of ours), will have been neglected in that respect and therefore likely have the beginnings of head (and oil coller) damage?

My 2.5 was serviced at Vx up until I bought it - its '98 and I bought it in 2004 - so potentially 6 years with no coolant change (not to mention I didn't change it straight away..).  

Agreed its a cheap and easy peasy job so no excuses now this is known..

[TheBoy]

I've not checked but I have a feeling that coolant change is not specified in the service booklet that comes with the car (pre facelift anyway).  Does this mean that any vehicle which is serviced accordingly (eg at Vx ) in its early years (I suspect most of ours), will have been neglected in that respect and therefore likely have the beginnings of head (and oil coller) damage?

My 2.5 was serviced at Vx up until I bought it - its '98 and I bought it in 2004 - so potentially 6 years with no coolant change (not to mention I didn't change it straight away..).  

Agreed its a cheap and easy peasy job so no excuses now this is known..

Prefacelifts had standard coolant, so should be every 2 years (MAX!), similar to brake fluid.  Whether a dealer does it is another matter...

[JamesV6CDX]

Right.....lets get some common sense into this thread shall we!

1) Petrol Fumes in the header tank.

More than possible, The first piston stroke pulls in the fuel air mix with the inlet valve open, the second stroke squashes it....if the gasket is suspect, some of this petrol air mix can get pushed through the fire ring on the head gasket and into the water.

2) Compression test

If you think this will conclusively show headgasket failure, think again. Its likely to show absolutely nothing particularly given that this is not a complete gasket failure (like some K series engines suffer). You might at best see a slight drop but, this may only be within the allowed tolerances between cylinders!

3) Header tank pressure.

The header will be being pressurised slightly by the compression stroke and more by the firing stroke.

4) Is it common

No, this is indactive of a poorly maintained engine which has not had the required coolant changes and the 50:50 antifreeze mix maintained. The lack of inhibitor in the system will be affecting the head casting and the composite head gasket material. Stick to the correct mix and change intervals and you wont get a failure of this sort.

[size=72]5) GET THAT BLOODY HEAD OFF AND GET IT SKIMMED![/size]

Don't mince your words, Mark

[Markie]

been telling you for ages on this thread Tunnie..nice and easy head off...dont be too scared....its not your car anyway  

[familyman]

I've not checked but I have a feeling that coolant change is not specified in the service booklet that comes with the car (pre facelift anyway).  Does this mean that any vehicle which is serviced accordingly (eg at Vx ) in its early years (I suspect most of ours), will have been neglected in that respect and therefore likely have the beginnings of head (and oil coller) damage?

My 2.5 was serviced at Vx up until I bought it - its '98 and I bought it in 2004 - so potentially 6 years with no coolant change (not to mention I didn't change it straight away..).  

Agreed its a cheap and easy peasy job so no excuses now this is known..

Prefacelifts had standard coolant, so should be every 2 years (MAX!), similar to brake fluid.  Whether a dealer does it is another matter...

This operation is what the dealers call a "call up" its recomended and advised to the customer when its due like the brake fluid but as its extra to the service its up to the customer to pay for it not the dealer to do it FOC. Most customers who are ignorant about cars say no dont wont the extra cost of b/fluid or coolant changes

[JamesV6CDX]

Me, Tunnie and Markie made good progress yesterday.

Cambelt and aux belt off,
Fuel pipes, Injeector rail, inlet manifold off
Electricals off
Exhaust downpipe off
Coolant pipes off
Cam sensor out
Camcover off
Rear timing cover off
Camshafts out, all caps and lifters carefully stored in their original positions for refitment
Head removed!!!
Exhaust manifold removed from cylinder head with no snapped studs.
All exhaust manifold studs extracted to be refitted with new ones.


Father Tunnie had a VERY lucky escape with the cambelt on this one. The right hand idler was shot to bits, and the belt was soooo slack that it wasn't even sitting on it. Thankfully no signs the belt had slipped, so we'll be OK to renew with a new cambelt kit.

And this car was meant to have had a cambelt kit change by VX 10,000 miles ago. Looking at the state of the pulleys, all I could say was "my ars*e!"

Cylinder head will now go to machine shop for checking and / or resurfacing, as I had no accurate enough way of checking for distortion.

Tunnie, now the head is off and cams are out - do the paraffin test to make sure all the valves are seated well.

At the moment, we may not remove valves and stem seals due to time constraints. Car is low mileage and uses no oil, and has good compression, so probably not yet necessary.

Then after all that... we did a bit of a speedy combined effort, and removed the shot oil cooler from Tunnie's LPG facelift proeject.

Then for the rebuild...

[Markie]

very pruductive day, and of course Tunnie wil now see the head removal is not difficult  

[tunnie]

very pruductive day, and of course Tunnie wil now see the head removal is not difficult  

  

Dunno about that, could not have done it without James....


Like to say a HUGE thanks to James for popping over and helping, its a long distance for him to come, and feel bad now he had prang on the way back!

We were dead lucky with the cambelt, the dealer said it changed the kit on the invoice, did they 'dangle berries'!! Bloody scumbag dealers telling fibbs and charge for work they did not bloody do!!!

What sodding annoys me is my dad paid for that work to be done, was done after we bought it from the lease company.

Any who, todays task is to clean up the around the head area, get rid of the old gasket. Get it nice and clean for re-fitting.

Also going to fit the oil cooler to the Elite today