Overheating Tin Top

[Guest 2b cruising]

Hi. Overheating a diesel can do much more damage than the same fault on a petrol engine. They cook themselves very quickly. This can lead to warped parts such as cylinder heads.

A blown cylinder head gasket does not always put oil into water or water into oil. If it is blown between a cylinder bore and water jacket drilling it can easily pressurise your cooling system and send the water through your overflow.

If the leak is only minute, it might only be leaking when your engine is up to temperature or when your engine is laboured.

Your engine does not need to be overheated to cause this but as your coolant level goes down, up goes the temp.

Hope this is of some help to you, also if you do take your head off, it is strongly recommended to have it pressure tested.

 

Regards, 2b

[Guest timswait]

Got it checked by a local garage and they diagnosed head gasket. A block test of the coolant tested positive for exhaust gases in it. They recommended trying a product called Steel Seal in the coolant to seal it. That did nothing.

Head gasket was replaced at the beginning of January. They found a small leak to the water jacket on No4. It was pressure tested and found to be fine, so the gasket was replaced and touch wood this seems to have been fine since. Not entirely impressed by the garage though. The owner/manager seemed to really know his stuff and be very helpful, but I've not got so much faith in his staff. When I got the car back it had become an complete pig to start if it was left sitting for any length of time (e.g. overnight), luckiliy the battery is very good so it could crank it for long enough to get it to fire. I then found the plastic handle for the bonnet release had been snapped off and so had the disptick tube! I complained and they took it back and replaced the disptick tube and handle. They also replaced all the injector seals (all free of charge of course) as the owner thought that maybe one of those was dripping fuel into a cylinder and flooding it, he must have been correct as after that it was back to starting instantly again. Then last week the bolt holding the auxillary drive belt tensioner snapped, so I had to drive home from the peaks in the dark without an alternator or power steering! Again saved by the good battery, got home fine despite having to use headlights. It was over a month since the garage had done the work, so I didn't take it back that time, just replaced it myself. It might have just been coincidence, but it was a part they would have taken off to get to the head, and given the other issues it does seem that the garage is staffed by gorillas. Now I'm just hoping there's no more bits about to fall off....

[Longboarder]

Wahay. A solution at last and good to see the feedback. I've added a 1.9TDI PD engine car to the stable. Goes beautifully. So a nice round six vag cars but only four are diesel.

 

Nigel