Over the Rover - I've had enough

[Graham1961]

Sorry to read of this about your engine, as a 1.8 owner myself i was interested in reading this, my own car has 33,400 miles on it and is serviced twice a year, with coolant/brake fluid changes every 2 years, touch wood i've had no problems, i think you have been very, very unlucky as you have done everything that can be done.
It's hard to advise what to do with your car, but even if you bought a replacement engine, it would still cost a lot less than another car.....once again i am sorry to read your misfortune.

[Tim_Burgess]

Sorry to hear about your experience, I can understand why you want to cut your losses.

If it's any consolation, my 75 had allegedly had a head gasket just before I got it - it failed within 2000 miles because it had been done by an idiot. I took the car to my MGR garage and had MLS gasket and uprated sump rail fitted. That was 5 years and 44,000 miles ago. I notice that you say you dont have MLS gasket, seriously I would get the work done and give the car another chance. My old bus will be 10 next month so yours is a youngster by comparison.

SWMBO's MGF went to 73,000 before HGF struck, and it was my fault for cracking the radiator on a rock! That's now got the X-Part gasket kit and it too has been fine.

We've had 5 K Series and 1 KV6 between us and only 2 suffered HGF, and all have done big mileages - one went to nearly 200,000

Any engine can suffer HGF; aparently the indidents of failure on the Fiat Punto FIRE engine is even higher than K Series. After all, what else are you going to get for the money you spend on getting the car fixed?

[COLVERT]

There is a very good chance that when you had the first head gasket failure the liner heights above the block were not checked. If low you were just sitting on a bomb and waiting for it to go off. You say the liners failed but did not tell us in what way. Usually they just drop and need new gaskets to raise them to the correct height. If your repairer didn't know this then that is, maybe, the cause of the Second failure.
If your car is that good everywhere else it deserves another go.


Colvert.

[south bank]

Thanks for the support all and the messages of sympathy. It'll be one of the biggest things that irks me if/when I sell it, knowing that few other owner's clubs are full of such genuinely good people.

One substantial problem is that it's worth far too much to scrap, though repairing it means I'm properly stuck with it; a car I don't want. I don't want it anymore one iota, I won't enjoy driving it again fearing repeat. But I'll have no choice. The repair money is the money I'd need to use to get something else worthwhile .

The original gasket job was done by Best of British Rover, Darlaston, West Midlands. As an exclusive Rover/MG repairer and parts supplier I expected no better job could be done elsewhere and he concluded that the throttle body was at fault for the intermittent fast idle problem that had developed in the previous months; something which may have had a hand in the head gasket also, however it had likely failed due to wear and general for want of a better word ; rubbishness.

The full MLS kit was fitted, head skimmed, everything flushed, various sensors replaced and a new throttle body provided for the princely sum of £600.

After suspecting the liners to be at fault this time (I went back to him), we tried SteelSeal which apparently the US army swear by for head gasket issues and cracked blocks. We tried it to no avail, leading him to believe the liners hadn't cracked, but moved.


There is however some small light of hope. The engine has never actually once exceeded normal operating temperature, I've never let it. If the fan's kicked in twice in short succession, I've pulled up to let it tick cool and as a result, the needle has never been higher than its usual just below half way on the gauge.

I've phoned a trusted and excellent mobile mechanic who works on the rest of the family's cars and always has. He says that he's never known a K-series liner move because they physically can't by themselves and that without the increased heat, there's nothing to give the steel liner cause to expand differently to the engine therefore create an impression in the block, its gaskets nor crack the liner itself. It's never therefore been beyond its normal operational tolerance or design limits. Although it was supposed to be fitted with the uprated kit, he questioned the quality of the previous work and says that he can't see for a moment it being anything other than again, head gasket failure. Or rather, the same head gasket failure incident and a second attempt at fixing it. £300 if I want him to fix it.

As a result I'm taking the car to get a third, fourth and maybe fifth opinion tomorrow at several garages reccommended to me that I've never used to try and be sure of a completely objective opinion, not influenced by returning business.

When driving the stupid thing, you'd never suspect that there was anything wrong with the car. It's still silky smooth and exceptionally quiet, not heating up any quicker than normal or straining under acceleration. It behaves perfectly and never stutters. It's just turned water into oil. Maybe it's the first alchemy engine .

Thanks Zircon for the tip, I didn't know about that. I'll try the Xpart Close Call scheme when everything is costed should it be confirmed I need a new engine, hopefully saving some money.

How long ago did you replace the engine Steve? Was it a brand new, unused engine, a recon or a low mileage engine? It is spooky but lets just hope the £1600 doesn't come my way as a bill too as in that case, the readers of the local papers would soon be reading about an abandoned, stolen () Rover 75 being found sticking out of a canal in the middle of the night...

[Zircon]

Hi south bank,

I really do hope things work out for you. I absolutely understand how 'sick to the stomach' you must be - it's almost as though the car you fostered so much love and attention on has 'betrayed' you. I think many - if not most - of us have had one car like that in the past ... but difficult to be sure if it's the car itself or a person who had a hand in it's servicing somewhere along the line is responsible.

If at the end of the day you do contact the X Part Close Call scheme, it would be really interesting to see if you get a good result - after all that could ultimately be good news for all of us - as well as excellent PR for X Part, you might think.

Take a few deep breaths ... and best of luck again!

All the best,

Zircon/Nicholas

[chrissyboy]

i agree with all that say the first repair was not done right ...also checking the coolant every week /fortnightly is just not good enough .2 days is pushing it really imho... head gaskets dont just go there is always a reason why they do go ... had you checked the coolant say every 2 days you may just of saved the gasket if you see the level was low ... but my money is on the repair not being done right and the cause not traced.i would take the car to someone else to fix if the guys that are going to do it are the ones that did it last time .you cant take as gospel that ex rover repairers are great . any repair is only as good as the mechanic that has done it ..i would say get it done by one of guy on here that have done them and the ownerhas had no problems since ...

[calibrax]

Originally Posted by south bank

How long ago did you replace the engine Steve? Was it a brand new, unused engine, a recon or a low mileage engine? It is spooky but lets just hope the £1600 doesn't come my way as a bill too as in that case, the readers of the local papers would soon be reading about an abandoned, stolen () Rover 75 being found sticking out of a canal in the middle of the night...

Replaced it back in January. Total cost to me was £1,220... the work done by the garage (diagnose problem, remove engine, replace, etc) came to about £1,195, I got £475 back from the AA (breakdown repair cover), and I supplied the engine which cost me £500.

A brand new engine would have been £7,000, and a recon one £3,500... at those prices, simply not an option! So I sourced one myself on eBay for £500, which had 10,000 miles less than my existing one. It came out of a tourer that had been written off in an accident (front wing and side damage, but not bad). Had it shipped to the garage (Apple MG - very good they are too).

Took a bit of a chance really, as the engine could have been duff... but it all worked out well, and the car is now running beautifully, have covered a few thousand miles since with no problems at all. And the engine came with a lot of ancillaries still attached, so I now have some spare parts (injectors, fuel rail, turbo etc etc).

[south bank]

Third Update:

I have taken the stricken white elephant (Well, blue) by the trunk and dragged it hanged headed around the region's garages today.

Three out of five opinions agree with the liners dropping. The fourth was the ex-Rover main dealer whom the car has always been serviced by. They said they've never had a 1.8 K16 with liner failure and that although highly unlikely, given the MLS upgrade, it might just about be possible. The fifth said a straight no it wouldn't be, but conceded to hearing of it in Freelanders . As it's the same block, it does make sense and I can't see the logic in the denial.

All agreed the only way to be certain would be to remove the head and look, incurring the cost of replacing the head gasket again if I thereafter need the car to be mobile in order to transport it to a garage to get the engine changed. So an extra £300 on top of the engine cost to check. I'm not that rich.

So I'm settled, barring a miracle on needing a new engine .

Having settled on this now, I will be calling Xpart thanks Nicholas . I'll try to appeal to Xpart's human side since I'm too poor to repair it maybe even this year. It would be a good PR case, being a recent car that by general industry standards, has no real business being in this predicament yet. Seeing such a car recovered could be good from a promotional point of view.

Chrissy - The original failure occurred when returning from football on a Sunday last year after only checking the coolant the Friday night before. I actually put a dot on the calendar when I check the coolant, I'm that sad. The coolant level has never diminished, neither has the oil even through the failure. After arriving back home from football, when I reversed on the drive I noticed that the fan was on and alarm bells started to ring. A couple of long hours later I went back to the car and checked the oil, the level of which hadn't decreased since Friday although it looked slightly weird on the dipstick. I then checked the coolant, to see it had become a creamy, thick liquid but the level in the tank remained the same, just on maximum. It hadn't failed based on these, so there must have been something else playing a part, what I'm not sure.

Ron at Best of British who repaired it is a member on here and owns a V8 tourer. He's widely regarded as being the man to go to locally, but due to the cost compared to having a mobile mechanic do the work, I may well be having our trusty mobile mechanic swap the engines eventually. Eventually .

As it's staying on the drive, if he does it as opposed to a garage I'll be able to reduce the costs further by doing lots of the preparation work myself so that literally, he can just undo the bolts and remove the lump when he arrives. When the engine is in and working, I can again finish up then. I'm debating as I'm nearly committed to it staying on the drive, fetching the head off myself to inspect the state of things. If it stays still from now on I might as well since I'd have nothing to lose.

I'll let you all know when I've phoned Xpart.

Until then, if any of you happen to walk past a youthful, recently divorced engine, point it in my direction. So long as it has a penchant for steel undergarments, isn't mixed up in the head and frothing at the mouth that is .

[capese21]

The full MLS kit was fitted, head skimmed

If it did not overheat why did they skim it? A skim will weaken the head and increase the chance of another HGF....

A garage that always skims a k series head regardless imho does not know the engines as well as they would like you to think.

Good luck with it.

Ed.

[south bank]

Originally Posted by capese21

If it did not overheat why did they skim it? A skim will weaken the head and increase the chance of another HGF....

A garage that always skims a k series head regardless imho does not know the engines as well as they would like you to think.

Good luck with it.

Ed.

Interesting point there. I never really thought of it but now you mention it, I'll need to ask some questions now to make sure I actually got what I had to pay for in the first place. And if I did, why they decided to skim a head that possibly couldn't have needed it.

Are you a mechanic Ed or someone who's mechanically minded?

Thanks.