300tdi Head gasket ??

[loony landy]

My disco has died and it points to the head gasket failing so i am thinking of doing it myself.  Got full photo instructions and seem quite easy to do but the haynes manual says there are 3 thicknesses of gasket you can use  :'(

Which one do i get ??  Dont want to put it back together and find its been done wrong and goes again 

Anybody done there own ??

cheers



tony

[J.D.]

Measure the piston protudence (Sp?) and then use the following guide.
200Tdi & 300Tdi cylinder head gasket sizes

1 hole 1.30mm ----- ERR5261 for piston protrusion between 0.50 to 0.60mm
2 hole 1.40mm ----- ERR5262 --------------------------------- 0.61 to 0.70mm
3 hole 1.50mm ----- ERR5263 --------------------------------- 0.71 to 0.80mm
NO holes 1.60mm -- ERR7154 ------------ if higher than 0.80mm use the NO HOLE gasket.

[Disco-Ron]

The other option if you can, is to see what gasket you take off.... and simply buy either the same one, or the slightly thicker one to be on the safe side.....

[loony landy]

cheers for that one its off i will look for the marks and take it from there  :dance:

[Mud-muncher1]

Just remember to torque it back up again then angle the bolts

[loony landy]

Just remember to torque it back up again then angle the bolts

Whats this angle the bolts ??? i know torque  :)

[Range Rover Blues]

At the back driver's side of the engine there should be a flat "bit of gasket" that protrudes from the joint, roughly alongside No.3 or just behind it.  It will have a number of holes punched in it, most often 3 denoting a "3 hole" gasket.

Be careful, a lot hit the market incorreclty market, I've got a 3 hole with only 1 hole in it.  Measure the thickness of that peice of gasket, not the used part which will have crushesd down.

Or if you fell competant then measure piston projection on the front and back of all 4 pistons.  My sister's 300 TDi should be a 2 hole except for one piston that is in slightly tapered, it runs form a 1 hole to a 3 hole, so I fitted a 3 hole.  Annoying as the rest of the engine is 2 hole and would run better as such.

Don't be lazy and fit a 3 hole "just to be safe", there are 4 different gaskets for a good reason.

BUY A GENUIEN GASKET, or you may well be doing it twice.

Check the head for flatness, the LR manual says you can't skim it EVER, news flash, lots of us do :twisted:

Whilst it's off clean the inlet manifold with petrol, the inlet ports too in the head plus the pipework and intercooler (I cleaned the turbo with WD40 too). then fit an EGR blank and reroute the engine breather to the bottom of the airbox.  Ours has an oil catch tank and baby K&N filter too, I blanked the hole in the airbox pipe with an old plastic radiator plug.  A year later and the insides are still clean :) plus I know any oil in there now comes for the turbo [-o<

[Range Rover Blues]

Just remember to torque it back up again then angle the bolts

Whats this angle the bolts ??? i know torque  :)

The bolts are stretch bolts (typical of iron/ali engines and don't need retorquing after 500 miles) so  you tighten them up to a set torque then the following 3 stages (2 on the outer rows) are done by angle torquing, sufficient to make the bolts behin to stretch.

Stretch bolts can be re-used up to 5 times, though 3 is recomended.  If you do re-use then centre punch one dimple on each bolt head to signify they have been re-used.  I may be wrong but they have 5 stars on the head~5 uses~5 centre punch marks.

[loony landy]

Cheers for that, does anyone have the torque settings for them and what angles??

[Range Rover Blues]

Buy decent bolts, they will have the settings on the instructions, either there oron the packaging for the gasket.

The angles are 1)-60 deg, 2)-60 deg and 3)-30 deg for the inner rows only.

[minty]

me and funky rhino have just done his and we got the wrong one to start with. don't worry you will no straight away if its the wrong one as with the above you need to take into account how many times the head has been skimmed as well easyest way take the one you take off to mach up and get one a bit thicker job done. you will need to have head skimmed and you will need a thin 19mm socket or so attachment to get to the head bolt at the back of head near the bulk head. the just follow the Haynes manual you wont go wrong.

[loony landy]

me and funky rhino have just done his and we got the wrong one to start with. don't worry you will no straight away if its the wrong one as with the above you need to take into account how many times the head has been skimmed as well easyest way take the one you take off to mach up and get one a bit thicker job done. you will need to have head skimmed and you will need a thin 19mm socket or so attachment to get to the head bolt at the back of head near the bulk head. the just follow the Haynes manual you wont go wrong.

cheers matey, dont think ill be getting it skimmed as afaik it is not warped in anyway.  So hopefully strip off replace gasket and back on  :dance:  Just want it done quick  :roll:

[Range Rover Blues]

Check it's flat with a steel rule and feelers, if it's warped you are wasting your time putting it back on.

Minty, why fit a thicker gasket if ther head has been skimmed? the head it utterly flat, the thickness of the gasket is purley to take account of the varience of piston projection (above the top of the block at TDC).

[Muddy]

Did this on a defender about a month ago, head pressure tested (300's often crack) skimmed and all new bolts and gaskets came to about £165, quite expensive but at least i knew if i put it back together correctly it should be all ok (which it was till i wrote it of 2 weeks later :roll:).

Don't forget that there is a certain order to torque the bolts up in and the last 30degree takes some doing. :lol:


RRB, out of interest did you pop a core plug to drain the water when you did it? and if so which one did you do?


Cheers, Will.

[marky]

On mine there is a drain plug about half way down the block on the turbo side near the front.

[Range Rover Blues]

Nope I syphoned some water out to make sure I didn't flood the engine with it but I left a lot in, as long as you are careful scraping the gasket off I couldn't see it doing any harm.  Antifreeze is expensive.

[minty]

Check it's flat with a steel rule and feelers, if it's warped you are wasting your time putting it back on.

Minty, why fit a thicker gasket if their head has been skimmed? the head it utterly flat, the thickness of the gasket is purely to take account of the variance of piston projection (above the top of the block at TDC).

when we changed our one the man gave us the wrong one then told us that there are three different thickness why? i dunno may be it has some thing to do with the bolts going back in and reaching the bottom of the holes ? when the head is skimmed may be its to make up for wot come off ??????  do you no !

[Les Henson]

Head gasket thickness is determined by how far the piston protrudes from the block (deck). I don't know that putting a thinner gasket on will cause any damage, but I wouldn't attempt it.

You need a torque wrench and an angle guage to tighten the head bolts.

Stage 1 - 40nm (this is to make sure all bolts have a starting point and are the same initial tightness)
Stage 2 - 60-deg
Stage 3 - 60-deg
Stage 4 - Bolts 1, 2, 7, 8, 9, 10, 15, 16, 17, and 18, a further 20-deg.
A good quality head gasket (Elring, Payen, for example), will come with a slip of paper with the bolt numbers and tightening sequence/figures.


Les.

[burgerman]

 ALL manafacturers have a minimun thickness for all engine parts. So as long as you do not exceed this there is no problem  BUT



  You must check the valve protrusion heights above the head face ( also valve tip lenghs)  And to skim a head properly the precombustion chambers should be removed first, the head skimmed, then machine the chamber seats to leave the chambers one and a half thou proud of the head face, It dont sound much but it DOES make a difference causing the chambers to come loose and try to find an exit from the engine  :shock:  Yes it does happen  :(


     Most PROPER engine shops will be able to carry it out for you

  Not done a 300 but a few 200 gaskets not a bad job really

[Range Rover Blues]

300 TDi doesn't have precombustion chambers, it's a direct injection engine with the chamber in the piston, which saves you all the work Burgerman is refering to.

The valves will move slightley closer to the piston if you skim the head and IIRC there is a measurement for this in the factory manual.  You can adjust this by cutting the valve seats if needs be but I found I didn't.

Unlike a petrol engine the volume of air above the piston at TDC is quite important because the C:R is much higher for one thing and also because the engine runs because the fuel auto-ignites.  If you lower the C:R then it won't run as well and you may loose economy, if you go the other way then a piston will hit the head at high speed.

Annoyingly you'll often find that 3/4 pistons will be well away and one will be higher necessitating a thicker gasket.  You can then hear that one cylinder is doing all the work at idle hence the clatter.

[burgerman]

Woops  :oops:  :lol:   Cant win um all, you can tell i am a V8 man at heart  :roll:

[Les Henson]

Valve stand down on a 300TDi engine should be-

Inlet - 0.81`to 1.09mm

Exhaust - 0.86 to 1.14mm


Les.

[loony landy]

Well mine has been done took me about 6 hrs in total but 2 hrs was waiting for a gasket to arrive  :roll: :roll:

Followed les guide and it was very simple and even a person with limited knowledge of the lady could do it.

Seems it has had a gasket before as the one i took off was nearly new but who ever did it never tightened the 8 headbolts in the mddle as these were just nipped up !!  It has water on top of pistons 3 and 4 and you could see where is was leaking out !!!!

But now its all back on and seems to be working well, it get to temp ok and the heaters work better too.

Will check the head bolts after 200 miles just to be on the safe side  :dance:

[tack43]

Bear in mind you can't really check them unless you slacken all the bolts and redo the whole angle thing again, but, this would in effect "blow" the head gasket again.  :'( Best to leave well alone if you are confident you've done it right first time.

Rich

[loony landy]

Bear in mind you can't really check them unless you slacken all the bolts and redo the whole angle thing again, but, this would in effect "blow" the head gasket again.  :'( Best to leave well alone if you are confident you've done it right first time.

Rich

cheers for that , i think we did it right well to the book anyway, just got a air lock somewhere now and i cant get rid of it !!!!!!

[Range Rover Blues]

Got to agree with TAck on that, do the job once and leave well alone.  the combination of ali/iron engine and compoisite gasket/stretch bolts has "fit and forget" written all over it.

Air lock, yeap it happens.  Probably the heater matrix.  I like to fill them with water at the thermostat housing elbow, get them hot then drain any air bubbles back form the same point.

There is a narrow pipe that's supposed to force air form the thermostat into the header tank whenthe pressure cap opens, but given the thermostat is above the header tank I don't have much faith in it when there's lots of air in the system.