Dead Chim after 13 days of ownership
Discussion
So I managed 1200 miles in 13 days, of great fun in my chim
Couple of little problems, nothing to major until today........
I was on my way to pick up a new set of speakers, was very heavy rain so i was taking it easy,
About 10 miles from home on the M25 i started to loose a bit of power, and started to hear a tapping noise with higher revs or acceleration, the belt was squeaking i thought to my self, im sure i can get home ( bad idea, i should know better )
Tapping got louder..... i got to my drive and it died,
took her in the garage only to smell burnt oil with alot of steam and smoke,
On further inspection i see no coolant in any of the tanks, im starting to fear the worst, head gasket or knackered heads,
I filled the coolant back up with warm water to avoid cracking any thing that might be very hot still, i see the bleed valve on the corner of my rad very loose and with a deformed rubber washer, so im thinking its that, BUT!!!
On further inspection i see a little strand has come off the belt and made a nice deep cut in my swirl pot and caused it to bleed,
What im worried about is, have i done any more damage to heads or some thing else?
Thanks Alex
Couple of little problems, nothing to major until today........
I was on my way to pick up a new set of speakers, was very heavy rain so i was taking it easy,
About 10 miles from home on the M25 i started to loose a bit of power, and started to hear a tapping noise with higher revs or acceleration, the belt was squeaking i thought to my self, im sure i can get home ( bad idea, i should know better )
Tapping got louder..... i got to my drive and it died,
took her in the garage only to smell burnt oil with alot of steam and smoke,
On further inspection i see no coolant in any of the tanks, im starting to fear the worst, head gasket or knackered heads,
I filled the coolant back up with warm water to avoid cracking any thing that might be very hot still, i see the bleed valve on the corner of my rad very loose and with a deformed rubber washer, so im thinking its that, BUT!!!
On further inspection i see a little strand has come off the belt and made a nice deep cut in my swirl pot and caused it to bleed,
What im worried about is, have i done any more damage to heads or some thing else?
Thanks Alex
They have gauges that are there to warn you about what is going on under the hood.. I'm sorry but if you can't read the gauges I'm not sure that you can postulate how long / how bad you've continued to run an engine that needed minor attention into an even worse state? Boiling the thing dry is just about the worst scenario I can imagine TBH.
spend said:
They have gauges that are there to warn you about what is going on under the hood.. I'm sorry but if you can't read the gauges I'm not sure that you can postulate how long / how bad you've continued to run an engine that needed minor attention into an even worse state? Boiling the thing dry is just about the worst scenario I can imagine TBH.
45 psi oil pressure,95 degrees water temp
70 degree oil temp
When it all happened, If you read that would you suspect any thing?
After 8.5 years working on cars none of them readings show any thing out of place, or are Tvr Rover V8's different? to every other 4 stroke engine
A very similar scenario lead to an engine rebuild in my case (stopped down the hard shoulder in a cloud of white smoke, coolant temp just above 90 - recovery truck. Found no coolant in the header tank whatsoever (leaking rad and water pump), both head gaskets gone - no point only doing the head gaskets on a 106,000 mile engine with marginal oil pressure at idle, so out it came). 't Was a blessing in disguise though - cost me over a year before I finally got to register the car here but have had a mechanically unburstable car ever since. 
That's got to be a total fluke accident for the belt to do that? And if the dash is giving you those readings I can understand not stressing. Could be a blessing in disguise mate, give you the chance to get it 100%. it must be something going round, my otter switch went last night!
Daz
Daz
Alexdaredevilz said:
spend said:
They have gauges that are there to warn you about what is going on under the hood.. I'm sorry but if you can't read the gauges I'm not sure that you can postulate how long / how bad you've continued to run an engine that needed minor attention into an even worse state? Boiling the thing dry is just about the worst scenario I can imagine TBH.
45 psi oil pressure,95 degrees water temp
70 degree oil temp
When it all happened, If you read that would you suspect any thing?
After 8.5 years working on cars none of them readings show any thing out of place, or are Tvr Rover V8's different? to every other 4 stroke engine
weld up the hole fill it up with coolant and fire it up, if you've fooked the engine already trying it again now its cooled down can't do much more damage
Good chance that you've done the engine.
Check the shells and crank before its turned over again.
Problem is, with all the coolant gone...there's no media to indicate that the water temp is rising...coz all the waters gone!
Not unusual to do this and usually results in a rebuild...just heads if you're lucky.
I have a level sensor in my header tank. The car beeps at me if coolant is low.
(Sorry, HAD a coolant sensor
)
A
Check the shells and crank before its turned over again.
Problem is, with all the coolant gone...there's no media to indicate that the water temp is rising...coz all the waters gone!
Not unusual to do this and usually results in a rebuild...just heads if you're lucky.
I have a level sensor in my header tank. The car beeps at me if coolant is low.
(Sorry, HAD a coolant sensor
)A
spend said:
They have gauges that are there to warn you about what is going on under the hood.. I'm sorry but if you can't read the gauges I'm not sure that you can postulate how long / how bad you've continued to run an engine that needed minor attention into an even worse state? Boiling the thing dry is just about the worst scenario I can imagine TBH.
Bad day Spendy?Guillotine said:
Problem is, with all the coolant gone...there's no media to indicate that the water temp is rising...coz all the waters gone!
Guillotine said:
Not unusual to do this and usually results in a rebuild...just heads if you're lucky.
A
The 'driving on with a tappety sound' bit doesn't sound good I have to say... although when my engine was opened up, apart from the head gaskets nothing was found that wasn't commensurate with a 100+ K mile engine - two round lobes on the cam, bearing shells, valve guides/seats fairly worn... A
Again, any damage will have been done during this episode, running it briefly after having repaired the engine mount and coolant tank won't make it worse...
Not really Pods 
No-one has reconciled the 'loose' rad bleed valve into any of those diagnoses BTW.
I still standby the belief that a chronic overheat is just as catastrophic to a lump as running it with no oil, even worse really - bearings cranks are easy to replace grind, hidden slipped liners / warped heads blocks are all much greater problems to deal with and might even only show up after a period of use.
No-one has reconciled the 'loose' rad bleed valve into any of those diagnoses BTW.
I still standby the belief that a chronic overheat is just as catastrophic to a lump as running it with no oil, even worse really - bearings cranks are easy to replace grind, hidden slipped liners / warped heads blocks are all much greater problems to deal with and might even only show up after a period of use.
Podie said:
spend said:
They have gauges that are there to warn you about what is going on under the hood.. I'm sorry but if you can't read the gauges I'm not sure that you can postulate how long / how bad you've continued to run an engine that needed minor attention into an even worse state? Boiling the thing dry is just about the worst scenario I can imagine TBH.
Bad day Spendy?
Normally if the coolant is lower the water temperature dumps randomly between two values (dependant on the car)
My coolant never rises above 91c but the one time (early in ownership) that it was running a little low on water - it was hitting random numbers between 88c and 94c, not rising or lowering..
But checking coolant, oil and a general look around should be done weekly.
My coolant never rises above 91c but the one time (early in ownership) that it was running a little low on water - it was hitting random numbers between 88c and 94c, not rising or lowering..
But checking coolant, oil and a general look around should be done weekly.
Im still waiting to find out the damage on mine after a similar problem.
popped a core plug at the back of the engine, and dumped all the coolant out under the back of the engine. impossible to spot from the drivers seat round mallory full chat.
I then get a high water temp alarm, followed quickly by temp going down as i backed off. Sadly though that was due to no water left so next alarm was low oil pressure as it cooked...
I did have somthing similar though on my chim. driving down the m5, and the heater suddenly went cold. I pulled over and steam coming out of the water pump bearing.. got recovered new water pump and fine for years after that.
SO its a real lottery, depend on how long you ran with no coolant.. I'd fiw the swirl pot, check the rad bleed valve, and refill the coolant. Then before i do any thing else I'd drain the oil, and do an oil change. Taking a good look at the oil that comes out for contamination.
Then either fire it up and see what happens or do a compression and leakdown test first
popped a core plug at the back of the engine, and dumped all the coolant out under the back of the engine. impossible to spot from the drivers seat round mallory full chat.
I then get a high water temp alarm, followed quickly by temp going down as i backed off. Sadly though that was due to no water left so next alarm was low oil pressure as it cooked...
I did have somthing similar though on my chim. driving down the m5, and the heater suddenly went cold. I pulled over and steam coming out of the water pump bearing.. got recovered new water pump and fine for years after that.
SO its a real lottery, depend on how long you ran with no coolant.. I'd fiw the swirl pot, check the rad bleed valve, and refill the coolant. Then before i do any thing else I'd drain the oil, and do an oil change. Taking a good look at the oil that comes out for contamination.
Then either fire it up and see what happens or do a compression and leakdown test first
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