If the pump hasn't seized then it looks like it was just one of those random failures that could happen to virtually anyone at any time. Put it down to metal fatigue, dodgy manufacture or a dodgy weld, nothing that you could have foreseen. As for the heater core, I wonder if O rings would have acted as a sort of secondary pressure relief rather than blowing the end out of the Audi core.......
Oh Marty. Wish I had the knowledge to help you instead of you helping me. Now you remember back to when I had that infuriating battery drain that those expert idiots in the diagnostic place could not sort out. Despite me telling them that the red light by the gear stick was not going out when locked, they took no notice and virtually laughed at me. I was close to getting shot of the useless lump of metal that it is!!! You kept saying. Bring it here I will fix it. Don't give up on it you said. Eventually I gave in. A 68 year old granny, on her own, drove 3 hours in a car I could not turn off in case it would not then start, to see a chap I did not know, in the hope he would fix it. Well you did and it has been perfect since and I will be eternally grateful to you for that. I have not given up on it YET!!!!
The ps pump failed, fan belt came off, different spec evap tank cap didn't vent pressure as it should and the next weekest part of the cooling system turned out to be the heater core or maybe just an O ring... Am I missing something or does it seem everything is likely to be OK after you've fixed the ps pump, heater, got a new cap and replaced the radio you didn't like? Of course there is a chance of further damage but I'd investigate rather than summise and be too disheartened at this stage, maybe the cap that didn't vent prevented engine damage at the expense of the heater.
The cap was the correct spec... it was replaced with a genuine LR part when I built/installed the new engine 18 months ago and vented as it should - just obviously not quick enough out an 8mm overflow for 6L + of boiling coolant to escape before the heater core plastic gave way! the trail of coolant from the vehicle and the puddle that was left under it once I pulled over was from the venting thru the overflow.
As you can see in the pics the heater core blew out pretty spectacularly.
I might be lucky, and replace the PS pump, heater core, and probably swap the cap (even if it's back to my old one to test, as it was still OK AFAIK - I replaced it as preventative maintenance). And see what it runs like. But given that it has overheated, and it's alloy - the normal thing for these vehicles is the head gasket to blow - and/or the head(s) to warp. I may have gotten extremely lucky, but I'm not holding my breath.
I guess assuming it fires up and runs OK with no immediate sign of there being a blown gasket, I have coolant sniff test here, which I'll try to see if there is any sign of combustion gasses in there..
Hopefully will have more news later this week once more investigations have taken place...
For my money Marty, I think you're right. Once you've got the coolant system and ancillaries back together just crank it. See how it sounds and if it pressurises. Then if it come up to temp and stabilises do your sniff test and with a bit of luck you'll be good to go. Maybe wear wellies on the test drive? ;)
You could pull the valve covers and check for obvious cracks I guess - I'm not sure if there's a "usual place" where these engines like to crack their heads, I know it's between 3 and 4 on a BMW M20B25 and between 2 and 3 on an AMC/Jeep 4.0 but they're both I6 engines - I haven't had that "pleasure" with a Rover V8 yet....
If you get stuck for a car, you can borrow mine, only thing is, it’s still running on liquid gold, I’ve not had the enthusiasm to find the broken wire on lpg system. ( I’m pretty sure that’s where the problem is )
Cheers Chris - I appreciate the offer! I should be OK for the moment though, I don't have anywhere to be work-wise for a fortnight or so, and am crossing fingers I can get it sorted in that time! Failing that, I have to go to Bournemouth for work, which is doable on the train, and am there for a week, so not the most horrible if I have to do that without the RR...
I have ordered a new set of blend motors, so I am hoping to get the dash pulled out this afternoon/tomorrow morning, and the heater box out - new heater core in, and then new blend motors in when they arrive on Wednesday. I think Sloth is planning on coming up Wednesday to have a look with me, so main thought is to get the PS pump from workshop, and then get it started and see what the result is...
Marty, I have got a spare used PS pump here that I can post on to you to help get you going again.
I bought it on Ebay a few years ago. It is off a diesel but I think they are all the same. Maybe the bracket is different, diesel vs petrol.
I think it is ok.
Either let me have it back when you are done or send me another one (not the one that blew up! Ha Ha).
We'll have it going again and see what's up :)
Henry's mate George is coming along too to give the carpets a bit of a de-coolanting.
So, a bit of an update from yesterday...
Sloth came up to have a look with me, and after the normal chat, leaning over the engine bay looking at it and going 'yep, it's F**KED', and probably a few bits of banter back and forth about sat nav units... we cracked on.
I'd got the heater box back in, with a new heater core (still Audi style - but a Nissens one this time, with bigger hose connections - 19mm instead of 16mm, so got rid of some excess joins in the pipe reducers) and tidyed/re-taped up the majority of the fascia looms, so we started off with plumbing in the new heater core into the engine bay, before briefly and gingerly turning it over a couple of times and starting it up (no belt or anything yet - literally for a few seconds to see if there were any horrible noises which might indicate us tearing it down!). Satisfied that it wasn't on the brink of self destructions, we headed off to the workshop to collect the replacement (old) PS pump, and a few other bits.
Getting back, we swapped the PS pump - (the design of the pulley on the one that destroyed itself was a bit different - so no idea if that made a difference), put the new belt on and filled it up with coolant.
Started up again and set to work bleeding the air out, which between getting it up to temperature and letting it cool a couple of times we investigated his random ABS Fault and brake lamp failure messages which were randomly popping up on the dash. After a bit of detective work with the Nanocom, we found the brake switch acting up, so pulled that apart and repaired it.
Back to my RR and another burping session, along with coolant sniff test, which came back negative. Another break for it to cool, followed by topping off the reservoir and then running it up to temp with the cap on and allowing it to build pressure this time. The good news is that the cooling system didn't seem to overpressurise, so things seem to be OK on that side of things.
The bad news... to me, although the engine still seems to run quite smooth and sweetly, there is a bit of a noise there, which I don't recall it being there before, and neither of us can put our finger on what it might be. Again, it doesn't seem to be blowing pressure into the crank case, so it might be either an exhaust gasket or head gasket blow to the outside? It's not so prominent that it's possible to pinpoint exactly where it's coming from either.
The other downside, is my MOT ran out on the 15th - it was booked in to be done on the 12th, but then this happened on the 9th, so it's had to be put off. So I can't really take the RR out for anything of a run to see how it performs under load and driving conditions - unless its being driven to a pre-arranged MOT. And I don't really want to book it in for the MOT, until I'm happy that it can do the required engine running bits without any signs of blowing/damage. So feel a bit between a rock and a hard place!
I have to finish getting the interior put back together - BECM back in properly, and the dash back together/ductwork in/instrument cluster etc before it's driveable anyway. I might then chance driving it around the estate/down to the local Tesco and back a few times to see how it performs. If it seems to be OK, and nothing presents itself, and that helps clear the last bit of the air out of the cooling system, then I might put it in for the MOT next week and see what presents itself. That way, if something does crop up, and it's got an MOT, then at least I can limp it up to the workshop, where it's easier to completely strip things down.
Part of me wasn't 100% happy with the heads when I got them back from the machine shop when I built the engine in the first place, so I have retrieved the heads from my old engine that came out (and hadn't had overheating issues) so I might look at slowly rebuilding those, and then doing a head gasket swap at some point for my own piece of mind.
But I guess the main thing out of it all is that nothing is springing out at us that says it needs an immediate teardown, so I think I have been pretty lucky. The biggest casualties out of this have been 1) my foot, 2) the old heater core 3) the nav unit - white screen and nothing happening 4) the HEVAC main board (fair few traces of coolant on it and in the connectors) and 5)the underside of the dash - it's got some surface scarring from being blasted with hot coolant/steam! but not noticeable from the outside luckily.
I've got a few more pictures of progress, which I'll put up once I've got them off my phone and onto the server.
Can you take a picture of the pulley on the broken PS pump? I forgot to take one yesterday.
There is a crack in it that appears to have been present for some time, as its got visible rusting in it. It runs up from the centre where it has come free from the centre / bit still bolted to the pump shaft. My guess is it cracked a while ago and decided it no longer wanted to hold on any longer when it failed.
Sounds like good news to me! I'm sorry I wasn't able to be of any use, but maybe the positive vibes helped a bit?
Martyuk wrote:
The other downside, is my MOT ran out on the 15th - it was booked in to be done on the 12th, but then this happened on the 9th, so it's had to be put off. So I can't really take the RR out for anything of a run to see how it performs under load and driving conditions - unless its being driven to a pre-arranged MOT. And I don't really want to book it in for the MOT, until I'm happy that it can do the required engine running bits without any signs of blowing/damage. So feel a bit between a rock and a hard place!
I believe usually you'll get a few weeks leeway after an MOT has run out even if police stop you... Just tell them 'ahh bloody hell yes thanks for that I'd forgotten and the garage were supposed to send me a reminder'.
I certainly know this rock and a hard place scenario.
Get her back together and MOT'd then on a good test drive. Yorkshire should be far enough ;)
So an update of pictures from the last few days...
Just aswell I've had P38 dashboards out numerous times before - that kind of task doesn't scare me and only takes a couple of hours to do... almost took longer than that cleaning all the bloody wiring and re-wrapping it with tape that isn't sodden and sticky on both sides!
Incidentalley, we also noticed that the pulley on the front of the PS pump is slightly different to the original one, the part number is slightly different (they all show as being interchangeable though) but as Sloth mentioned - there appears to be some form of crack up the metal of the pulley and you can obviously see where it's cracked away from the central part.
Bloody hell Marty. Looks like a ruddy mess!!!!!! That said I am sure you will get it all back together. All the right bits and in the right place!!!
Looks like fun.
Just been having a look back at the earlier photos and noticed a button on the seat that mine doesn't have.
What's the round button ahead of the long button?
That's for my uprated seat heaters - they've got a dual temp setting which effectively switches between series and parallel on the seat base and seat back elements so they either get 6V each on low, or full 12V on high.
Very nice and toasty, and wanted to fit the switch somewhere on the seat, that would look like it could have been there from the factory :)
Tomorrows task is going to be to replace the control board in the HEVAC controller as it got coolant on it - not a lot, but I have spare boards, so may aswell not take the chance! and then make sure all the new blend motors work/calibrate OK. Will top up the coolant tank again and might run it up to temp again.
Awaiting some connectors to tidy up one of my other projects - I added LEDs to the back of the door handle cups, so the handles are back lit when the side lights are on and then slowly fade out over about 30s once the side lights are turned off. Got the project working, wired in and figured "I'll tidy it all up later" and then never got around to it, so figure that whilst it's all in bits I'd put the PCB in a case, and put a connector on the wiring for it to make it a bit neater! then going to try and soak a bit more coolant out of the footwell foam, strip the tape off these looms to clean them and re-wrap them, clean the sill channel out. A final clean out of the sill channel should mean I can get all these looms back in place, and with any luck the foam and carpet back in again. Also waiting on some aluminium foil tape to reseal all the HEVAC duct work, the gaffer tape I had used has held up well, but the adhesive has gone all crusty, so figure it's worth doing all that again whilst it's apart!
If you're interested in the heated seat pads, then let me know and I'll try to find a link to the ones I got on eBay... Sloth has the same ones (and put me onto them) - though I think he mounted his switch further back. I hacked apart the wiring loom they came with and customised it/shortened it to fit neater under the seat, and then wired it into one of the P38 connectors for the factory heated seats, so it still plugs into the vehicle loom.
Ah, cool.
I'm OK with my standard seat heaters, I've never found them lacking. Was just curious about the button :)
I hope you do get yours back up and running. It sounds like it has lots of little improvements all over the place to make it better than it started!
With the coolant in the foam, have you tried washing it out with fresh water first? I've found that the coolant that leaked on to my carpet at your workshop isn't properly drying. It still feels greasy and slightly damp. I think the coolant doesn't like to evaporate as well as water.
Washing it with water first will make it even wetter but it should hopefully dry out better in the long run.