My view is that E5, E10, E85 and neat Ethanol is a flammable liquid so could be used in an internal combustion engine. No different to people running a diesel on cooking oil or recycled chip fat or a petrol engine on LPG or CNG, it isn't what the engine was originally designed to run on but it works. Top fuel dragsters and some of the American race car series run on Ethanol so why not? While trying to get an old engine with a carb to run properly on Ethanol would take quite a bit of alteration to fuelling and ignition, the closed loop control on a relatively modern ECU equipped engine should take care of a lot of the required alterations. Our current ECUs only allow for the ignition timing to be retarded if run on low grade petrol, they don't allow it to be advanced if you run on higher octane fuel for instance but the flex fuel vehicles have an ECU with wider adjustments to fuelling and ignition timing to make optimum use of the different properties. As of 2017 the French Government have allowed the fitting of flex fuel ECUs (previously it was an unapproved modification so the car automatically failed the Controle Technique) to cars that originally couldn't use it although many have found their car will run on it quite adequately without any alteration.

Very similar problem but unfortunately no resolution other than he changed the gearbox. That would seem to point to an internal fault within the gearbox but even then it could have been electrical and he disturbed the bad connection when changing the box. From the codes, 1755 and 1777 refer to the interconnection between the engine ECU and gearbox dealing with the ignition timing retard but the others are interesting. P0722 is the output speed sensor, while P0740 is the torque converter clutch so both electrical. However, electrical faults tend to work or not, not appear and gradually get worse. A few posts on the subject (it seems to be common on Discoveries fitted with the 4HP22 gearbox) on other forums have mentioned battery and alternator but I can't see that either, unless the supply getting to the gearbox is low due to a bad connection somewhere.

The XYZ switch drives the LED next to the gear lever and also the gear display in the dash (although this will usually blank anyway if the gearbox is in limp mode), but if the LED next to the gear lever displays correctly, then the XYZ switch is fine.

The only time I have know an auto hesitate before engaging gears, was on an Audi where somebody had filled it with the wrong fluid. It was one built at a changeover point so the fluid was correct for the year of car but not the particular gearbox fitted. I assume you have checked the fluid level as per the book, checked cold with engine running in Neutral after slowly cycling through all the gears. Is it the correct fluid? It should be Dexron 3, not Dexron 4 or 5, later is not always better and isn't an upgrade as many seem to think.

We spoke about this and I considered bunging some E85 in mine last weekend when I was in France. The only thing that stopped me from doing it is that one of my lambda sensors gives an open circuit heater fault (P1187) all the time so one bank runs open loop. It remained after I replaced the lambda sensor so it is obviously a wiring or connector problem but ordinarily that doesn't matter as the petrol in the tank is treated the same as the spare wheel, for use in emergencies only, and I run solely on LPG. But that stopped me from trying it, or at least a sizeable percentage mix of E85 and petrol, as not having a lambda sensor signal to allow it to run in Closed Loop, may not have been such a good idea. However, Land Rover say that all their vehicles built since 1994, so from the beginning of P38 production are E10 compatible so that means that the fuel system is made from materials that aren't going to suffer. As E85 has been around in France for quite some time now, P38 owners over there have tried it and report no problems with performance or driveablity. They started with a 25% mix of E85 and petrol and worked their way up to 100% E85. The only downside is fuel consumption rises by up to 30% but that isn't so much of a problem as it is so much cheaper. In the French Autoroute services (which are a lot more expensive than driving a mile or so off the Autoroute and finding a supermarket filling station), but they are the ones that show their prices petrol is around €1.65, LPG is €0.99 (but only €0.75-0.80 in the supermarkets) while E85 is €0.85. So considerably cheaper than petrol, and only marginally more expensive than running on LPG when you take into account that you will use a bit more of it.

Those two articles you linked to are interesting Dave but the first just confirms what has been found, similar performance but less mpg, while the second one is just a scare story to encourage you to buy the lubricants they sell. Any change seems to upset the classic car community but you haven't been able to buy rubber, I mean real rubber, fuel hose for years now, fuel injectors and their O rings aren't rubber and the P38 fuel system is sealed so although the fuel is Hygroscopic, it needs to be in contact with moist air to absorb the moisture and that shouldn't happen.

I've been meaning to start a thread on Nigel's car after working on it for a couple of days recently. I don't think it ever had combustion gases getting into the cooling system at all, I've got my own theory on the sequence of events but I'll save that, and some rather interesting photographs, when I get time to write it up.....

https://auctions.asm-autos.co.uk/auction/items/details/2001-land-rover-range-rover-bordeaux-3950cc-petrol-automatic-4-speed-5-door-estate/180750 if anyone wants a look. Is it the same one that was on Coparts and eBay a few months ago? If it is, at least it's been washed before the pictures were taken this time.

AFAIK there's no difference with the ECU but the difference with the height sensors is a socket on the sensor itself or on a flying lead. Don't see why they can't be swapped as long as there is enough cable, they are only a potentiometer after all.

My generic code reader will work with just about anything BUT, with GEMS it shows a MAF airflow reading but in the wrong units and with the decimal point in the wrong place. Fine as an indication that the flow is increasing with revs but doesn't give any meaningful figures. My Nanocom has licences for GEMS and Diesel so if connected to a Thor will only connect to the other subsystems not the engine.

Which NGK plugs are you using? GEMS takes BPR6ES and they are gapped as standard at around 30 thou anyway.

+1 on Elring gaskets and ARP studs. Make the job so much easier and you know the heads are torqued down properly, 35 - 50 - 65 ft/lbs.

On GEMS, it comes under Inputs, there's 3 options, fuelling air and others, I think it's under others but you should be able to find it. I'd check mine but a) it's a 4.0 litre and b) it's parked outside a hotel in the main square in a village in rural France so revving the goolies off it might not be appreciated by the locals (mate's son gets married this afternoon so we will be contributing to Boris's Covid test profits sometime on Monday).

Engine fully warm, in neutral, all loads off:
@idle - 20 kg/hr +- 3 kg/hr
@2,500 rpm - 61 kg/hr +- 3 kg/hr

So if you assume it is going to be linear, you should be able to work it out. Or if it isn't going to be linear you should be able to work out the curve from a Bosch one. This does assume you have one that is working so you can read the airflow and measure the voltage.

So is his if you look at his sig.

I've also found this http://www.mez.co.uk/p38-heater-orings-1.html so with a combination of the various guides, it should be fairly easy (he says but at least I won't be doing it until early September and will have the car for 3 days).

It won't strain the height sensors as the shocks will limit how much the suspension can extend. Most car transporter trailers have legs at the rear so the back doesn't drop right down. I use the extension on the suspension as a guide when loading a car. Watch how high the back of the car is then drive onto the trailer and when the back of the car has dropped to just below normal height, the balance is about right.

But your car will be LHD Leo, on a RHD, the matrix comes out half way then hits the steering column. At that point I gave up and bypassed it so the owner could drive his car home......

I'm working on the principle that if I can at least get the heater box loose, I can twist it a little so the matrix will slide straight out.

This is one job I'll be doing next month. Had a car here for the last couple of days that needed a few jobs doing, one of which was heater core O rings. Now I've done these numerous times on a number of different cars and have it down to about an hour now but when I started on this one it was pretty obvious someone had been in there before me. Changed the O rings (which appeared to be generic rubber rings and were being dissolved by the coolant), fired it up and watched while a small trail of coolant came out from just behind the screw head. Seems that whoever had been in there before had done the screw up too tight and cracked the heater matrix. Shot off to Rimmers to pick up a replacement but got partway through and realised the only sensible way to change the matrix would be to pull the dashboard out and do it properly. So the heater core has been temporarily bypassed and I'll be doing a proper job on it when the car is next in this area. It'll also give me chance to seal the joints in the heater ducts while I'm in there. Any hints? RAVE says to remove the wiper motor, pollen filter housings and steering column but I've seen where others have done it without, is it really necessary? With the steering column out I'd have been able to change the heater matrix with the heater box still in place and it was only that which stopped me from going any further.

He won't. Bonnet open is triggered by a short across that connector, so open circuit means it never tells you the bonnet is open even when it is.

Mines just the same, missing the screenwash cap......

Or are you referring to the disconnected heater hoses or the lack of ABS and an old school servo and master cylinder?

It connects to the bonnet open switch, or that is the plug on the bonnet open switch on the base of the RH bonnet catch, and somewhere there is it's dangling partner.

RAVE says 78Nm for all 7/16th bolts not listed on the last page of the torque settings. So if they are 7/16th bolts, that should be correct.