Dodgy Engine???

[jonnyc]

Been brousing the forum - noticied andy the landie has a sick engine - blowing out oil. Unfortunatly, recently my landie - 2.25 diesel - has started blowing oil out of the oil filler - which i put down to a loose filler cap- until i read andy the landie's plight....... :(  It's got me thinking because i do quite a few moterway miles every now and again - and its made a right mess under the bonnet. But it only does it every now and again but usually on the moterway - Will it blow up?! It still seems fit, consumption at 25 - 30mpg and i can overtake truck easily (all with overdrive) But now i'm worried as i'm going up to fort william on saterday....

[nzrover]

As a starting point, change the oil.  Use a good quality 15W/40 oil that meets at least CF specifications.  This problem could be caused by the wrong grade of oil.

[Andy the Landy]

Mine runs on 20w/50. Should I try 10w/40 :?:  My Landy still does 20ish mpg and is not a problem on local pottering about. The 1st time oil blew out was from oil filter housing (dodgy O-ring) and actual engine oil level hadnt dropped. 2nd time it was either air filter or oil filler tube  amd oil level had dropped to minimum (both times was at motorway speeds). A bit smokey on start-up, but once warmed up appears fairly clear

[nzrover]

Mine runs on 20w/50. Should I try 10w/40

The really good diesel oils are normally 15W/40 rated (as that's what heavy diesel engines use).  Sitting halfway around the world from you it's a bit hard to know what's available to you - Caltex (Texaco, or whatever they're called in the UK) Delo 400 15W/40 would be ideal.

As a general rule, it's not worth cutting corners on oil quality to save a bit of money - any of the fleet diesel oils from the major manufacturers should be fine.  At the other end of the scale there's not much point in spending vast sums on synthetic oils to put into an old 2.25 diesel either.

[Andy the Landy]

The oil we use in the coaches at work is 15w/40 from Boxer Oils and our Boss certainly doesnt skimp on anything to do with vehicles, so I'll ask him if I can try some. I only use 20w/50 as someone told me to run an old Landy on this