Losing coolant! Could it be the head gasket??

[Cassillis]

Hi all; I have a small problem with my disco1 200Tdi 147,000 miles.
Had a water leak from the front of the block some months ago. Stripped it all out and replaced all the gaskets from the block forward, did the cam belt as well while i was in there. The vehicle never overheats and runs at about half on the temperature gauge. Replaced the radiator as the old one was pretty poor but I'm still losing water. No visible leaks no puddles, pools or dripping but the expansion tank is empty every 3-4 days.
Would this point to a head gasket that has gone?

[hobbit]

If no obvious sign, one point it may be worth checking is the expansion tank having a crack in it, only leaks when hot and expanded

[chris9119]

Graeme

What a bummer......

Check your oil and see if its got water in it......, however, it could have boiled off before contaminating the oil...., white trace elements.....

As said, could be header when warmed up......, could also be water pump gasket or the heater hoses at the back of the engine...., they do have issues with rusting away......

If the team can help, just call.

[L90OOK]

Do you get allot of white smoke on startup?
Did you skim the head when it was off & check block for true?  Did you fit a thicker head gasket?
That's allot of water to lose so must be able to find a trace somewhere.  :?

Just a thought...did you bleed the system properly?  An airlock can cause back pressure & push water out the expansion tank.  Does the heater work ok?

[peasey]

could be the head is cracked as i had this with a diesel escort a few years back took me ages to work out where the water was going as ther was so much black smoke i couldnt see the white smoke :?  :?  :? do you have any trouble starting it?

[lee celtic]

I did the timing belt on mine last week and have been losing water ever since  :shock: so I took the car out for a good thrash with no fan to get it nice and hot then parked up and popped the bonet there was a small trickle of steam coming from the top rad hose  :oops:  :oops: It wasn't tight :oops:  :oops:

I have also heard that a mate at work has a disco that was loosing water and it turned out to be the header tank split around the seam with age and it only leaked when hot so it may be an idea to wrap the header with bog roll before you go somwhere to see if it gets wet :D

[Ja1983]

climb underneath when warm, look up at ther water pump, theres a little hole underneath, check round there for water marks/dfrips, if you find some (or a lot as i did!) replace the water pump and you should be fine, therees also the head gasket size issue... 1, 2 or 3??

good luck, and akways carry a bottle of water under the scuttle panel, beats piddling in the header tank like i had to do!  :oops:

[Cassillis]

Graeme

What a bummer......

Check your oil and see if its got water in it......, however, it could have boiled off before contaminating the oil...., white trace elements.....

As said, could be header when warmed up......, could also be water pump gasket or the heater hoses at the back of the engine...., they do have issues with rusting away......

If the team can help, just call.

Now it was this reply that got me thinking.

Oil looks Ok

Water pump gasket  ok

Then i remembered i had changed the heater box, it was the first mechanical job i did on this vehicle. Now my carpets are wet in both foot wells, they seem to be damp all the time which would negate sunroof or windscreen leaks. I fear there may be a leak behind the dash, from the heater matrix possibly.

Could someone suggest a method to confirm this before i have to take the whole dash out again. I thought about some vegetable dye into the coolant, this would then show onto the carpets. Any comments would be of help.

[barmiebrumie]

Undo the heater pipes from the back of the engine & put a piece of pipe between them IE:- bypass the heater If you loose no water then its the heater matrix again  :twisted: , Think I've got one if you ned it  

[Cassillis]

Aha!! Good idea john and thanks for the offer will be getting the overalls out next week sometime.

Pm'd ya too