The waiting is over!

[Aggie]

Congratulations Charles 104000 miles on mine. Anything i should be considering?

[Charles]

Congratulations Charles 104000 miles on mine. Anything i should be considering?

If you haven't done it recently, then expect the Head Gasket to need replacing soon. On average, mine needs replacing every 85k miles

Your shock absorbers will be getting tired but, unless you notice a significant deterioration in ride quality, then they probably still have another 20-30k miles in them. The springs last forever.

Also, consider changing your gearbox oil every 60k miles or so - even if you just drain the box but leave some of the oil in the torque converter, then this makes a huge difference to gearbox performance

Talking of which, you need to monitor your TC performance as you might find it suffering from excessive slip and you will notice the revs rising by 2-300 rpm with no noticeable increase in speed. The TC is listed as NLA but any decent gearbox company should be able to refurbish it.

Other than that, you should consider driving it more

[ali]

That’s a huge mileage to achieve in any car. Fantastic!

I wonder how much V Power that took?

13,000 gallons roughly

[hermes]

Charles, how did you determine that the head gasket was due?

I'm approaching 85,000 miles.....

[Charles]

Charles, how did you determine that the head gasket was due?

I'm approaching 85,000 miles.....

There are a number of indications:
- mpg worsens unexpectedly (depends, of course, on how carefully you monitor this)
- pinking under load at lower revs (open the window and listen as you go up a hill under load and it is obvious)
- gearbox changes up earlier than expected (resulting in a deep exhaust tone and the feeling that it should be in a lower gear)

Because the gasket typically fails between cylinders, you shouldn't experience cloudy exhaust fumes (water in the cylinder) or emulsified oil in the filler cap (water in the oil) - so, even if you don't pick up on it immediately, the only problem is crossover between cylinders which reduces power and worsens consumption but shouldn't cause damage.

If you think that it has gone, then a compression test across all six cylinders will reveal the culprit as normal cylinder compression should be about 180psi but where the gasket has failed between cylinders, the reading will be lower, nearer 120psi on two neighbouring cylinders.

From experience, the gasket generally fails between the two cylinders at the back of the engine (closer to the bulkhead) which are 5 & 6 IIRC

Hope this helps

[hermes]

Super, thanks for the info. No signs yet then! Even the TC continues to behave.....