2004 Discovery 2 Expo Build

[MStudt]

Not good but on the bright side welcome to Oregon! I live in Sweet Home but work in Eugene! Glad to hear of another local member. Hope you get the rover repaired.


Sent from my iPhone using OB Talk

Nice to see someone in the area too. We're in Eugene for now, but most likely moving around the end of the year. My wife works in town, and my new employment will be a couple miles before Roseburg. We're thinking about getting down to the Cottage Grove area, but we still need to do some research.

I'm hoping to have it shipped out around the end of the year, but time will tell.

 

[MStudt]

The Rover has made it to Oregon.

A lot has happened over the last 18 months, and not a lot with the Rover. We bought a house, and finally have some much needed room to work on vehicles. Now we just need to clean out the garage from all the remodeling we had to do. I should have the Rover back on the road shortly.

 

[CatPowerDude]

Amazing thread. In the past year I have put a Atlantic British long block in my 04 along with the low temp thermostat. Then it was still getting hot and I found a few leaks. So I replaced all the hoses to find the radiator had now sprung a leak. Currently waiting on my new radiator to arrive. But when my cooking system was working right I was seeing 190-194° on the trails this past summer with ac blasting. I know all the woes of getting the rover cooling systems for function correctly. I had a lot of trouble getting the air bled out of mine. Either way this is a really unique one off build and I read it from beginning to end tonight. It was a great read. Good luck with your progress.

 

[MStudt]

Amazing thread. In the past year I have put a Atlantic British long block in my 04 along with the low temp thermostat. Then it was still getting hot and I found a few leaks. So I replaced all the hoses to find the radiator had now sprung a leak. Currently waiting on my new radiator to arrive. But when my cooking system was working right I was seeing 190-194° on the trails this past summer with ac blasting. I know all the woes of getting the rover cooling systems for function correctly. I had a lot of trouble getting the air bled out of mine. Either way this is a really unique one off build and I read it from beginning to end tonight. It was a great read. Good luck with your progress.

Thank you

Everything was working great on the new engine for the first 500 miles, and then it went to crap.

 

[CatPowerDude]

Thank you

Everything was working great on the new engine for the first 500 miles, and then it went to crap.

Ha, I had a very similar experience. My thermostat had decided it was not going to work intermittently. Ordered and installed a new low temp oem thermostat. Got it installed then had worse overheating issues. Pulled the new thermostat and put it in water over the stove and monitored the temp and watched to see if it opened. New one was functioning as it should. I check my fan and fan clutch, both were fine. Put the thermostat back in and still had issues. Turns out I wasn’t bleeding all the air from the system. I followed the rave instructions to the t. I mean I work in engines and equipment all day everyday I’m no stranger this kinda work and I couldn’t figure out for the life of me what the deal was. A local rover friend suggested parking the truck on an incline when I add the coolant and sure enough that worked. I was seeing 194° in the summer on the trails with the ac blasting and similar temps driving around town. Few weeks later I noticed coolant tank was low. So I start checking. No visible leaks and no signs of an engine problem, even did a compression and leak down test and sent an oil sample out for analysis. No faults found. So as long as I kept coolant in it the truck was fine. Went on a 800mi trip lots of off-roading and mud involved. Got home was cleaning up and saw wet spots on my coolant hoses that were covered in mud. So I ordered and replaced all the hoses. Thought surely I’m good now. Nope truck is still getting warmer than normal. Found coolant on the ground. Dyed the system and traced it to a small crack in the radiator. Now I’m waiting on it to arrive from rovers north. So I truly feel your pains. I hope your problem is something cheap and simple and it has just been overlooked. I still have a hard time believing how temperamental these cooking systems are. It’s a cooling system it shouldn’t be this complicated haha. Best of luck I look forward to readying your updates. And if I think of anything that may help you I’ll be sure to make a post l.

 

[MStudt]

Ha, I had a very similar experience. My thermostat had decided it was not going to work intermittently. Ordered and installed a new low temp oem thermostat. Got it installed then had worse overheating issues. Pulled the new thermostat and put it in water over the stove and monitored the temp and watched to see if it opened. New one was functioning as it should. I check my fan and fan clutch, both were fine. Put the thermostat back in and still had issues. Turns out I wasn’t bleeding all the air from the system. I followed the rave instructions to the t. I mean I work in engines and equipment all day everyday I’m no stranger this kinda work and I couldn’t figure out for the life of me what the deal was. A local rover friend suggested parking the truck on an incline when I add the coolant and sure enough that worked. I was seeing 194° in the summer on the trails with the ac blasting and similar temps driving around town. Few weeks later I noticed coolant tank was low. So I start checking. No visible leaks and no signs of an engine problem, even did a compression and leak down test and sent an oil sample out for analysis. No faults found. So as long as I kept coolant in it the truck was fine. Went on a 800mi trip lots of off-roading and mud involved. Got home was cleaning up and saw wet spots on my coolant hoses that were covered in mud. So I ordered and replaced all the hoses. Thought surely I’m good now. Nope truck is still getting warmer than normal. Found coolant on the ground. Dyed the system and traced it to a small crack in the radiator. Now I’m waiting on it to arrive from rovers north. So I truly feel your pains. I hope your problem is something cheap and simple and it has just been overlooked. I still have a hard time believing how temperamental these cooking systems are. It’s a cooling system it shouldn’t be this complicated haha. Best of luck I look forward to readying your updates. And if I think of anything that may help you I’ll be sure to make a post l.

I really hope the inline thermostat fixes everything for me. If not we'll be running the ghetto stat mod for a while.

I have a brand new radiator, hoses, water pump, 180* stat, and added Water Wetter. Still running at idle over 215*, and maybe 1-2* cooler when driving. I can tell you that my lower radiator hose is cool to the touch, and can be held with your bare hand with no problem. That's even when the engine temp is at 215*. We put in a gutted stat housing just to see what would happen on a Midwest summer day. The temps were holding in the 170's with no issues. Swapped the 180* back in, and problems again. Put the gutted stat in again, and 170's all day.

Now we're running a gutted housing with a clamp on the bypass to control the temps. I actually read something about clamping off the bypass hose if you're traveling, and the engine starts to warm up. Supposed to be a good way to tell if you have a bad stat or not. It's pretty ghetto, but it's working for now.

Mike

 

[CatPowerDude]

I really hope the inline thermostat fixes everything for me. If not we'll be running the ghetto stat mod for a while.

I have a brand new radiator, hoses, water pump, 180* stat, and added Water Wetter. Still running at idle over 215*, and maybe 1-2* cooler when driving. I can tell you that my lower radiator hose is cool to the touch, and can be held with your bare hand with no problem. That's even when the engine temp is at 215*. We put in a gutted stat housing just to see what would happen on a Midwest summer day. The temps were holding in the 170's with no issues. Swapped the 180* back in, and problems again. Put the gutted stat in again, and 170's all day.

Now we're running a gutted housing with a clamp on the bypass to control the temps. I actually read something about clamping off the bypass hose if you're traveling, and the engine starts to warm up. Supposed to be a good way to tell if you have a bad stat or not. It's pretty ghetto, but it's working for now.

Mike

Then to me it really sounds like your new thermostat will fix it. I had the exact same symptoms with the lower hose being cold and the upper one being hot.

 

[MStudt]

Almost four months after having the Rover delivered to Oregon I was able to start working on it. I've been spending so much time remodeling our house since buying it in October that I haven't spent a single minute on the Rover until this past weekend.

Most of you know about the ongoing issues around the high temps, and the multiple things we've tried to fix it. After replacing the t-stat 3 times, and Airlifting the cooling system with no success we moved on. This weekend I was able to pull all the original tubing off the rover, and removed the OEM fan. I was able to mock up all the new tubing with the added t-stat housing. I also added an aluminum body before the t-stat that holds the sending unit for an addition temp gauge, peck cock valve, and sight glass. I still need to cut the upper fan shroud, modify the new t-stat, and put everything back together. The goal is to have it up and running by the end of the week, and license it in Oregon next week.

Out with the old

In with the new

I also have a bunch of other items to take care of due to this sitting for the last couple years. Both batteries are completely dead, and need to be exchanged under warranty. I need to redo some of the wiring, and install some items that were removed to install in our 4runner. I also plan on adding a solar panel to help with charging the battery since this won't be driven very much.

Mike

 

[MStudt]

She's purring like a kitten again! I'll have some details soon on the stupid issue we had.

Mike

 

[MStudt]

Seems that all the issues we had were related to bad t-stats. We had 2 OEM stats's that were bad, and 1 aftermarket OEM stat as well. After getting the Rover shipped to Oregon I was able to install the new inline stat, and hoped that would work the first try. I neglected to drill an 1/8" hole at 6 o'clock in the new inline stat, and that caused my temps to spike just like before. Last night I pulled the stat, drill a hole at 6 o'clock, and then re-installed it.

The hottest temp I had was 206, and within 30-45 seconds that dropped to 186. While running the Rover for 20 minutes that seemed to be the norm, and was pretty consistent with that fluctuation. For now, seems seem to be back to normal, and hopefully they stay that way for a bit.

Mike

 

[CatPowerDude]

Glad your cooling problems are fixed!

 

[MStudt]

As of today there is a new owner for this vehicle, and a new project starting very soon.

Mike