The temp gauge getting red hot is just due to the heat sensors that triggers the gauge to go red. Pouring gallons of water onto the engine bay cools the sensors and everything goes back to normal. Mind you that this happened during extremely hot outside temps (55 celsius) and rock crawling in low range with air conditioning on high, very extreme conditions. When cruising in such temperatures, all is well and the fan does the job of cooling the car. The Defender is a very tough vehicle that can tackle extreme terrain and conditions like no other vehicle.

 

Someone's extremes are someone else's everyday life

Valid point about rock crawling and the rest, though. Jokes aside, I wonder if someone has already implemented anything that allows the vehicle to breathe easier in extreme heat. One more thing to think of: you saw the red where you have the sensors, meanwhile, how did the other parts fare where sensors are not installed? Diffs? Gearbox? Brakes? Turbo bearings? And what kind of thermal stress pouring water on hot metal causes, will it cause fatigue cracks later?

 

All good questions. I do not have an answer for your questions, but this action was recommended by the guides that do this several times a year, and I was told they keep the cars for a minimum of two years for these adventures which are tough. In any case, the Defenders kept going strong without a single mechanical or other breakdown. Our group only experienced one tire puncture. These Defenders are really tough!

 

The Best 4x4xFar, as we know!

 

Fan of Doom kicking on happens to me after every drive in my 110 too, in New England. It only bothers me when I pull into my garage and it deafens my kids, or park in the garage at work where people look at me funny when I walk away from my car going WOOOOOOOOSH.

 

Yep - pulled up outside a restaurant last week and the two people outside gave me an evil glare - they essentially had to shout over the noise...

 

You said, "Pouring gallons of water onto the engine bay" - could you please be more specific? This can be read several different ways, and "engine bay" is also a pretty vague location, for example, I'd be very vary about splashing water directly onto the engine block, might just crack it outright. Do you have a video of it, by chance?

Not being facetious, but curious - I might run into this situation pretty soon, want to be prepared for the worst case scenario.

Sigh... I exist on a different time scale. My current vehicle is over 21 years old (first owner), the second oldest is 11, and we had another that was totaled by an old lady turning into it at 40mph at 19 years old, over 200K miles on it, and being basically as good as it was the first day (lightweight Japanese sports coupe, btw, with an engine with a redline and temperament of a motorcycle - and it wasn't driven lightly, either). What was that classic car recipe, again? Oh, I remember, "buy new, wait 20 years, voila, there you have it"

So, two years is a blink of an eye. In my experience, vehicles start showing age at about five years old regardless of how hard they are pushed (negligence is a different case altogether, so I'm not talking about it here).

I see that old Defenders very much can survive for 20 years, however, the current design - seeing the sticky tape and plastic (and knowing how plastic just falls apart into dust under the Southwest sun), I'm having my doubts, but I'm willing to spend my dollars to test it

Nice to know. Don't forget, though, that these vehicles are observed and maintained religiously, lest they damage the brand reputation, and all the problems are fixed on their dime, not ours, so I wouldn't take this as a statistical baseline.

Yeah, it's leaps and bounds above the competition, that I know already, but will L663 generation also be as long lived as the previous? I guess we'll just have to live and see. It would be interesting to watch all the failure modes once the first crop of Defenders starts exiting the warranty (which would be just about now, the current offering is four years - was it also four or more at the beginning?

 

@Vadiable Paradox I do not have a video of the water being poured into the engine bay. Nothing cracked and the water reset the heat sensors causing the gauge to go red.