I have an estimate of $3500 for head gasket and all associated gaskets, new plugs and ignition wires, new oil and coolant.
The leak is small, dixie cup every two weeks for around town driving. No refill for trip driving, the overflow tank stays perfectly.
I am going to get another opinion as I think this much money into a 2001 Discovery is not a good idea. I may even try a sealant.
Actually I believe with a good pressure test I may find something other than the head gasket id the issue. This may be wishful thinking on my part.
Any thoughts?
Thanks.

 

I think your estimate is high, mine was $1750.

I think your idea of leak testing may be fruitful. You can loan/borrow a pressure tester from parts store, be sure to get one that fits the coolant bottle. Pump up to 15 PSI and wait 30 minutes.

The around town driving may subject engine to higher temps and the coolant may be vented out by a weak coolant cap. You could zip tie a paper towel to the overflow line and drive around, then check for moisture. Guess a small sandwich bag would work as well. The idea is that you should not have any venting.

Would hold off on the sealant. Stopz Leakz (generic name for radiator sealers) work by filling a small hole. Does not take much. The rest of the bottle circulates in the cooling system, clogging up the rough surface inside heater cores and radiators where calcium and scale are frequently present. So a jug of stopz leakz may slow the leak, but can take out capacity in the cooling system.

 

"I have an estimate of $3500 for and all associated gaskets, new plugs and ignition wires, new oil and coolant"

That must be a dealer price and independent shop should be around half that

 

The gasket set is any where from $90 - $120 depending on source. The labor is normally 12 hours for a pro tech, which I am not and don't claim to be. Head skimming and valve seals/job can be handled by the local machine shop, mine charged $250 for this service. Insist on new cylinder head bolts - another $30 - $40.

 

Wow. Amazing thread. Just read the entire thing. Very impressive and informative.

 

It is mostly what not to do, and what happens if you go down the path to the Dark Side.

It is posted to keep my ego from exceeding the space inside the clock light bulb. It should be a beacon to others to learn from mistakes of those who tumbled down the path before. My big problem was failing to use the valley pan gasket for final alignment before torquing down heads, once that was done I was too cheap to buy a second set of new bolts, which turns out would have been a lot cheaper than what came next.

But if I can do it with a little help from the forum, then anyone else should have an easier time of it.

And I'm not on here to pretend that I know more than the next guy, I don't super skills and secrets that I won't share with you, don't belong to a secret web site, etc. Just try to help where I can. Started as a noob and Spike and Mike have lifted me out of that phase. Probably just good at putting info out there for guys to have their own copy of, like manuals, etc.

 

Buzz, your help is always appreciated by me and glad you rover is still going after the nitemare, my hg job was nowhere near that price above and was probly less then 1 k with my own labor mine took a month or so due to machine shop and I work out of state, in reality with machined heads sitting there and not needing to descunge the valve train it is probly a 1 day job beginning to end so 12 hours sounds right

 

I work out of state also, long commute, you know the drill.....

 

When I go to work 3.5/4 hour drive stay a week or so then drive home

 

Two hours each way each day for me. But I have also done the travel by car and back on Friday milk route, and the fly out on the 6:30 to Atlanta (doesn't every connecting flighty go thru there?) with all the other same guys "on the bus", back on Friday, always amazed at how many golf clubs a plane can take off with. My projects have taken me all over the southeast, plus NYC, Philly, Toronto, Minneapolis, Chicago, Milwaukee, Green Bay (always seemed like I went there in January). Even got to drive in snow, and I was sure to get the collisison damage wavier on the rental.