Thanks to everyone who helped me get my water pump gasket on and assisted with all the problems I had with the belt... "user error", or weakling syndrome, you take your pick!

BUT, unfortunately, after putting my Disco back together and testing it- still leaking! Traced the leak back again, and it looks like it is coming from the timing cover gasket.

Does that sound like a reasonable assessment? How hard is that to fix?

I imagine it will be somewhat easier now that I don't have to waste hours figuring out how to get a belt on and other silly calamities.

Guess the hellish carpool continues for now. Going to try and place Atlantic British order tomorrow to be delivered Friday and work on it over the weekend.

Any useful suggestions/tips/additional things to check for and/or order would be appreciated.

Thanks - yet again!

Marni

 

Water does pass thru there so it could leak.
Antifreeze can mix with your oil if there are leaks in the timing cover so be careful.

 

Perhaps you should borrow/rent a coolant pressure tester and pump up the cooling system to 15 PSI and wait on leaks to reveal. The front cover seal is not very much, but will be all the labor you did for WP, plus more. A kit with the gasket, new front crank seal, and new oil pump gears is like $110 at AB, shop around. While in there eval the timing chain as well.

 

One thing that may not be obvious when doing the timing cover gasket is that you have to drop the oil sump. It took us a while to figure out why the damn timing cover wasn't sliding right off.

I don't know your mileage but while you've got everything apart, you might as well inspect and/or replace the timing chain, oil pump and pickup seal.

 

Marni, how many miles on your engine? If over 100,000 miles seriously consider replacing the timing chain set and oil pump gears for the wear that they have on them.

 

pix of the water leak points, as mentioned, does not take much to have coolant into oil.

 

common leak on disco of this age, often misdiagnosed.
personally I would invest in a pressure tester before an ultra gauge.

 

I made a leak tester when trying to find my coolant leak.
Here the write-up on it.
https://landroverforums.com/forum/di...-tester-58681/

Turns out mine was also leaking at the front cover.

I would not say it was a super hard job but you do have to remove a lot of stuff which makes it seem like a big job.
go ahead and get about 10 cans of brake parts cleaner or some other suitable degreaser as you will need a bunch to get everything cleaned up for reassembly.
I cannot stress the cleanliness thing.

There are a lot of little parts that I did not order when I placed my initial order.

I did not realize that the oil pan had to come off so I had to order that and while your ordering that go ahead and get all the oil cooler line O-rings if yours has oil coolers.

You also have to unbolt the oil pick up from the front cover as well before the cover will come off.

I also had to built a crank holder tool to get the harmonic dampener bolt loose.
Here is what I did there as well.
https://landroverforums.com/forum/di...er-tool-59559/

Some people use the fancy clutch fan wrenches to get the clutch fan loose but I just set a 12" adjustable wrench to 36mm and squeezed it down in there on the nut and gave it a good tap with a hammer.
It will break loose easily.
There is a vid on youtube that shows the concept with a whench that someonce ground to fit the nut but the concept is the same with the adjustable wrench.

If you have the downloaded version of the RAVE manual then read through the entire process there before you even order parts.
Make sure you click on all the links in the steps.
That's what I did not do and that's why I had to place 3 different orders.

Either way I took my sweet time and did a few other things while I had it apart.

If you are looking for inspiration, it really made me feel like I accomplished something once it was done, drive-able and everything worked like it should.
This is what has kept me working on cars trucks and motorcycles for the last 20 years.

Good luck

 

Is it easy for him to inspect the timing chain without taking everything apart? Also, is it possible your leak is from somewhere right above there and dripping down?

 

yes it is a pita, because you have to drop the oil pan all because LR decided to use to studs instead of bolts on the bottom of the front cover.

I first step is jam a rag between the belt and one of the pulleys that will lock the motor up so that you can free the crank bolt.

The check and see if the front frame support will come out this will decide how easy the oil pan will come off.