Whats years were good

 

@redwhitekat the general consensus is all years, they pre-date the Discovery II by about 5 years Production ended in 2001 but Land Rover was still actively improving things. while they were in production. Earlier about 96/97 might be best, as those were the 1st years the 4.6 was introduced.

So you get block from a P38/P38a likely had good quality control.

 

They went through 2002 model year, Gen 3 started in '03. I agree they are probably all of higher quality than the 4.6's made for and used in the 03/04 D2's.

 

This is probably what my engine has going on, I'll press the sleeve out of the block and confirm soon. Looks to be an 03/04 since the ridge at the bottom which holds the sleeves from dropping is shown. Seems these blocks are worse for cracking.

 

I'll make a speculation on this topic:

A top hat liner will do one important thing here, it will provide a couple mm more of surface area to seal the water between the block and cylinder. Contrary to the video, I believe that the fact that the stock liners are tapered at the top means there's a VERY tiny surface area for them to seal against the head gasket, probably a fraction of 1mm. A top hat liner would provide a few mm of flat area at the top for the gasket to do it's best to seal this area. Now it's VERY important to consider a cometic steel gasket vs a typical gasket here, the steel gasket provides sealing on a very specific bead and that might mean it will only seal water between the combustion chamber and water jacket or between the water jacket and outside of the block depending on where it lands but certainly not both. I would want to see precisely where the gasket bead lands before installing one. There's a fair chance it would land on both just barely and if it did, it could be THE fix to this issue along with a top hat liner. HOWEVER, please note, it would still not solve the issue o water between the sleeve and block going down into the oil instead. On the earlier 99-02 models it certainly would have an easy time doing so, on the 03-04 with the interlocked sleeve/block that seal could indeed be water tight or at least improved. I would say this is an important time to choose a O-ring around the base of the cylinder!!! It could be just the solution. Granted all of this talk is based on a band-aid fix. If my block is cracked and fixable I'll probably take the steps to answer these questions and use a top hat liner on that cylinder as well as an o-ring as extra insurance should it somehow happen again, greatly reducing the engine failing even if the block were to give way.

Some food for thought on the subject,

-Greg

 

Great video of liners and top hat liners misconceptions