Well guys, I've been a long time lurker on here for quite some time, and a proud owner of a 2001 Land Rover Discovery II for about 2 years or so. I figured it was about time to somewhat contribute to this board, since I've gotten so much from here that I've never even needed to ask any questions!

For the past year or so, my Disco has had a bit of a coolant leak at the valley pan gasket in the rear near the coils that tends to run over the top of the transmission and onto the ground. It's slowly and progressively gotten worse, so I finally decided to order the gasket kit from AB a while back. Still put it off until this past weekend, when I finally parked her and started the tear down. The kit I ordered included the full set of head bolts also.

Along with that leak, I have the typical valve cover seepage. Other than that, everything has been great. No head gasket issues so far and no overheating (I've been adding coolant as it drops).

I figured with about 115k, and since I was going to be removing the upper and lower intakes, I'm going to pull the heads and put new HG's in, and replace the valve seals.

So far I've got the coolant drained, the upper intake, alternator, AC compressor, valve covers, etc removed. Would have gotten a lot more done but it started raining.

I've already contacted a local extremely reputable machine shop that will clean my heads, install the new valve seals (I could do this myself), grind the valves and seats, check the mating surfaces for true, and machine if needed... All for $80 a head. If the valve guides are warped or bad in any way, it'll be around $100 - $110 each head. To me that's a steal! The shop is huge and primarily deals in heavy diesel trucks, but they also do regular vehicles too.

I've only got about 2 days this week without rain, so going to try to get the heads off by this weekend and have them to the machine shop on Monday. That'll give me a little bit of time to get a few other things done before I start re-assembly!

 

Mark sure you torque the head bolts correctly which doesn't mean set the scale on your torque wrench and call it a day. You have an initial torque which if memory serves me is 15FTLBS. Then turn the bolt 90 degrees and a final 90 degrees all is the specified pattern. Good Luck

 

Switch to ARP! There's other threads on ARP vs stretch bolts, but since you've got them off, good time to decide!

 

Thanks. I am fully aware of the torque specs for the heads. I'm a freak when it comes to anything I get involved in. I have done so much research over the past few weeks/months. I think that's one of the reasons I've held off from doing this. I wanted to make sure I felt confident in myself before I started into the whole thing.

I'm more of a shade tree mechanic and the most I've done like this is a frame up resto on a 1984 Honda V65 Magna, including engine, heads, carbs, etc.. about 3 years ago.

I've got a few other things to do to the Disco also.. Like the headliner, possible inline thermostat mod (not sure if I'll do this yet), etc..

 

I'll have to check on that.. Not really looked into it. What does ARP stand for?

 

Automotive racing products

 

ARP = Automotive Racing Products

 

must be an echo in here...

 

Now's the perfect time to replace the stock T-stat w/ a warm weather stat (180F). If I were you I'd also replace the water pump, spark plugs, and spark plug wires.

I just noticed I'm slowly losing/leaking coolant (external leak looks like rear of motor on the driver's side) so, I may joining you in your expedition in the very near future. If you run into anything out of the ordinary, please post. I'm curious and I'm sure others who read this later will be too. I found a great write-up/resource for head gaskets. PM me if you're interested in the link. I read over it this morning, seems very through.

 

...here