General Info:
1996 Discovery I
230,000
Only use unleaded gas
Only use 10-30 oil
Multiple oil leaks
Engine light on for last 100,000
SRS light on w/ last S blinking
No overhaul - original everything
ABS light on
Tranny Leak - small leak

Okay, after the laughter dies down.....

I love this car and I hate to put her out to pasture (into hubby's hands to do with as he wants :*( so we keep limping her along little by little.
Here is what we have done in the last 150,000 miles:

1 new/used alternator off ebay
front/back brakes
2 tune ups
1 radiator flush
2 valve covers
1 voltage regulator
1 battery
1 oil pan gasket

Now obviously I know I'm a lucky son of a gun with my land rover. We are a frugal family that lives in the mountains and somehow, maintenance of our vehicles are on a 'as needed' basis.

This just goes to prove how rugged and awesome these trucks are.

My problems:

Today upon getting on the freeway, at about 50 mph and 3000 rpm - it began to starve for gas and sputter. When I let up on the gas, it would cruise along at an even 35 mph. On our limping way home, I stopped and let it sit for about 2 minutes and then re started it - didn't help. I then stopped at the one gas station in the area and put supreme gas in and got a injection cleaner. It sat at the pump for about 4-6 minutes. After restarting it, it drove home fine. When I got up the mountain, it went up fine under load @ 10 mph, I parked and revved the motor up good. It still sputtered at 3000 rpm. I wanted to push some of the high octane gas through it and held it at about 2400 rpm for a few minutes. It began smoking from the exhaust piece that is right before the junction from both sides, on the driver side. It is a tubular looking piece - is this the torque converter? Obviously alarmed, I shut it off and went inside to begin to trouble shoot. About 2 hours later, I went out to start it and it starts/runs perfectly. I didn't push it but just revved it up good a few times and it cruised up to 4500 rpm with a normal lovely purr.

Ignition issues occasionally - recently it locked up good and after pounding on it for 5 hours - it broke free. We got a dealer estimate of $777 for a new ignition - very happy we got it free. One time since (about 3 weeks ago) it has not supplied power to the coil/starter when turning the key but did upon trying again.

I mention the ignition issue because, could it be related?

I usually do all my troubleshooting by just reading/scanning/searching and combining answers to my questions, but I'm not finding much specific about these torque converters. On this note, another weird thing, about 4 months ago when going up the mountain when turning to the right and going uphill, it would make a pretty awful rattle clunk noise. I got under it and checked everything and couldn't find anything loose. It did not affect any aspects of driving at all and seemed related to suspension. This miraculously went away about 2 weeks ago without any fixing.

So please, after you get done laughing at why I could POSSIBLY wonder why my truck isn't running right, I understand what you mean but this truck is/was/can run great if I can get this issue resolved. It's a strong motor and as you can see - we've had little issues with it in over 170,000 miles and over 10 years.

Thank you for taking the time to read about my rover.
Amber

 

I'm guessing that the tubular exhaust piece you mention, and the fact it was smoking from there, and the awfull rattling you heard, and the sporadic loss of power...leads me to suspect a failing / broken catalyitic converter.
Its time for some major maintenance by the sounds of things....one quick check of the converters is to use a rubber mallett and tap on the converters ( there's one on each side) if they rattle they are junk. check that and if you intend to keep the rover...get started with the 60k service as detailed in the tech section of the Discovery 1 section

let us know how it goes