To drain the coolant you just need to remove the lower radiator hose.
The shop manual wants you to remove the freeze plugs.
Just remove the lower radiator hose and prepare to get wet and make a huge mess.
Make sure your pets and kids are in the house and have the garden hose ready to wash it all down the drain or out into the driveway.

 

Thanks Phil,
that's what I thought, there is no line-of-sight for the coolant to drain to, and I was thinking there must be a spot somewhere to put the bucket under! But no, it's just going to collect in the plastic pan cover an poor out of the Oil filter access panel. I'll try to rig up some funnel around the lower rad hose.

Can you confirm also that this hose is about 1/3 of the way 'up' the radiator so it's not going to drain out fully?!

 

No, you will not drain out 100% of the old coolant, but you will get out 95%+ of it.

 

there is a vacuum tool you can use to remove the air pockets in the system. and as many head gasket jobs ive done in 7 years on series 2 there should be a bleeder screw on the upper radiator hose to bleed the system if you still have a factory part installed, also another trick i do is pressure test the system and keep adding coolant as your release the pressure takes a little longer but always does the job for me.

 

I flushed the radiator today. To collect the fluid I got a long oblique funnel from O’Rielly’s and placed it under the bottom radiator hose with the funnel end pointing through the oil filter access panel into a bucket. (I protected the fins on the inside face of the radiator with a sheet of cardboard as it’s tight in there. It’s probably worth investing in the tool that removes the viscous fan to get that extra maneuvering room.)
(1) After removing the Thermostat I only got 1 pint of coolant from the bottom radiator outlet. I thought that was odd! (2) So I bent the other (mid height) hose going to the coolant pump downwards into the funnel. This got a lot more coolant out. Still not as much as I thought there should be though…
(3) So I blew through the top of the expansion tank and next (4) through the top radiator hose, these 2 actions got about 1 pint of coolant out. (5) I inserted my garden hose (after running it to clean it) into the expansion tank and this flushed more pink coolant out – I kept going until it was clear water. (6) Next I inserted the (garden) hose to the radiator top hose and flushed through the top (RH side) of the rad. This got more pink coolant out. (7) Inserted garden hose into the ‘T’ junction hose shared with the top hose but tilted upwards to flush through the manifold outlet pipe. This got more pink coolant out.
I repeated these steps & flushed from the 3 points (expansion tank, top radiator hose & top hose going to manifold.)
Observations: Eventually got a gallon of pink fluid. No sediment in the coolant which looked in very clean condition (recently done I expect.) No sediment in the clear water I got on the subsequent flushes. Car was in my garage on flat surface. Serpentine belt is routed correctly & I can see no evidence of leaky hoses.
Next step is to fit new thermostat & new LR (pink) coolant.
Any observations or suggestion would be welcome.

 

There are no drain plugs in the radiator. Don't use Dexcool again when refilling the coolant system and do you have the correct t/stat much less know how to bleed the system?
If you have any questions, send me your number and I'll call you.

 

Im with you...Ive fixed everything I can think of and replaced everything I can reach.. I have the same problem.. No smoke. runs great...pressure tested the water system..PERFECT not heads. till it overheats..I solved the problem by removeing the bleeder and letting the steam pour out, itll run for an hr with no problem...we...till it runs out of water..so I keep to 5'ers of water in the back what problem? LOLOLOL

 

Mike, thanks for the phone conversation on Tuesday, I will get a cooling system pressure check done at Biggs Eastside next week - hopefully thay can find something.
Jamesimm - this short article is informative:
Diagnosis of overheating in a V8 Petrol Land Rover

 

Tonight I fitted the new thermostat and re-filled the cooling system with 50/50 coolant and water. I filled the expansion tank to the top. Ran the engine for a minute and then re-topped up the expansion tank compensating for the circulation.

Next I ran the engine for 5 or 6 minutes with the air conditioning on. I had to turn it off after 5 – 6 minutes as the coolant looked like it was boiling as it exited through the expansion tank overflow pipe.

I re-filled the expansion tank and re-started the engine but did NOT turn on the A/C this time.
I watched for 10 minutes with the engine idling with me pressing the gas intermittently as the coolant level crept slowly downwards. After the 10 minutes running the coolant is 2 inches below the original top-up level.

The engine temp gauge did not move from ‘normal’ (not either with the A/C on the first time or off the 2nd time.)
The top 3 radiator hoses were hot; the (left) bottom hose was not hot. The radiator was hot to touch.
The electric fan at the front clicked on twice during this test. The Viscous fan ran fast while the engine was running.

Any suggestions?

 

So whats the problem?
Other than bleeding the system the wrong way it all sounds normal.