I have a horrible feeling my T4 van's head gasket is toast

[mangocrazy]

Just got the call and....
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The radiator's fucked!
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But it seems like the head gasket is OK... Once the new rad is fitted then further cooling system testing will take place,
but it looks like the old girl is not yet quite ready for the scrap heap.

[mangocrazy]

Van now home (having parted with £641.40) and besides the new rad has also had large amounts of the gear linkage replaced (5th and reverse were getting very, very hard to select). So it's time to take it on a medium sized journey to see how it responds...

Sheffield to Tamworth (AP Workshops) with the Falco in the back next Thursday? Sounds about right...

[weeksy]

Hey that's not a complete disaster then

[KungFooBob]

Told you it was just a leak :p

[mangocrazy]

Hey that's not a complete disaster then

No, just par for the course in trying to keep a 22 year old van on the road...

Not happy with the misleading diagnosis from the French garagiste, mind. He jumped to the wrong conclusion and worried the shit out of me.

But anyway, all's well that ends well...

[demographic]

Well, a fresh rad and few bits and bobs seems like a result to me.
Nice one.

[mangocrazy]

Well, a fresh rad and few bits and bobs seems like a result to me.
Nice one.

Yeah, I'll take that any day of the week. Way preferable to the alternative.

[demographic]

Whats the rest of the van like?
If it's in half decent condition I'd just keep chucking bit's at it til its knackered.

[mangocrazy]

Whats the rest of the van like?
If it's in half decent condition I'd just keep chucking bit's at it til its knackered.

Not bad for a 22 y.o. van. Underside seems solid enough, van has done 260k miles but engine still feels strong. I'm intending to do just what you describe. Had the head gasket really gone then that would realistically have been time to consider options but I appear to have found a get out of jail card that's not free, but comparatively inexpensive.

These things are renowned for doing starship mileages. A mate who now lives in Germany bought an ex-AA van like mine a couple of years before I did from the same dealer. His is still going, and he drives all over Europe in it.

[demographic]

Yeah, bloke came upto me at a service station a while ago (trying to buy my Hiace) said he knew of a Hiace that had done 700k with just two clutch changes.

Mines done 240k and is a bit rough looking but still trogs on well.

[Mr. Dazzle]

Get yourselves a rusty old Merc!

https://mercedesblog.com/this-is-the-me ... ilometers/

3.4 million km in 28 year is 120,000km a year though - which feels alot. Cab driver though.

[KungFooBob]

Get yourselves a rusty old Merc!

https://mercedesblog.com/this-is-the-me ... ilometers/

3.4 million km in 28 year is 120,000 a year though - which feels alot. Cab driver though.

I'm sure I once read that American MB dealers are encouraged to buy mega high mile cars from punters to show off in the shops.

[weeksy]

Get yourselves a rusty old Merc!

https://mercedesblog.com/this-is-the-me ... ilometers/

3.4 million km in 28 year is 120,000km a year though - which feels alot. Cab driver though.

It's not a van ?

[Mr. Dazzle]

Correct.

[demographic]

Correct.

Dunno about Mango but I'd struggle to fit my massive toolsafe on any car.

Well, it just wouldn't happen. Plus an old Merc might do one thing but modern ones seem full of dead tech and I wouldn't tough one with a ten foot pole.

[mangocrazy]

All the genuinely long-lived and tough engines were designed and built at least 20-30 years ago. They weren't festooned with emissions gear (EGR, DPF etc.) and were built to do big mileages. I'd list the VW 2.5 Tdi in my van as one of them, along with the 2.0 HDi Peugeot, the 5 and 6 cylinder diesel engines in late 80s/early 90s Mercs, the VW 1.9 TD, Volvo's 2.4 D5 and Ford Duratorq engines. There are plenty more, but they are all 'old' technology.

[Count Steer]

This increasing complexity is getting a bit daft. I keep calling our (Japanese) shopping trolley a laptop on wheels. Umpteen levels of menus and a load of really non-intuitive controls.

When I bought my (German) car I thought it was a tad OTT when the manual was about an inch thick and half of it seems to be screen shots rather than actual stuff like how to find the jack and change a wheel, where to put oil, water and that sort of thing (+ endless safety stuff).

However, when I get in a newer, loan version my heart sinks and getting back in mine feels like 'back-to-basics' driving.

Now they're putting all the gubbins on motorbikes!

I think I'd stick with what you've got and chuck some £££s at it - it'll still work out cheaper than buying another.

[mangocrazy]

[Dunno about Mango but I'd struggle to fit my massive toolsafe on any car.

I've also failed to find a car that can transport motorbikes or full sized sheets of plasterboard around the place...

This increasing complexity is getting a bit daft. I keep calling our (Japanese) shopping trolley a laptop on wheels. Umpteen levels of menus and a load of really non-intuitive controls.

Agree entirely about the complexity. I'm a big believer in simple. Simple stuff works, doesn't take a degree in physics and/or AI to figure out and is almost always more reliable.

I think I'd stick with what you've got and chuck some £££s at it - it'll still work out cheaper than buying another.

That is precisely what I intend to do...

[demographic]

This increasing complexity is getting a bit daft. I keep calling our (Japanese) shopping trolley a laptop on wheels. Umpteen levels of menus and a load of really non-intuitive controls.

When I bought my (German) car I thought it was a tad OTT when the manual was about an inch thick and half of it seems to be screen shots rather than actual stuff like how to find the jack and change a wheel, where to put oil, water and that sort of thing (+ endless safety stuff).

However, when I get in a newer, loan version my heart sinks and getting back in mine feels like 'back-to-basics' driving.

Now they're putting all the gubbins on motorbikes!

I think I'd stick with what you've got and chuck some £££s at it - it'll still work out cheaper than buying another.

Fairly serious privacy issues with new cars, in the US they've been collecting peoples data about their driving habits and flogging on to insurance companies (amongst many others) and a lot of people don't fully reset the cars details when they sell the car on.

It's worth being aware of.

[Mr. Dazzle]

I've posted this loads of times, but your car collects laods of data about you (or at least, your driving) and sends if back to the mothership. It's been this way for at least 30 years, with increasing levels of sophistication. If your car has any sort of plug it in to dealer aspect to it during servicing, that's one of the things it's doing. If you've got an app or an online car we know loads about it.

It's all anonymised and it's not at the level of "drove to shop, drove to bingo, drove to cocaine dealer" - it's just in "bins" of how long you spent at each speed, gear etc. I can go online to a system and select "95% percentile driver in North America - total time spent at 10-20mph" sort of level.

It was originally put in place by boring Engineers like me for boring reasons. We just want to make better cars

It's only much more recently that money has got involved

S'all written down in them T&Cs you didn't read.