I managed to find time past weekend to look at the p38 a little more in depth. I was hoping to be able to pinpoint the exact cause of the problem head gasket or something else.
To make sure I didn't suck in air somewhere due to a faulty radiator or hose I went ahead and replaced the radiator, the bypass hose at the back of the engine and the hose between thermostat and heater core. I also replaced the thermostat o-ring and waterpump at the same time. The radiator I was going to replace anyways, I bought an aluminium one which is a bit thicker and therefore has more cooling capacity.
I ran a quick pressure test and after minutes I lose 2,5 psi starting from 15psi, which I think is still problematic.
I investigated all hoses and connection while under pressure to find leaks of coolant but I couldn't find any external leaks. I checked at the heater core as well, but since that radiator has been replaced as well and also has newisch o-ring it was unlikely to find a leak there.
So that basically means I'll have to strip the head off and replace it.
This round trip of 2500km was uneventful apart from overheating brakes and so I got over the p38 paranoia and thought I could just take off anywhere.
That was until I wanted to go to the Belgian Ardennes, mid highway all of a sudden steam in front and back. With my heart in my throat I was conveniently able to pull over at a gas station.
There I discovered the radiator top right hose came off and the coolant was gone. I re-collected myself and took my tools, bought bottles of water to fill her up and drove home at a slow pace.
When I got home I parked it and I didn't want anything to do with it , i was gutted.
About a week or so later I started to look into it. I ordered a tester and fluid to check for a head gasket failure. The fluid turned yellow although it took quite a while.
I attached a transparent hose between the top of the radiator and the expansion tank to better see the coolant. There are bubbles in there, sometimes steady sometimes none. Also the cooling hoses become a bit stiffer with a closed cooling system, that's not abnormal if they don't become to hard.
I bought an amazon pressure tester and I'm losing pressure. Just don't know where yet. So I started to look around for parts.
I ordered a new water pump, o-ring thermostat, bypass tube behind the engine and a new radiator in aluminium, head gasket and head bolts more gaskets... The problem with the diesel is that when the heads are warped they cannot be skimmed or you are at risk of getting cracks in the head where the swirl chambers are.
New heads I thought were unobtanium, but so it happens that AMC just made a new batch of heads. I went ahead and bought one straight away. Even if I don't need it I'll be happy to have one available just in case.
Hopefully I'll be able in the coming weeks to further troubleshoot the issue and if not go ahead with the cylinder head replacement.
I you read my blog you probably already noticed I actually overhauled the engine 2 years ago. I inspected the cylinder head back then and I knew it was not entirely in spec for the longitudinal measurement. On top off my head I think it cannot exceed 0.10mm. In my case it was somewhere in between 0,10 and 0.15mm. Because the heads cannot be skimmed according to Rave I decided to take my chances and install it anyway. Which worked up until now.
I almost have all the parts available and I'll try try to troubleshoot a bit more before I pull the plug on the head.
It has been a while already that I bought the so called faskit from a spanisch company.
This system allows to continue to use the air suspension in case of a failure with some of the EAS components such as:
It took a while but finally I came around to install the bigger volume intercooler on the p38.
I ordered it as a Brit part but it seems the supplier is Serck motorsport.
When I received it the weather was bad and I was in a rush to install it. Needless to say it wasn’t that straightforward to install let alone in a hurry.
For ease of access you should drain the cooling radiator,so I did. I also removed the right radiator holder which bolts into the chassis to make it easier to install the intercooler.
The intercooler is thicker and somewhat different in shape so you cannot re-use the original fixing points. The different shape is also a very tight fit.
With the intercooler in place I then installed the radiator again. The engine oil cooler now must be installed on top of the intercooler instead of below. With everything in place, I marked some points to drill holes to fix the intercooler and engine oil cooler to the 2 side pillars/ holders. I also added a thick 3mm washer behind the intercooler to allow for a little more clearance.
The installation height for the intercooler is dictated by the oil cooler, because it sits right below the top of the radiator. Like this the hoses for the intercooler line up with the turbo and intake hoses. Just make sure the left side clears the wash bottle filler neck.
I used self tapping screws, I might change that later to bolts and nuts.
Now do I really feel a difference? Well firstly I noticed that the old intercooler was leaking and so I was losing boost pressure because of that. I didn't drive it all that far or long because I still have the transfer case issue that needs sorting, but I will say that in my opinion it feels more powerful in lower rpms. I also noticed the engine is running cooler. Now I have to say I cleaned the radiator a bit while the coolant was out so maybe this helped as well.
All in all I'm happy with the result, maybe later on I'll try to increase the boost pressure only ever so slightly to extract a little more horses but first the transfer case, the ball joints and the panhard bushes😏😐😂. But that's for another time.
It's been a while that I have been looking at tires that are more off road focused for the P38. I did not want to go the route of a mud terrain tire because they would only get minimal use.
Instead I wanted something in between a mud tire and an all terrain tire.
My first ideas were:
After only 1000km the transfer case started to make a lot of noise.
At first I thought I had an engine problem because the noise seemed to come from the front off the car.
After some investigation I concluded the TC is the culprit. Before that I was thinking the gearbox was the problem so I changed the gearbox oil and filter twice.
Eventually upon changing the oil from the TC it was evident that this was my problem. The oil that came out was not looking good and I found metal particles in it and the little mesh filter was clogged up.
Fortunately I found a second hand unit, I had to drive 4 hours to pick it up and bring it home.
Of course in the back of my head I was thinking what if I put this one in and it's no good?
So I found a company that is able to check its condition. Yesterday I got the news that it looked brand spanking new on the inside and no work is needed.
I'm so glad this worked out nicely, now it is just a matter of taking the old one out and putting "the new one" in.
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| P38 Borg Wagner transfer case |
Finally finished the installation of the rear bumper and carrier. 💪
Finally the p38 is back on the road since it passed technical inspection last week!
I’m so happy after all this time to finally be able to drive it.
Past weekend I installed on off the many upgrades still to come on this vehicle, the roofrack by mp4x4.
These are Continental crosscontact Atr 265 45 R20
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Finally I came around to install the head lining on the p38. Getting it back in was no joke. Extra hands are needed if you want to successfully install it.
It looks a lot nicer and cleaner. Another small project of the to do list.
