hose torn to shreads.latest installment..makes good reading

[oldiguana]

yo dudes and dudesses,happy new year to you all except me..........the boss was out in the bus on wednesday she noticed the temp guage droppin so decided to leg it home,then pop.....the "top hose"....runs from the head to the reservoir/waterpump and to the rad has been completely shredded....aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!

its been losing a bit of water gradually getting worse for the last 12-15 months and theres also oil in there too,changed the oil cooler o ring to no avail..,the little bottle behind the number plate never fills or empties either........so is it deffo head gasket......please no arbingers of doom

narthen...........a follow on...just abite too strip the engine when i noticed the top up tank behind the numberplate was frozen solid.........always had a prob with it never filling or emptiing....so hence i put no anti freeze in it!!!!....hence tophose shredded due to nowhere for the water to go under pressure.....next couldnt understand why no antifreeze had made its way from the reservoir....the genuine cap i bought from vw is a load of w**k...ive always screwed it up tight believing this to be right.......put the old one back on which came with the reservoir from "high_tower"....and gee f****n wiz.....water comes out under pressure.....so ive put some ptfe tape round the thread and left it on.....
plumbed everything up so hopefully its ow ok........got it up to temp and all seems ok...does this cap problem seem familiar to you guys or am i a complete and utter f**k wit???....answers on a postcard+ £5 admin fee to oldiguanas beer fund

[oldiguana]

come on guys im desperate for a bit of advice.....dont fancy takin the head off if i dont need to.........cheerz in advance

[toomanytoys]

hoses blowing apart never seem good......
fit another hose and refill.. get it up to temp... take it for a very short drive...
coolant in top up should go up and down a little under normal hot/cold expansion/contraction...

[SkinupCamper]

To prove that it is head gasket/cracked cylinder head you can buy a chemical test kit to check for CO (carbon monoxide)in the coolant system when the engine is running. You do this by drawing air from the expansion tank through the tester. It will change colour to tell you what chemicals/gases are in your coolant
...prove your fault b4 you pull it to bits.

[Simon Baxter]

Who converted it, have they got all the pipes in the right place?
I've seen some lash up with pipes in the wrongplace that could do what you have experienced.
pictures please.

[oldiguana]

i converted it duck 3 years ago but made sure all the hoses were sound and fitted correct.....its looking like £30 for a cylinderhead/block testing kit...................ive suspected it for somee time but its never overheated and passed emissions with an oil n filter change 3 times...............dont fanct doin it n a friend has just rung as his freelander has same prob...............ho hum

[oldiguana]

ive just edited the thread to see if anyone has any ideas whether im on the right track......jesus what a learning curve....any bigger it'll be multi coloured with a crock of gowd at th'end

[Mocki]

'ART-NOON! the caps are a known weak link, so you maybe onto sommats.....
its common fro them to either fail, or never work from new, so i hope thats is your problem owld duck!

[oldiguana]

ah duck,i cant believe i never noticed it before..........if i knew the correct pressure i could probably adapt one from another motor........i cant believe summat as reliable as a vw would have such a f****n ridiculously silly fault like that..............lets hope its the prob sorted now....if so ive just saved mesen 200 smackeroonies!!!!!!.....p.s.we should be seein you all at the fost show in feb...dubfreeze i think.....booked the weekend off so arm gonna get slaughtered n have a decent natter to you all this time!!!!!!!