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From: BROWN DAVID E (DAVE)[SMTP:debrown@srpnet.com]
Sent: Tuesday, March 07, 2000 9:24 AM
Subject: 4.6 engine differences
Gregg says:
>I have a friend who wants to put a 4.6 in his 89 Rangie, He is planning on
>purchasing a long block in a crate from the dealer,what problems will he
>encounter ? I was concerned about the timing chain cover and the lack of
>distributor. Also will he have a problem with pulley's and the flywheel ? Of
>course the dealer is no help, they don't perform "swaps " like this. I
>personally think the computer and injectors should be able to keep up with
>the motor, after all my 88 has had no problems with my upgrade from a 3.5 to
>a 4.2. . So any and all suggestions would be appreciated .
Gregg, and other considering this swap,
There is a spacer that came with my 4.6 short block,
about a 1" spacer that went over the end of the crank shaft. This allowed
me to re-use my existing pulleys. You will notice that the 4.6 crankshaft
is (I think) shorter (or maybe longer?) This spacer compensates for the
difference just fine. Another oddity will be a 2" or so hole, opposite side
from the starter motor (drivers side.) I presume this is for the
distributorless ignition crank position sensor. I just ignored it and left
the hole open, but have thought about plugging it with a rubber bung or
something. Possibly I'll get to this before I go wading??? Probably not,
and then I'll discover the consequences!
The timing cover fits fine, and your intake with
distributor SHOULD also bolt right up. It will bolt onto the block fine,
but not having 4.6 heads, I don't know for sure how that will mate. I
wouldn't expect any problems though. Basically, you're using the SAME
engine block, and re-using all your ancillaries. Your friend is getting a
long block - but I use a short block, and reused my 3.5 heads after having
them milled and ported by "Zimmerman Racing." Flywheel is a bolt on - no
worries.
As for injector size and fuel... I am using my 3.5
injectors. However, I replaced the entire engine computer and all sensors
with a Haltech fuel injection computer system, which is programmable by
using their software and a laptop. (I don't have a "laptop" so I used my
"desktop" and monitor sitting on the passenger seat hooked up to an
extension cord to get the initial setup done and get it running.) BTW I use
a 4-wire GM o2 sensor, at around $30. ;-) (Had to rub it in! - Sorry to
those who have to buy the $$$ LR replacements.)
If you plan on using the LR engine computer, I would
suggest having it tested afterwards with an exhaust gas analyzer to make
sure it isn't running too lean. Too lean will burn it up and you'll have
holes in the piston, or other catastrophic failure. Higher fuel pressure
can compensate for the additional fuel necessary, to a point. You may
consider an adjustable fuel pressure regulator.
Just out of curiosity, how much is a long block in a
crate from the dealer??? I'd hate to speculate! I got my new short block
from RPI Engineering (in the UK) for around $2500 with air freight shipping,
and I think 3% ($60) duty. See the RPI web page for more helpful
information! RPI had a price increase the week after I was quoted a price,
but they honored the quoted price for me when I barked up. A reputable
company IMO.
Where are you located? If you're near the Phoenix
Arizona area you and/or your friend are welcome to take mine for a test
drive to get a feel for what you'll end up with. Granted, I have headers,
Flowmaster muffler, Piper cam, and the Haltech, but I also have 34" tires to
counter all that "speed." ;-)
If you have any further questions, feel free to ask.
Good luck with your project, Dave Brown - '87 Rangie
4.6L - with "stuff"
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From: Jeremy Bartlett[SMTP:bartlett@slip.net]
Sent: Friday, March 24, 2000 9:19 PM
Subject: Re: Rover 3.9L V-8
> Also, all pre-94 engines are prone to the head gasket problem. The fix was
> in only using 10 bolts per head and not using the off-set loading by adding
> the other 4 bolts. See the new block design (4.0 & 4.6L). Also, the
> composite helps, but not necessary with the new design.
Go with the composite gasket. Make sure the head/block are appropriately
textured. Some are too 'polished' and with the expansion coefficient of Al that
leads to problems (like any Al block.. not
Rover specific)..
Also check the gasket vs. block pattern; there are 3 holes on each upper end of
the gasket. When it is laid on the block you will see that the upper drain back
hole (into the lifter gallery) is partially
over the front casting of the block. Consider grinding/filing away this part of
the block
to avoid oil leaks (they look like they're coming from the intake corners).
Regarding the 4.0 /4.6 are you considering a timing cover change (change to
serpentine belt)? If not the covers are interchangeable but you'll have to mix/match cam etc.
Although that's based on NAS parts and I've not checked alternatives (UK, etc. and RPI, JE etc.)
The 4.0/4.6 does have a higher volume oil pump than the 3.9 (interna/external
gear pump
rather than 2 meshing external gears); oil passage ways are also larger which is
nice. I don't know
how the 3.9 pump (you'd have to keep this is you want to keep the original
multiple belt
set up handles flow through the 4.0/4.6 galleries; it's probably OK (perhaps Ben
Mitchell can comment?)
I'm considering a 4.0 (maybe 4.6) swap myself but haven't worked through the
details yet.
(Sort of depends on what blows my way too).
Power issues apart (frankly not a bid deal for me), the advantages of the
4.0/4.6 are better oil flow (theoretically cooler) locally improved casting, and
cross bolted strength.
Jeremy
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From: Robert Dassler[SMTP:roadsiderob@hotmail.com]
Sent: Thursday, July 13, 2000 12:01 AM
Subject: [D90] 3.9 to 4.6 swap
Hey everyone,
I am currently swapping a 4.6 into a 95 disco for a customer. I can tell you
that the ancillaries will swap over with no problems but there are a couple
of things to watch out for. Firstly, the rod bolts/counterweights may hit
the oil pan--I had to dimple the pan for clearance. Secondly, the end of the
crankshaft may be longer than the 3.9. I ended up fabricating a spacer to go
on after the pulley/damper to space it all correctly. I am going to go with
a 4.2 chip at this point. The basic block castings are the same, but the
front covers use different gaskets. If you put in the wrong gasket you will
either have a coolant leak or not build oil pressure--depending on which way
you screw up. I do not think that the 4.6 camshaft is compatible with the
distributor drive. You will need a cam from a 95 3.9 or 4.2 that will mount
the distributor drive gear and is machined for the cam retaining plate used
on newer engines. The retaining plate is not required but it helps control
cam knock (camshaft tapping against block--intermittent knocking noise at
idle--won,t cause a problem but freaks some people out if it gets loud
enough). All of the fuel injection components bolt up and according to the
parts books the 4.6 uses the same injectors as the 4.0 so injector capacity
should be adequate. As the block castings are all basically the same, you
can bolt this engine into any Rover and hang the original ancillaries onto
it. The main difficulty is crankshaft length. The original 3.5/3.9 engines
with the external oil pump had fairly short snouts. They were extended when
they changed to single serpentine belts and crank driven oil pumps. The
engine I swapped in was built from new 2000MY components and the crank
appears to have been lengthened again for the Bosch injection equipped
engines. As noted previously--a simple spacer to go on after the damper and
take up the space is a workable solution. The engine that I installed came
from a company in England called V8 Developments. It is a new 4.6 with 8.0:1
compression, extensive porting on intake and exhaust runners, heads are
mounted with studs (ARP), double roller timing chain with a crank gear that
gives cam timing adjustability. It is designed to work with the blower. The
company that built it has a nice web site and they will sell individual
pieces or complete engines. I really like the double roller timing chain. If
you are swapping a larger engine into an early Classic, you may have to
change the ECU. The 13CU and 14CU computers may not have the capacity to run
a larger engine and the early 14CUX computers had soldered in PROMs which
preclude changing the chip. The harnasses and hardware and sensors were
basically the same for all of these cars, so simply plugging in a 14CUX ECU
into an older car will work fine (and the diagnostics are better too!). If
you do this, get the ECU for a D-90 as there are minor differences
concerning the functioning of the A/C and the D-90 ECU will provide the
outputs required in an old(87-88) Classic. Putting a 4.6 into a 97 D90 would
be really simple with no fitment issues at all.
Happy Swapping
Rob Dassler
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From: Ben Mitchell[SMTP:ben@mitchellfamily.com]
Sent: Friday, August 11, 2000 7:24 PM
Subject: [D90] Engine Transplant Rant w/ Some Lessons Learned(Long)
Since I've said virtually nothing about this on the list yet (or anything
else in about a year for that matter) I thought I'd take a few minutes to
share some lessons learned from my ongoing 4.6L engine swap fiasco.
First some background since many of you probably don't know a thing about
this:
About a year and a half ago, the factory 3.9 in my '94 D90 died, presumably
due to sand ingestion though we'll never know for sure. Since I had to
replace it anyway, and since the 3.9 had always seemed a little underpowered
to me, I opted to go with a 4.6L shortblock and have it built up with the
heads and ancillaries of the 3.9 (which were pretty much fine).
We priced various sources for the shortblock and it soon became eminently
clear that buying it in the US was a really bad idea. It was over $1000
cheaper to buy it from a distributor in the UK, have it airfreighted to the
US, and pay the customs broker to boot. We bought it through the
(unfortunately, now defunct) ADI, who bought it from Marshall's, a sizeable
dealer in the UK.
This engine was built and installed using Land Rover parts for everything
but the oil pump, for which we substituted a high pressure alternative to
provide adequate pressure for the larger oil channels in the 4.6 (which runs
at absurdly low pressure at idle in the HSE rangies anyway). We used a 3.9L
cam so it would idle smoothly. From the research we did, this basically
means it cuts off some of the high rev power, but I don't really care much
about that since (a) it was certainly going to be better than the 3.9 in the
worst case and (b) I have begun to tow the 90 to the trail on a trailer.
Oh, we also used "high performance" hydraulic lifters, which wouldn't hold
pressure worth a damn and were replaced within a week by factory lifters.
Unfortunately, even after replacing the lifters with ones which seemed to
hold pressure, we still had what we thought to be lifter noise, but we
figured we'd give it a while to work in to see if that would settle down (it
turned out not to be lifter noise at all, but we're getting to that).
I spent several weeks carefully breaking the new engine in and, aside from
the "lifter noise" was generally quite pleased with the power output and
torque curve produced by this plant. In fact, in an ad hoc acceleration
test, I actually got it to chirp all four 33s, which impressed me quite a
bit.
About 5000 miles into this engine, I left early one morning to do a little
wheeling in the Tahoe area. As I passed through San Francisco. The vehicle
began making a clattering noise loud enough to be heard over the swampers,
flapping top, open window, and stereo turned up loud enough to defeat all
that racket, all of which I was listening to through my shooting ear
protectors so as not to deafen myself before the age of 30 :-) This was
somewhat disheartening, but fortunately I noticed it about 200 feet before
the exit I take to get to Roverland, the shop that did the engine
transplant. I pulled off, parked the truck, and called for a ride home.
Philippe (who owns Roverland), diagnosed the problem and discovered that I
had spun the #1 connecting rod bearing, sending shards of metal through the
engine. Quite aggravating given the 5 figure cost of the transplant, "But
hey," I figured, "I've got a warranty on this." An interesting observation
to be sure, given the events which have transpired since that time.
When Philippe ordered the 4.6 from ADI, he confirmed that Rover has a
worldwide warranty on its products and that we would have no problem getting
any warranty issues resolved by a local dealer should we have problems with
the 4.6. Subsequently, I've confirmed the existence of such a warranty
through several sources in the UK, so I know it's for real. This point
notwithstanding, when we contacted the nearest dealer in the bay area, we
were informed that they wanted nothing to do with us and that we'd have to
send it to the UK. To make a (very) long story short, we went round and
round with multiple groups over this for a couple of weeks before they
finally concluded that we should take the engine out, crate it up and ship
it to the UK. Not what we wanted to hear, but at least it seemed
conclusive. We removed the engine and were about ready to nail the crate
shut and call the shipper when Rover changed its collective mind and told us
they'd have their Factory Rep (Eric Deck) inspect it at a local dealership
of our choice.
I dropped off the 4.6L shortblock (removed from the vehicle as originally
requested so that it could be shipped) at a local dealer.
Let me now take a step back and describe more thoroughly what he would find
when he looked at that engine. One of the stretch bolts holding the two
halves of the number one connecting rod around the journal on the crank had
quite clearly galled when it was inserted (actually, quite a few of them
did, but this was the worst one). In the process, it had actually bulged
out the inside edge of the rod creating a pressure point on the bearing.
This caused the bearing to fail. Two separate machine shops have looked at
this and agreed with the diagnosis, so I'm pretty confident in it. Back to
our story...
We heard nothing back from them for quite a while, but ultimately Mr. Deck
called Philippe and explained that it was his opinion that the failure was
due to oil starvation. Needless to say, we were a little shocked by this
analysis.
I called Mr. Deck who failed to return my call the first time, but
ultimately I was able to track him down. The ensuing conversation was full
of gems.
First he complained that clearly he couldn't do a proper diagnosis because
he was unable to examine the engine "in situ". My counter that it had been
removed from the vehicle at Land Rover's request seemed not to carry any
weight with him.
Then we moved on to his oil pressure argument. I countered that none of the
other bearings were worn in the same fashion, and wouldn't one expect the #8
cylinder to be the worst off if the problem is low pressure? He replied that
"some of the other bearings were damaged" to which I replied that they were
clearly damaged by the shards of metal that had been spun off by the first
bearing's failure, not by lack of oil. His reply was priceless. "There
wouldn't be any metal floating around...the oil filter would have extracted
it." This is even better given that not two minutes later he freely stated
that the cylinder walls were pretty scored up by the shards of metal
floating around", or something to that effect. He was not amused (or
swayed) when I pointed out this obvious inconsistency.
When I brought up the galled bolt and corresponding bulge in the connecting
rod, he acted as if it was simply not possible that Rover would have shipped
a defective block and claimed that *we* must have done that while inspecting
the bearing. (Absolutely, positively, beyond all shadow of a doubt, false.)
Anyway, at this point I suggested that he contact the machine shop that I
had looking at the parts. He did, and in spite of the machinist's 25 years
of experience, relative impartiality (hell, he gets paid *more* if they
don't cover it under warranty since I'll have him fix it), and absolute
certainty about what happened, Mr. Deck was still unpersuaded.
At this point, I decided I wanted to start getting my paperwork together to
make a clearer case; and so, I called Rover in the UK to request a written
copy of their parts warranty (shouldn't be too hard, right?) After about 10
phone calls to the UK, I finally got in touch with a guy who said he'd fax
it right to me. Great! Three days later, I received a fax explaining that
he couldn't provide me with the document without a copy of my invoice.
Alright, I thought...no problem. But when I contacted Philippe, he
explained that the invoice had been taken by customs when the engine entered
the country. ADI, who could have supplied a duplicate, is no longer in
business, and the probability of my getting it out of customs is about
0.000001%. Which leaves me pretty much out of options.
I bought a new crank and 7 connecting rods (only one was good enough to
warrant reuse - anyone else think $140 is a little steep for a stock rod?),
and the machine shop is rebuilding the block even as I type this. By the
time everything's said and done, I expect it would have been cheaper to buy
a used '94 D90 in good shape, move all my gear over to it, and keep my
current one as a parts car.
So what advice can I offer to someone else who needs to replace an engine?
1. Seriously consider finding a good mechanic/machine shop and have them put
a domestic engine in the thing. A 4.6 short block from a US distributor
costs about $4500. That's JUST THE BLOCK. For the difference between that
and a domestic block, you can do a lot of engineering, and when you're done,
parts and know-how are everywhere.
2. If you decided to go the Rover motor route, buy everything you need in
the US. You do *not* want to get involved with any "worldwide warranty"
work since LRNA basically won't honor it.
3. If you decide to go the Rover motor route, put a 3.9 back in. One of the
documents I got from Rover actually explained that they were off the hook
because my installation wasn't EPA approved (someone please explain how
their faulty manufacturing is excused by this?) It gives them one less way
to screw you over.
Well, that's it. Hopefully I'll have a truck again sometime in the next 5
months or so. It shouldn't take that long, but everything thus far has
taken 10 times longer than it should; so I'm pretty pessimistic about the
whole thing.
-Ben
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From: Ben Mitchell[SMTP:ben@mitchellfamily.com]
Sent: Thursday, December 07, 2000 8:25 PM
Subject: RE: [D90] 4.6L Help...
> Was the cam for a carburated engine or a fuel injected one. Makes a big
> difference, a fuel injected engine likes a lot more overlap than a carb one.
This turns out to be the difference and it's a point worth noting for
everyone.
Apparently, the Crane cams are designed for carbed engines and will not run
well in a HotWire fuel injected vehicle.
If you're building a fuel injected engine, use the 3.9L or 4.2L cam, or
perhaps try one of the Piper OptiMax units designed for a fuel injected
engine and sold by RPI.
Crane doesn't seem to feel the need to make this clear because they tell you
the cam's not for use on anything post-1968 anyway for emissions reasons.
Anyway, it's now looking like I get to put in a new cam. I'm going with
either the 4.2L (if we can find one) or the 3.9L because I've now got
definitive confirmation that they work. I've not heard anything about the
Piper units and so I'm not going to go that route.
Best,
-Ben
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From: Clarke Williams[SMTP:clarkewilliams@halcyon.com]
Sent: Thursday, March 09, 2000 9:34 AM
Subject: RE: [D90] RE: diesel conversions
For all you Tdi fans out there that were thinking of putting an imported Tdi into your rigs, there has been a survey of owners on the South African LRO list for about the past week or so. (BTW, the using a Tdi in an American vehicle on the highway violates EPA regs and can cost you serious money if you happen to get caught. It has never been EPA tested or certified.)
Here is a pretty typical comment:
***************************************************************************
To: za-lro@playground.sun.com
Subject: RE: TDi engine survey
I asked a similar question a week ago, these where the responses I got:
Mine = 122 000 km, sheared a rocker cover bolt and broke the rocker shaft @
110 000km.
Riaan Botes wrote:
Mine's on 140k.
New crank @ 80k - poorly designed crank pulley rattled on the keyway.
New crank @ 100k - poorly designed crank pulley rattled on the keyway. The
finally got it right this time. But poor design and workmanship were the
reasons for this.
Turbo overhaul 110k - sucked water through the intake, and the oil seals
started to leak.
Paul Donaghue wrote:
98 Hardtop with 120 000 with a few minor problems
Geurt Bloem wrote:
Mine has done 187000km and the only major hickup was the vacuum pump broke.
I must say all this talk of the engines not being good for 200k, I think,
given the knowledge I now have, if was in the position of buying again I
would most likely not buy a Tdi. In the meantime I think I will just have
to hold thumbs, overall I like the vehicle - just hope it will last.
Cheers, Stuart
***********************************************************************************************
Clarke Williams
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From: Clarke Williams[SMTP:clarkewilliams@halcyon.com]
Sent: Friday, March 17, 2000 5:26 PM
Subject: Re: [D90] Diesel to auto or not to auto
While I certainly can't address SG springs directly (those questions are best answered by SG), I do know what the 6.5L diesel weighs in non-turbo form as well as what the Tdi 200 and 300 weigh. The difference in weight is about 80-90 lbs. This is approximately the weight of a spare tire on the bonnet, or a heavy duty bumper (I've never weighed an SG bumper but would bet it weighs more than 90 lbs), or an 8000-9000 lbs electric winch.
I would say that OME 766 springs would probably be about right. This is a 250 lb/in rate spring about 16.1" height with 17 mm wire diameter. OME shows this as the spring for an Isusu Diesel Defender as used in Australia. The Isusu engine is similar in weight to the GM 6.5L engine. Another possibility might be the OME 764 spring. About the same height, taller than the OME 751 springs by about 2" at 17" tall. Rate shown by OME is 220 lb/in vs "heavy duty front" 751 spring rate which is 230 lb/in.
Do you know what the corresponding spring rate, coil diameter, and height data is for the SG springs?
Where are you planning to get the 6.5L engine and fitments to put it into a Defender?
Clarke
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From: rob smith[SMTP:rob@archenland.demon.co.uk]
Sent: Sunday, March 19, 2000 4:54 AM
Subject: RE: [D90] Parts hunting
Mathew Reeve asks:
> Rob, have you thought about putting an underseat tank in, and using the
> original tank space for the LPG tanks? Obviously this depends on the local
> availability of LPG, since your range on petrol will be vastly reduced. It
> depends how important your load space is.
Under seat tank is under consideration, if someone would swap a nice new 110
tank for a nice new 90 tank then that would be a step in that direction.
One tank supplier I've talked to says 80 litre tanks can be put in the wheel
arch boxes on a 110, which give me 160 litres of tank, say 128 litres of
fuel, which is 'about right' for a 400 mile range. I know John Mc has a
pair of 30/35 tanks where the original tank was. Using those with one in
each wheel arch would give me about 176 (or 184) litres of fuel, which would
get a long way - say nearer 600 miles!
Rob Smith
Mine's the Blue 110