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Diagnosing and Rebuilding 2003 ZD30DI

32K views 223 replies 20 participants last post by  JakeWild 
#1 ·
Hi all, thought I'd post some pictures for the issue I'm having with the coolant. I've owned the car for about 5 years now and up until about mid May while traveling back from Lorella Springs the expansion bottle never had air in it and the overflow bottle always settled back to it's original cold position. Now the expansion bottle has a massive air section in it and the over flow fills above the MAX mark and never gets sucked back in. I have manually removed the coolant from the over flow and bled the air out of the expansion bottle to just have it do the same again after a 15 min drive. At idol I can't see any bubbles and no sign of leaks from the expansion bottle to the overflow or anywhere in the system. It doesn't seem to be loosing coolant just pushing it into the overflow and not sucking back again.

When I first bought the car I replaced the expansion bottle and did the glow plug timer and steel tip glow plugs not long after.
The radiator cap is about 2 years old along with the rad and hoses.

I'm unfortunately leaning towards a crack in the head.

Whats everyones thoughts

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#2 ·
It will have cracked between the glow plugs and the valve. Very common due to the long 5min glow time.

Get a new AMC head and fit a glow timer and it will out live you.

Sent from my SM-G960F using Tapatalk
 
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#4 ·
It will have cracked between the glow plugs and the valve. Very common due to the long 5min glow time.

Get a new AMC head and fit a glow timer and it will out live you.

Sent from my SM-G960F using Tapatalk
I was looking at MR Cylinder Head with Permaseal VRS gasket kit how does that rate compared with AMC head?
Already have the glow timer installed so all good there.
 
#3 ·
Hi all, thought I'd post some pictures for the issue I'm having with the coolant. I've owned the car for about 5 years now and up until about mid May while traveling back from Lorella Springs the expansion bottle never had air in it and the overflow bottle always settled back to it's original cold position. Now the expansion bottle has a massive air section in it and the over flow fills above the MAX mark and never gets sucked back in. I have manually removed the coolant from the over flow and bled the air out of the expansion bottle to just have it do the same again after a 15 min drive. At idol I can't see any bubbles and no sign of leaks from the expansion bottle to the overflow or anywhere in the system. It doesn't seem to be loosing coolant just pushing it into the overflow and not sucking back again.

When I first bought the car I replaced the expansion bottle and did the glow plug timer and steel tip glow plugs not long after.
The radiator cap is about 2 years old along with the rad and hoses.

I'm unfortunately leaning towards a crack in the head.

Whats everyones thoughts

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First up ensure the clamps and hose from the expansion tank to the overflow tank are good nick and perfectly sealed, a leak here can cause overflow to not get sucked back to expansion tank on cooling, happened to me a couple of years ago, I found a slight suction leak at a clamp. This will not always cause fluid to leak out but it can allow air to be ingested as the system cools, worth a look before doing anything else.

The other thing to try if you can get hold of the gear is to pressure test the sytem, when I had my doubts I did this overnight on a cold engine up to full cap pressure and also did one with the engine warm, but pressure will change as engine cools so you need to take that into account.
 
#5 ·
Thanks Ross, after reading your suggestion I had a look, the upper hose was so loose it basically just fell off even with the factory springs clamp. The lower part of the hose attached to the overflow bottle is so tight I can't turn or even move it.
The hose itself looks in pretty good condition.

So I cut the loose piece off at fitted a better hose clamp. Fingers crossed

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#9 ·
Well it's getting worse.:( I drove the car to the city and back about 70 klms and now it appears thats it's now using coolant. I've had a good look all over the engine and coolant system and can't find any leaks. I rang Powercurve for some advice and they strongly suspect a cracked head. I also rang an Aussie manufacture of coolant test systems to purchase some equipment and they advised me not to waste my money it'll be the head:oops:

So it looks like I'll be stripping the head down after the Show and Shine and I'll document here to show everyone my findings.

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#10 ·
There is an issue with sniff testing the coolant on a diesel, if you get a positive result, yes you definitely have an issue, if you get a negative result you can still have an issue and not know it.

Pressure testing does work though, but if you are using coolant then that is bad news. Might be a bit early but take the rocker cover cap off and look for creamy solution around the inside of the cap.
 
#12 ·
In process of doing a head for a mate on zd30, yes it took a couple of tries with the coolant chemical test and all indications were pointing at head just tested for testing sake. Got head off and there is a slight but definite warp, I got one of the Mr cylinder head kits, good service from supplier. Must say this is not a basic job and not a five minute exercise, along with time to clean all clogged up manifold sections.
 
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#13 ·
Would you suggest replacing the intake and exhaust manifold bolts?
I'll probably replace the timing chain and tensioner and thermostat while I'm there. I'll have a good look at the water pump while its all apart and may even replace it while I'm at it.

I think I'll strip it all down first then order all the parts in one go instead of guessing.
If I need new injectors would it be ok to get higher flow than standard for anticipation of getting the new Eclipse turbo?
 
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#18 ·
After much thought and discussion with my wife we've decided to take the car to PowerCurve Performance to replace the head and have any other work that possibly needs doing done by them. The thought is, I've never rebuilt or replace a head and even though the manual is very clear and the support on here is outstanding I could make a very costly mistake. This is our only car and I need to have as little down time as possible. By having a PowerCurve work on it there'll be a guarantee or warranty with the repair.

My wife is really pushing for me to carry out the repair to save on labour, but I work full time so it'd be mostly weekends which means a couple of weeks without a car and if there's more problems like glazed bore or piston damage it would really push the repair time out. I also don't have all the tools needed for the job.
 
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#19 ·
After much thought and discussion with my wife we've decided to take the car to PowerCurve Performance to replace the head and have any other work that possibly needs doing done by them. The thought is, I've never rebuilt or replace a head and even though the manual is very clear and the support on here is outstanding I could make a very costly mistake. This is our only car and I need to have as little down time as possible. By having a PowerCurve work on it there'll be a guarantee or warranty with the repair.

My wife is really pushing for me to carry out the repair to save on labour, but I work full time so it'd be mostly weekends which means a couple of weeks without a car and if there's more problems like glazed bore or piston damage it would really push the repair time out. I also don't have all the tools needed for the job.
You won't regret that decision mate. I'll be able to check it out for you regularly ;).
 
#20 ·
After taking the car to Powercurve and having them check it over they were unable to establish why it was pressurising the coolant system, they had the car for close to a week and ran various tests and suggested to take the car home and continue to drive it until it gets worse.

So I have decided to pull the head off and started today.

Day 1
Pulled the intake off and clean as a whistle. I cleaned the intake about 5 years ago. Blocking the EGR and installing a catch can definitely works.
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This is as far as I got today, I don't have a socket big enough to rotate the crank to set TDC of piston 1, so it's a job for tomorrow.
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Inspected the coolant paths and they are clean so I don't see any reason to remove the water pump to inspect in.
The injectors don't look to bad but I'll take them to a diesel injecting specialist for testing.

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I only broke 1 bolt on the upper coolant connection on the timing cover and rounded 1 bolt head on another coolant pipe near the turbo stopping me from removing the exhaust manifold, so I'm hoping I can remove the heads with it still attached.
 
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#56 ·
After taking the car to Powercurve and having them check it over they were unable to establish why it was pressurising the coolant system, they had the car for close to a week and ran various tests and suggested to take the car home and continue to drive it until it gets worse.

So I have decided to pull the head off and started today.

Day 1
Pulled the intake off and clean as a whistle. I cleaned the intake about 5 years ago. Blocking the EGR and installing a catch can definitely works.
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This is as far as I got today, I don't have a socket big enough to rotate the crank to set TDC of piston 1, so it's a job for tomorrow.
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Inspected the coolant paths and they are clean so I don't see any reason to remove the water pump to inspect in.
The injectors don't look to bad but I'll take them to a diesel injecting specialist for testing.

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I only broke 1 bolt on the upper coolant connection on the timing cover and rounded 1 bolt head on another coolant pipe near the turbo stopping me from removing the exhaust manifold, so I'm hoping I can remove the heads with it still attached.
mate ,with the cracked heads i used a product THAT IS ALUMINIUM BASED AND IT FIXED MY HEAD ,NO MORE WATER PROBLEMS GOT IT FROM REPCO
 
#21 ·
Day 2

Removed the head and found a big crack piston 3 plus the usual glow plug cracks. this explains the coolant system being pressurised.

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But unfortunately I also found piston 4 has cracked and this probably explains the excessive blow by when under load for example towing the caravan.
Had a close look at the other pistons and bores and all looks good, no glazed bores and in fact the cross hatching can clearly still be seen in the bore walls, not bad for a engine thats has in excess of 200k on it and no sign of the ceramic glow plug tip damage. I changed to steel when I purchased the car.
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#22 ·
After much thinking, advice from here and talking to some of the suppliers I've decided to rebuild my own engine. I'll be sourcing the AMC heads and rebuild kit from SMS Diesel Spares . I'll be removing whats left of the motor, stripping it down and taking it to PLR Engine Reconditioning to check the block, deck, hone and clean it for painting and across the road from them is KM Diesel a injector and pump specialist will check the injector pump for me.

I spoke to SMS Diesel spares about ceramic coating the piston crown and heads just where the combustion chamber is but he strongly advised against it due to his personal experience where the coating wasn't applied properly and peeled off causing damage. Anyone else heard of this happening?


Looks like this has turned into a build thread after all :oops:
 
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#23 ·
Where did you get yours done?
 
#24 ·
Day 3

Removed the engine from the car and mounted it to the engine stand. Took a bit to get it removed from the transmission.

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#25 ·
Nice work Jake.
Nissan rebuilt mine at 183k when it blew a hole in #3 piston. I saw the block when it was stripped down and the hone cross hatch pattern in each bore was pristine (except bore 3 which had alloy splatter up one side). Like you I was very surprised.

When I saw the pic of your engine's head it sparked a memory. Everyone here seems to advise a new head of there is any cracks seen (which is the right thing to do in your case given your symptoms). Mine also had some small cracks in it although I dont recall the exact details. All I remember is that they welded some, cleaned it, machined it flat and used in the rebuild. When I sold tha vehicle some 8 years later, it had 350k on the clock, it was running fine (it even had a diesel gas conversion fitted in the first year of owning it too) and I'd not had any major problems with it.
Enjoy the learning curve. I'm sure you'll do it well
 
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#26 ·
Welding of a head can be successfull, over the years I've seen many success's but also many failures, the trick is in how the head is prepared and how it is welded and the materials used, I have less faith in this today than I would have years ago. I would be going a new complete head if I was in Jakes position (having been there once in 2006).
 
#27 ·
Day 4

Dismantled most of the engine today, I came undone when I was about to remove the crank. I had mounted the engine stand to the lower cylinder block that retains part of the crank and I found that the mounts suggested in the workshop manual where to close together for my particular engine stand. Tomorrow I'll be re-drilling the mounting plate to accept the closer holes.
On a positive note I was very pleased to see no sign of sludge build up anywhere.

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#28 ·
Day 5

Re-drilled the engine stand mounting plate to accept the closer holes. Removed the pistons and lower engine block that encapsulates the big end bearings and secures the crank. Took particular notice of the thrust bearing location and orientation, I'd hate to get that wrong.

Dropped the block off to get checked and cleaned and if required honed and decked.
Also dropped most of the other engine casing pieces off to get clean and have the old gasket material removed.

All of the oil pump screws were so tight the rattle gun hesitated to remove them.

When assembling the motor, would everyone prime the oil pump before first start?

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#29 ·
Yes I would prime with a concentrate which you can also coat the main and big end faces, etc, with when you assemble, I have always used a molybond product but nulon have a couple as well, you can dilute them a little with your normal engine oil.
 
#30 ·
While the block is off getting checked out I've been getting little miscellaneous jobs done, one being modifying the engine stand to work with the engine crane. I would have to bring the 2 together offset to one side because the legs would clash and lifting the engine or placing it on the stand would have to be at an offset making it a 2 person job and not very safe. The engine stand I purchased is rated for over 600kg, if I had purchased a lesser rated or a better quality stand it would have a centre support for the front wheels instead of the wide stance mine had.

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#31 ·
Received a call from PLR Engine Reconditioning on Friday my block is in pretty good condition and they're going to hone the cylinder bores out .5mm or 20 thou. I've ordered the new assembled head and rebuild kit with .5mm oversize piston rings. When all this arrives PLR want the pistons and rings for precise measurement when honing the cylinder bores which saves me from sizing the rings. 😊

After I have assembled the engine and it's all back in and filled with oil would everyone recommend the oil feed pipe for the turbo be disconnected at the turbo then crank the engine over until oil comes out?
I'd hate to run the engine and have no oil to the turbo for a period of time.
 
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#32 ·
If the oil pump is primed and the turbo is primed I don't think you will have an issue, it will only take seconds for oil to be on the move, you could also crank it over just before fitting glow plugs to get oil moving.
 
#33 ·
I hadn't thought about priming the turbo during assembly.
 
#36 ·
Had some parts turn up today, had a good look at everything and all looks pretty good quality.

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#37 ·
Thought I'd add some more photos of the parts kit and some old and new heads side by side photos. You'll see some differences in the casting and machining of each of the side by side photos. The gaskets are Japanese made Stone brand and the bearings are Japanese made NDC brand and from my research are a premium quality and highly recommend buy a number of top engine building shops, so i was happy to see them supplied.
Ben at SMS Diesel Spares who I was dealing with really knew his stuff and was great to deal with, answered all my questions. I highly recommend calling them instead of ordering off the website, I got the parts at a considerable saving to me by calling, then I got a nice little surprise when I opened the box, they sent be an AMC SMS vest free of charge. :D
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#38 ·
Had you thought about getting 5 angle valve seats cut to improve induction flow? I suppose this depends on how much you wish to spend and how urgent the build is.
 
#39 ·
I hadn't thought about it, I'll make some enquires and see what it costs and go from there.
 
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#43 ·
I've decided not to ceramic coat any of it.
 
#44 ·
It's the photos, in person they look the same.
 
#45 ·
When I get some time I'll work out a way to cross section the old head 1 where mine is cracked between the exhaust ports on cylinder 3 and 1 through the glow plug port it'll be very interesting to see whats in behind those ares.
 
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