drive shaft on landrover freelander

titch1

Looking for advice here, hopefully someone has this experience - have a 03 1.8l petrol and when we bought it, the drive shaft was removed. The dealer told us that this was common practice in an effort to cut the fuel consumption. Just want to know if this is correct? Was thinking of putting it back on as the engine struggles even when it gets to 100kph and it feels like I need a 6th gear. I'm sure it would be slow to take off with the drive shaft back on? but would it really affect the fuel so much? and would it help maintain the speed once it reached 100 or 120? Thanks.

BeardyGit

You're probably in for an unpleasant surprise here....

The rear end transmission on mark 1 freelanders are unreliable:

http://www.ashcroft-transmissions.co.uk/category_8.html

Might be that one of these components has failed and the prop's been removed as a result, rather than fixing the actual fault....

Could be wrong though. In any case, adding another prop won't solve whatever lost power issue you're having.... Have you checked for coolant leaks/oil contamination? Could be a failing headgasket - 1.8 K series rover engine and all that.

Do you have a good mechanic?

titch1

oh god it never ends! we only decided recently to keep the thing til it's death bed! luckily we bought it around 30k miles and it's now at 60k two years later, the head gasket remains intact. Keeping a VERY close eye on the coolant also. (I better not jinx it now!!) The power struggle has been there from day one, we just decided to look into the drive shaft only now. We moved house 6 mths ago and got a local mechanic to carry out a service recently. I've heard other reports that he's good. He certainly charges slightly more than others. You'd recommend asking him before he fits it then?

BeardyGit

titch1 wrote: »

oh god it never ends! we only decided recently to keep the thing til it's death bed! luckily we bought it around 30k miles and it's now at 60k two years later, the head gasket remains intact. Keeping a VERY close eye on the coolant also. (I better not jinx it now!!) The power struggle has been there from day one, we just decided to look into the drive shaft only now. We moved house 6 mths ago and got a local mechanic to carry out a service recently. I've heard other reports that he's good. He certainly charges slightly more than others. You'd recommend asking him before he fits it then?

Personally I'd recommend having a landrover specialist look at it, to be quite honest. What part of the country are you in and I'm sure someone here can recommend someone to approach to have it properly checked out. Only recently someone else here started bolting bits onto their 'rover to fix a problem, slowly but surely spending money and still having the problem they started with.... It's an easy trap to fall into. Only a specialist will know what to do (really) and where to look for issues that are idiosyncratic to a particular model/marque.

Robert Power down in Ballinaclash in Wicklow is very good at what he does...He's an independent but has all the diagnostics and has been in business for donkeys years just looking after landrovers. I'm sure others can recommend someone close to them that can set you right.

101sean

Any decent mechanic should be able to handle the Rover K series engine, used in several other cars. Definitely keep an eye on the coolant levels and invesigate if it drops. Most problems were down to owners never lifting the bonnet, cooling on these is marginal.

The rear prop was probably removed because either the viscous coupling or the IRD have packed up, the dealer was lying. The VC goes first and if ignored takes the IRD with it. Big cost to replace both (look at another recent freelander post on here) and the Ashcroft link but if you don't need the 4wd, running it in 2wd won't do any harm. I believe you can now even buy a blanking plate to do it permanantly.

titch1

thanks for the help. im in kildare but i got it serviced for it's first one last year in spirit motors, sandyford. it passed there with flying colours but i never thought to ask them about the engine. is there any reason that you can think of why it's struggling so much? the revs are very high on it but it's always run fine. i just need to somehow reduce them and surely this will sort out my engine struggle then?

101sean

Sounds like a sensor playing up and it's running rich, could be coolant temp sensor, MAF sensor, lamda sensor amongst others, I'd bet on MAF sensor. Need to get it plugged in to preferably Land Rover Testbook or otherwise any OBDII reader should read the faults and sensor readings. It won't pass an NCT/DOE emmissions test like that.

titch1

slightly lost now! Rang Landrover and they can look at it for 100e an hour! Im in Kildare and theres a mechanic near work who drives one himself (although it's a diesel). Was thinking of just getting him to drive it and see what he thinks. It passed the NCT last week. See it runs fine but you can hear the engine working a bit TOO hard thats all. Thought I could help it along but if all else fails I'll pay the double labour charge eventually. The robbing you know whats in Landrover!

titch1

ps thanks for the possible diagnosis. i can have a look myself before paying out. much appreciated!

rrv8

Sounds like your clutch is on its way out
Forget about refitting the shaft , wont make it any quicker , but will increase the fuel bill, Im running a Range Rover DSE with the front prop removed as I dont need 4wd , getting 13 mpg more out of it on 2wd

rugbyman

though all the advice given here is good, I think the problem is that the OP feels the engine is working too hard, is too noisy,

If this is something new then it sounds like the clutch. but a clutch on the way out would become a cluth gone fairly quickly. If it has always been like that then it must have a relatively low top gear. i know nothing of these vehicles but with a relatively small engine and sometime 4 wheel drive it probably has.

so ,OP is this a new phenomenon?.
cheap solution , ask someone who has a similiar vehicle to take you for a spin in theirs. take note of revs at say 60 mph and compare.

Rugbyman

titch1

hit the nail on the head rugbyman thanks! i dont know of any fellow owners though and really dont want to shell out that much to landrover themselves just to take it out for a drive for me! i was sure that since it has been serviced twice now, that any faults would surely have shown up particularly after landrover themselves did the first one. it is a long running issue though, 2 years now so i might shop around a few mechanics, ask them all to drive it and pick one who (hopefully) can give me a solution. i just thought it might have been common with this model esp being petrol. wish me luck ,hope im not charged for a few "test" drives!

BeardyGit

Do something for me. Take it out onto the motorway/dual carriageway and bring it up to 50mph in 4th. Note the engine RPM on the tacho. Do the same at 70mph in 5th gear. Stick the results up here.

I'll get a couple of other freelander owners to report back with their own findings for same speed/RPM once you've posted your results.

Edit - Also, confirm your tyres size in full and state whether they're road or offroad (especially knobbly tyres with big lugs), to make sure any reference is from a vehicle running with the same ratios

titch1

Gil Dub the PC is on it's way out! i only got to read this now. ill try this later and post the situation in the morning. really really appreciate your help in this.

titch1

Ok here are the results of the experiment! -

50mph in 4th gear- Revs at just under 3,250

70mph in 5th gear - Revs at just under 3,500.

(By the way when I reach 120 KPH it hits just under 4,000 and then it REALLY gets noisy!)

Tyres are on road. Size - 195/80R15 96S.

Is this all the info you need?

BeardyGit

Hate to say this, but that's quite normal for the 1.8 according the to gear ratios etc.

You should be getting about 33kph per 1000RPM in 5th gear on those sized tyres..... So, around about 4k RPM at 132KPH, or just under 4k at 120KPH is absolutely normal.

Have you actually owned a 4x4 before, or is this your first? If it is, I think it's perhaps just that you're not used to how they rev. The Freelander's actually built and geared like a proper 4x4, as much as they tried to be a car....

Time to stop worrying about how it's revving anyway.

titch1

Gil Dub cant thank you enough. So long as something won't actually burst, I can live with the struggle, and yep im a 4x4 virgin! Not the best one to start off with but doing more research SINCE i got it!With the whole 4 wheel drive that's why i thought it had to do with the drive shaft. Do you reckon the tyres are the wrong size for it as in too small? They were on it when i got it and ive just been replacing them with the same ones.
Also, it's not used for pulling loads at the moment

BeardyGit

Those tyres are the standard tyre size for the 1.8, so if you're just using it as a car, I'd leave well enough alone.

As regards replacing the propshaft/vc/ird stuff, if everything else is working okay and you don't actually need 4WD, I'd leave that alone too. It's just too expensive to sort out if something's broken that you don't actually need anyway. When you think about the fact that most cars on the road are front wheel drive. If you don't use it towing or offroad, leave it as front wheel drive and it'll be fine.

Best of luck,

Gil

titch1

Nice one. thanks a million for all your help.