Old Ford Diesels

anyone with experience of these? 96/97/99 1.8td
From googling online they might have problems with cambelts? Anyone know the interval?

dr.fuzzenstein

Had a '99 1.8L TD, it is no rocket, no idea about the cambelt, I always like to go for 60k to be on the safe side.
Other than that it was great, never broke down, it was old and smelly but reliable, bit like my dog really.

hiluxman

intervals change depending on the year, up to '97 its 40,000 miles from '97 on its 70,000 miles. very agricultural diesel engine compaired to others of the same year

dr.fuzzenstein

hiluxman wrote: »

intervals change depending on the year, up to '97 its 40,000 miles from '97 on its 70,000 miles. very agricultural diesel engine compaired to others of the same year

true, wouldn't call it refined (or fast, or quiet;)), but mine had 160k miles on it and used exactly zero oil, didn't smoke and was good on the juice, I swear my current 06 Focus 1.8l TDCI 115 hp drinks more, even thought it tells me it does 51 mpg, but then again it might lie like a cheap Japanese watch!
Some VW diesels can have some engine trouble, Citroen and Peugeot may have the best diesel engines, but Japanese are always a good bet, though I know mostly their petrol products.

maidhc

Have a 95 Mondeo 1.8TD with 240 something thousand miles on the clock. Engine has got rudimentary servicing every 10k and belt every 40k. Nothing replaced under the bonnet other than that from what I can remember. Still on original clutch even.

The oil is never checked between services either and it doesn't burn any.

dr.fuzzenstein

Or try an old Hilux, any car Jeremy Clarkson cannot break will have to be bomb proof.

bazz26

The Focus, Mondeo and S-Maxx still use that old Ford 1.8TD engine from the Escort and Sierra days. It has been overhauled with common rail injectors and a more modern turbo charger and intercooler over the years though.

dr.fuzzenstein

bazz26 wrote: »

The Focus, Mondeo and S-Maxx still use that old Ford 1.8TD engine from the Escort and Sierra days. It has been overhauled with common rail injectors and a more modern turbo charger and intercooler over the years though.

I thought it looked familiar, I wonder if this is the same engine I had in my old Mk III Escort based bread van ('85 or thereabouts), which was the most hideously awful car I have ever owned, but the engine was great, if a bit (or a lot) slow without a turbo.

benny_cakes

blindjustice wrote: »

anyone with experience of these? 96/97/99 1.8td
From googling online they might have problems with cambelts? Anyone know the interval?

The offical change interval for these is 36,000 miles....and thats straight from the 1995 autodata timing belt manual!

They are straight forward to change and no worse than any other diesel of a similiar vintage.

But a serious word of warning.....

if changing a cambelt on one of these engines they have been known to break a new the cambelt once fitted.

Its widely known & often a garage if replacing a belt on one of these will warn the owner that they won't stand over the engine if it breaks after being fitted or else point blank refuse to do the job and send the owner off to a main dealer. On engines up to about the early to mid 1990's this was a well known problem, but i donno if it still was a common problem on later engines or not.

A main dealer should be able to advise you better.

These also have a slightly unusual setup in so far as they have 2 belts that have to be changed.....the cambelt & an injection pump belt.

GTE

From my own research last year I read that those engines were reliable but didnt return a great MPG. The better diesels from the years you mention would be the VW TDI's. 50-60mpg and the Mark 3 Golfs are meant to be tanks, unlike the Mark 4s with have some silly problems.

Personally I discounted Ford diesels in my car search untill the TDCI came out.

maidhc

bbk wrote: »

From my own research last year I read that those engines were reliable but didnt return a great MPG. The better diesels from the years you mention would be the VW TDI's. 50-60mpg and the Mark 3 Golfs are meant to be tanks, unlike the Mark 4s with have some silly problems.

Personally I discounted Ford diesels in my car search untill the TDCI came out.

The 1.8 Endura-E fitted to the Mondeo was an indirect injection unit. It does 40-45mpg. Not wonderous, but similar to most of its vintage in the early to mid 90s. (I know the TDI came out in 1992 or so, but was not fitted as standard to the Vento or Passat until 1995 or 6... A Mk 3 Golf with anything other than a non-turbo is rare enough)

When the Direct Injection and latterly HDis came on stream in the late 90s then the mondy engine became horribly outdated.

The 1.8 TD fitted to the Focus in 1997 was an Endura-DI and had a similar head to the 1.9TDI and much longer belt intervals.

Max_Damage

VERY economical engines (60+ MPG), and quite reliable (apart from the whole timing belt thing).

If they are fitted with the Bosch fuel pump (some are and some aren't), it can also run on veggie oil with little to no modifications.

My parent's had a 1.8L TD Sierra a few years back. The engine never gave one bit of trouble (we got rid of it in 2004 with nearly 200k miles on the clock). The NCT put it off the road, purely on emissions

GTE

Max_Damage wrote: »

VERY economical engines (60+ MPG)

We are now looking at about a 20+ MPG difference between what you, Parkers.co.uk and a member here say. As long as you are on about the 1.8 TD

What kind of way was the car driven to get that MPG?

Max_Damage

bbk wrote: »

We are now looking at about a 20+ MPG difference between what you, Parkers.co.uk and a member here say. As long as you are on about the 1.8 TD

What kind of way was the car driven to get that MPG?

I was referring to the non-turbo models. Sure the real old 1.6L diesel's were known to get 70MPG.

As for our Sierra, that was more in the region of 45 odd MPG.

gofaster_s13

If you stay on top of the timing belt changes they are bullet proof, very strong engine, we have a customer that has nearly doubled the boost pressure using a bleed valve and adjusting the fuelling on the pump, its a monster to go(at the loss of some economy) and has been drivenHARD like that with no issues for 80 odd thousand miles

gofaster_s13

gofaster_s13 wrote: »

If you stay on top of the timing belt changes they are bullet proof, very strong engine, we have a customer that has nearly doubled the boost pressure using a bleed valve and adjusting the fuelling on the pump, its a monster to go(at the loss of some economy) and has been drivenHARD like that with no issues for 80 odd thousand miles

Should be no probs once it's not overfuelling leading to high egts.

gofaster_s13

EGT's are a fair bit higher than they should be:D

cadaliac

benny_cakes wrote: »

The offical change interval for these is 36,000 miles....and thats straight from the 1995 autodata timing belt manual!

They are straight forward to change and no worse than any other diesel of a similiar vintage.

But a serious word of warning.....

if changing a cambelt on one of these engines they have been known to break a new the cambelt once fitted.

Its widely known & often a garage if replacing a belt on one of these will warn the owner that they won't stand over the engine if it breaks after being fitted or else point blank refuse to do the job and send the owner off to a main dealer. On engines up to about the early to mid 1990's this was a well known problem, but i donno if it still was a common problem on later engines or not.

A main dealer should be able to advise you better.

These also have a slightly unusual setup in so far as they have 2 belts that have to be changed.....the cambelt & an injection pump belt.

This is true for the Non-Turbo. At least it was true for my 1.8 non-turbo fiesta van. When I asked a local mechanic to change the belt, he just refused (and explained why, as above).

gofaster_s13

gofaster_s13 wrote: »

EGT's are a fair bit higher than they should be:D

they're not too high though if he has done 80thou since the extra oopmh

shamwari

There were several interations of this engine. There was a 1.8D non turbo producing around 60-65 bhp. Then they turbo'd and intercooled at and extracted a whopping 90bhp. And finally, there was a low-blow version which was turbo minus intercooler and produced 75bhp.

These engines are noisy and not the most economical diesel about BUT they are usually very reliable and tolerant of hard use if looked after.

What goes wrong? Well not a lot really. Head gasket failures do occur but rarely. Turbo's are strong too. As others have said, timing belt change is a must, preferably using a kit containing tensioners and pulleys. The belts are easy to change and IIRC, I locked the sprokets using drill bits and marked them with Tippex.

Two types of injection pumps are used. A Lucas pump was commonly used before being replaced a Bosch unit with some electronics attached. The Bosch pump has a solenoid on its body to advance the injection timing depending on load. That solenoid can fail, causing the engine to idle roughly with clouds of white smoke. But it's an easy fix.

The Lucas pumps are usually ok, although I did happen upon one once where the bearing had failed on the pump's shaft, causing it to sound horrible, and perhaps risk throwing the timing belt off.

One final tale about this engine, and one that was fitted to my wifes Escort TD of years ago. The brake vacuum pump failed on it as she approached road works on the motorway. It was a miracle she wasn't involved in an accident, and what disturbed me more was that it was a silent failure. There was no advance warning light or other indication that there was a brake problem, until she tried to apply the brakes and found the pedal rock hard. A new vac pump was fitted and restored brakes. I used a vacuum switch that operated the "Economy Meter" on an old Corolla XL, and plumbed it into the vacuum pipe using a T-piece. The vac switch was then connected to a 12V bulb and a warning buzzer sourced from Maplins. If the light and buzzer went off when driving, she knew that there was a vac fault with the brakes, but thankfully, it never failed again.!