Fire the parts cannon, Disco style

"Akio Ohtori - RIP Oppo" (akioohtori)
02/12/2018 at 10:38 • Filed to: Disco Inferno

All this for good head... (Image from Atlantic British)

Even if you have the money allocated for a project, at least for me, it never feels good to lay out a ton of cash. Especially sober. And especially when you know the car will be no different to drive when you’re done.

[I would like to point out it took considerable restraint not to call this post “Getting good head.”]

Which is to say we’ve moved up the timetable for doing the 2nd half of the Oklahoma Adventure Trail, so I need to get to making sweet, sweet love to my head gaskets. Also I still want a center diff lock.

So yesterday I went ahead and bought Atlantic British head gasket kit, including the stretch bolts. For those unfamiliar Atlantic British is very proud of their parts. To talk numbers, this kit is $220 + shipping. Lucky8, another Rover parts supplier, sells their head gasket kit for $80 shipped. Why the difference? I sure would like to know!

The reason I spent an extra $140 for, more or less, the same parts is (not very) simple! They’re not the same.

Looking at the head bolts you’ll notice a critical difference between the two kits. The Lucky ones look like... well they look like bolts with rolled threads. The Atlantic ones have small notches in the shaft. What this means is the thinnest part on the Lucky ones is the threads, which is bad. Not only does that add some weird stress concentrators, it also means that is where the bolts will want to yield, which seems bad. The AB bolts will, at least in theory, yield at the thin part of the shaft, which is a minor, singular stress concentrator and not at a place that is mating with other parts. [At lot of this was regurgitated from my ME colleagues.]

Atlantic British head bolts. See the little divots? Apparently those are worth $80... (Image from Atlantic British)

One option was to just buy the bolts from Atlantic (at $80) and then buy the rest of the kit from Lucky. I think this would have made a lot of sense and been the most economical, saving about $60. But I didn’t because I choose to believe the Atlantic parts are going to be higher quality overall, and for a head gasket job that matters.

(Image from Atlantic British)

Are they actually higher quality (aside from the bolts)? No... probably not.

So aside from all this I have new wires coming from a company called Kingsborne, new coils, some new coolant hoses, and a few other minor items.

Now to begin researching Dexcool vs all others. I’ve waded into this fight before and it is decidedly un-fun.

Deathcool represent!

Sidenote: Any oppos aware of a good coolant selection guide? I usually go with factory, but there is so much hate centered around Dex...

DISCUSSION (9)

adamftw > Akio Ohtori - RIP Oppo
02/12/2018 at 10:44

I really hate AB. I usually got my stuff through RoversNorth (Vermont) or RovahFarm (Utah). The Genuine LR kit is something like $550? There are kits from cheap to great, if anything you get comes in a box with a Britpart label on it return it.

As for coolant, if you COMPLETELY flush the block, you should be ok with green... but I’d stay with the factory recommended fill. Because if there is any dex left it will clog up your passages quick when the green stuff hits it.

Akio Ohtori - RIP Oppo > adamftw
02/12/2018 at 11:00

Yeah, I can see why. They’re just too damn proud of their stuff. That said, for a job like this I am willing to pay a premium if the parts are good. I hadn’t heard of RovahFarm, I’ll add them to the list!

So the coolant debate is one that has raged on since the beginning of time dexcool. The last time I waded in it was for my 1999 Yukon (which shipped with Dex) and the conclusion was to keep Dexcool in it as the gaskets had been reformulated by that point. Also it wasn’t causing problems, so why create some?

With the Rover I haven’t started the research, but I assume I’ll reach the same conclusion. The only reason I am questioning is because the D2 facebook group is pretty adamant that people switch to green or G-05. The Alfa takes G-05 so I wouldn’t mind having two cars with the same coolant. (Right now they all four take different because fuck me that’s why.)

adamftw > Akio Ohtori - RIP Oppo
02/12/2018 at 11:10

I never got too into it with my D1 because it ran green from the factory in ‘95. G-05 rings a bell, though. I keep Dex in my Silverado, been that way since ‘05 and 125k with nothing in the cooling system ever touched so thats the way it’ll stay.

Aero > Akio Ohtori - RIP Oppo
02/12/2018 at 11:32

I think G-05 is one of the best coolants out there. It’s great at containing electrolysis between cast iron and aluminum, which becomes obvious when you open an engine up that used it as factory fill. DexCool really isn’t a bad coolant, but in my experience it causes a lot of problems if there’s any air in the system.

TheBloody, Oppositelock lives on in our shitposts. > Akio Ohtori - RIP Oppo
02/12/2018 at 11:57

I normally get my stuff from Rovers North and Lucky 8 but on the occasion I was getting a proline part I’d use the 10% discount AB sent with their brochure and it worked out cheaper in that instance.

gmctavish needs more space > Akio Ohtori - RIP Oppo
02/12/2018 at 13:56

I’ve just gone with my mechanics advice in regards to Dexcool. If it’s a GM product that came with it new, it gets Dexcool. If not, and it has Dexcool in it for some ungodly reason, it gets thoroughly flushed and replaced with not Dexcool. Like my Subaru. No idea why someone put Dexcool in a Subaru, but it now has whatever the Beck/Arnley Subaru/Mitsu coolant is, either green or blue, I can’t remember, but it’s in my Raider too.

Urambo Tauro > Akio Ohtori - RIP Oppo
02/12/2018 at 17:05

I don’t know the particulars of what’s so great about Dex-Kill. All I’ve got to go on is the pictures and horror stories from when things go wrong. Maybe it really is good stuff when used properly and changed regularly. But frankly, it just seems to be so gosh-danged sensitive, that I’m inclined to agree with everyone who says ditch it and use the green stuff instead.

Akio Ohtori - RIP Oppo > Urambo Tauro
02/12/2018 at 17:11

As far as I can tell, there isn’t much to recommend Dexcool. It is better than green in ideal circumstances, but also has a lot of downsides. I think a lot of the hate is fueled by a bad roll out. Initially it was known to dissolve the gaskets of the engines it was installed in (thanks GM!) and not a lot of people knew it was incompatible with other coolants, so they effed up their cooling systems by adding the wrong stuff.

That said, for the same price you can get the G-05 stuff which has a similar life, better anti-corrosion, better performance on aluminium engines, and fewer downsides. It seems to be what the Rover people prefer as a replacement, so I am leaning that way.

pip bip - choose Corrour > Akio Ohtori - RIP Oppo
02/13/2018 at 04:52

Land Rover #ERR6621