Bad day in the harding household

good job i didnt let her take the green wagon !!!

mrs drove to york for weekend break without me and oil warning light came on in middle of york she stopped ASAP and oil was on pavement a friendly chap offered to fit a clip on a hose near raditor where it was leaking but car would start ##

national breakdown called and looked and said hose had split and empted engine of oil and now it is seized up they will be towing car back to carlisle on monday

they thought £1500 for a reconditioned engine or scrap the car

Any advice its a rover 418sld touring 1996 my 88 K miles .ive owned it for the last 6 years and has been a great economical workhorse looks the part and i actually like it and was planning to run it into ground

as it stands its worth £50
How much is new or 2nd hand engine ? for a turbo diesel
how much to fit (i have a decent garage £25 per hour and are honest etc i thought maybe 15-20 hours to fit
the car is worth trade £2000 if it was okay
Do i spend £1-1500 on it or is reconditioned /secondhand engines more bother than they are worth ?
You will all say buy a scooby /forester etc and spend your pennys but i actually think its better to put a new engine in etc as i dont want a expensive everyday workhorse car

Advice please

 

You'll probably get some good pointers in www.roverload.com

They were very helpful when I changed a load of valves in my inlaw's Rover 220.

 

For the money you are about to outlay, why not bin the current workhorse & get another.......

 

If your wife stopped the engine before it seized - ie when she saw the oil light come on it might be worth checking the engine when it is cold to see if it is really seized proper - it could be worth putting in some fresh oil and trying to turn the engine over manually - you never know !
Regards
Dave

 

a small glimmer of hope

will try when i get it back to cumbria cheers
i dont really want to buy a forrester turbo just to cart garden rubbish etc

 

If it was stopped when light came on throw new filter on and chuck some oil in it. I reckon you have good chance of it being ok.

 

It shouldnt take that long to swop the engines. A good garage would be able to get it done in a day shouldnt they? (8hours)
Know a place in Birmingham which fits the tomcat turbo engine and the brakes off the tomcat onto on non turbo rovers for £1000 all in!! Working on that price you should be able to get it done cheaper than that if all your after is another deisel engine.