-4C this morning and started after perhaps four or five seconds of turnover, so I've pushed the envelop from my "previous best" of -3C.

I'm still inclined to think that starting that well at -4C suggests my glow plugs are working.

As mentioned in the "cold start" thread, I do wonder if at colder temps there is an air issue, with the throttle body not opening properly, giving the situation of fast crank, black smoke but no real ignition. 2005 D3 2.7 Auto
Previously:
2010 MY FL2 TD4e GS - Now gone at 199,500 miles, about 135,000 of them mine.
‘93 Defender 110 200TDi CSW
‘87 Defender 90 4 cyl Petrol
‘83 110 CSW V8 - best ever!
Range Rover 2-door V8 (not sure of year - 4-speed box and vacuum diff switch)
Series III SWB Diesel

Minus 6 this morning, Took quite a while to start.
At least 6/7 tries before coughing into life.
Battery is new and charged up last night for about 2 hours.
Went down to 12.2v and charged again to 12.9 and eventually started.
Of course after that starts instantly all day even after a 3 hour stop.
Collected set of glowplugs today from Taggartslandrover £68.16 inc vat.
Cheaper than Bosch from Eurocarparts.
Only snag , garage cannot do them till next Wed.
Hopefully with temp rising i will manage till then.
Tonight minus 3 and about zero by the time i will be going out.
Snow expected Friday and i have an early hospital appointment so will have to be up early to make sure car gets started. Jim A
Fl2 HSE 2010 auto
Disco 2Td5 auto 2002 gone
Disci 1 300Tdi auto 1996 gone

Evening all, well the glow plug system is usually quite reliable with extreme cold starting but a lesson learned here where if it’s quite cold plus the minus 5 degrees or lower worse case scenario the glow plugs do struggle to aid cold starting if your running on supermarket fuel as branded fuel like Shell and BP even Texaco seem to aid the really extreme cold, Iv tested my freelander with all sorts of fuel and I think the supermarket fuel plus corner garage diesel fuel is a lower grade especially in extreme cold weather. I know some forum chaps are going to disagree here and well I don’t care, because I have replaced all four of my glow plugs to NGK which in comparison are quite expensive but you only do that job once believe me, yesterday minus 6 degrees C the poor engine failed to start again this morning minus 9 degrees C again another failed start bearing in mind last year replacement battery with 800 amps cold crank starting plus the extra earth lead to starter mod. Plus new fuel lines and filter all genuine LR parts.

So what I do now is to put a 1kw fan heater under the bonnet with the lid closed if the degrees C is below 5 or more the vehicle and start cabling system is not under extreme pressure to start and the engine fires up straight away like it’s a warm morning, no stress on the battery,cables, glow plugs, the fan heater is on for approximately 3-4 mins just warming all the pipes etc.
I remember years ago Volvo in Scandinavia factory fitted warm up heaters to run the cooling system to aid cold starting plus defrosting the windows, this basically was a night heater plumbed to the cooling pipes which did actually work and not sure if they still fit these.

Anyway it’s a chore to do the under bonnet heater but at least the engine starts without fuss, just awaiting the flak from fellow forum members!!!

Davy, that seems a good idea to warm the engine area.
I have an early hospital appointment on Friday and will be up early to get started.
Will probably try the heater thing.
Thanks Jim A
Fl2 HSE 2010 auto
Disco 2Td5 auto 2002 gone
Disci 1 300Tdi auto 1996 gone

Interesting that we all seem to be relating this to temperatures in the -5C and below range. And it was the fan heater bringing the temp up to -3C that seemed to do the trick for me on Monday. But it looks like we are above these really cold temps now, so you'll hopefully not need to go down this route for your early start on Friday. 2005 D3 2.7 Auto
Previously:
2010 MY FL2 TD4e GS - Now gone at 199,500 miles, about 135,000 of them mine.
‘93 Defender 110 200TDi CSW
‘87 Defender 90 4 cyl Petrol
‘83 110 CSW V8 - best ever!
Range Rover 2-door V8 (not sure of year - 4-speed box and vacuum diff switch)
Series III SWB Diesel

Update. Glowplugs replaced yesterday by my garage. Two hours labour at £60 +vat, £68 inc vat from LR.for Glowplugs
Three old plugs were gone and one nearly done. Just have to wait now for next cold spell




Merry Christmas and Happy New Year Jim A
Fl2 HSE 2010 auto
Disco 2Td5 auto 2002 gone
Disci 1 300Tdi auto 1996 gone

2 hours is way quicker than it took me to do the job lol, but then again I am not a mechanic. Perhaps they didn't remove the inlet manifold as no mention of replacing the gaskets in your price breakdown. I researched both ways of doing the job, but decided the longest route was the safest route for me. Hope your starting improves. Mine did, but it's still not the best in cold weather.

I'd love to know how they did without taking the manifold off - if that's what they did. Jules

2 hours is about right for a manifold off job. There's no need to replace the manifold O rings if they're ok, but I would while it's of.

Oddly mine starts faster when it's 0°C outside, than it does when it's 10°C outside. Weired. Hyundai Ioniq 5 Ultimate. The family car.
2009 Rimini Red SE TD4. Gone.
2006 Tonga Green i6 HSE. Gone.
Audi A5 convertible, my daily driver.
1972 Hillman Avenger GT, the project.

You can replace the glow plugs without removing the inlet manifold. That's how I did mine. However, I would not recommend it. You are working blind and there is always the possibility of snapping a plug. Now at the point when I learn something new something old is lost out the other side !
Now retired so it doesn't matter anymore.
Freelander now gone.

The manifold was removed and refitted. Car is running fine. Actually feels much better since I had the crank sensor replaced about a month ago. Cold weather due soon. Will see then how it starts. Jim A
Fl2 HSE 2010 auto
Disco 2Td5 auto 2002 gone
Disci 1 300Tdi auto 1996 gone

gasman wrote:

You can replace the glow plugs without removing the inlet manifold. That's how I did mine. However, I would not recommend it. You are working blind and there is always the possibility of snapping a plug.

Without taking the manifold off.

Well, first cold morning since glowplugs fitted.
Minus 2C, Pressed button, went through cycle, glowplug light came on.
Pressed again to start and instant start.
Actually started quicker than in the summer.
Not out today. out tomorrow and another cold night tonight.
All's well at moment Jim A
Fl2 HSE 2010 auto
Disco 2Td5 auto 2002 gone
Disci 1 300Tdi auto 1996 gone

 Jules