Please Help! 2011 RRS 7600 miles oil leak +

[Range Lemon]

This is my 3rd and probably last Range Rover. April of 2010, my husband brought our '08 RR for service and came home with a 2011 Sport Lux. For whatever reason it took over 3 weeks for the truck to get through customs. The Sport is much smaller than my previous RR but drove much smoother. The first few months the truck drove perfectly. There were a few annoying issues with the HD radio, DVD and windshield wipers. The wiper issue seems to be something land rover carries from year to year because I had the same thing happen in my '08. Very often the wipers swipe once across the windshield when I first start the truck. They also would randomly turn on (1 swipe)while driving on a bright sunny day. We dropped the truck off at the dealership and they said it was a setting that needed to be adjusted. After 5 days of being at the dealership, I picked up my truck and it was exactly the same. If those were the only minor issues, I wouldn't be too upset.
It has been 10 months since we bought the 2011 Sport and 7600 miles later, I feel like we are stuck with a lemon. I haven't found much or any info about these problems after only 7600 miles and less than a year old.
Here are the issues. I've always mentioned to my husband that the truck had a burning smell, he said the smell is normal for new vehicles. It's been 10 months and the "new" smell should be gone by now. We scheduled a service appt for the burning coolant smell, whistling belt sound when accelarting from cold start or idling and sometimes a metal rattling sound when in reverse. The truck also seems to run louder and when I'm stopped at a traffic light, the sound hurts my ears. If you close your eyes, you would think there's a tractor trailer next to you.
Our truck was at the dealership on Monday and it was ready to be picked up Tuesday afternoon. I had to rush there and back before my son was dismissed from school and the truck still sounds exactly the same. The report says none of the problems could be duplicated but they did find an oil leak on the right side of the engine by the starter. Replaced the oil gallery plug. They also did. Multi point inspection report and circled the column that says may require future attention for the accessory drive belt and rear brakes. The report said the issues can't be duplicated and one of the reasons we dropped off the truck was for the squeaking belt sound. I looked under the hood before the truck was at the dealership and noticed that the belt slightly shifts side to side. I figured that the sound was due to the belt needing adjuments. Should the dealership have replaced the belt? Knowing the many functions of the accessory drive I'm afraid of the belt breaking while driving with my kids and losing control of the steering. When I asked about the brake pads needing to be replaced soon, the serviceman said thats very common around 8 to 10,000 miles. Really?? I had a Honda Accord for 10 years and never needed new pads. Even though the truck is under warranty, these issues are a safety concern. Also, most of these issues were once a recall ten years ago. Why do the same problems still exist? Any advice is appreciated. I'm considering trading in this truck and losing money to avoid future aggravation and for safety reasons.

[gooseyloosey]

Wow.

Ok, this sounds like a situation where there's nothing majorly wrong with this vehicle, its just the dealer sucketh.

The wipers: it sounds like the rain sensor is malfunctioning. I believe there is a way to adjust the sensitivity of the detector, but if the wiper switch is off they should not be operating, period, therefore they may have to replace the switch or sensor in its entirety.

The coolant smell:: oil leak::plug replaced = fixed?

The belt noise. They should check the belt tension with a device that measures belt deflection. Unless something is significantly wrong here, the belt should not be worn out yet. If the tension is within specs, and its still squeaking you can apply a small amount of belt dressing to stop the squeek for a while. But it will be back. All cars chirp once in while.

Rear pads worn: In normal driving, the front pads will wear first. Most folks here get 20-30K out of a set. You may get and extra 5-10K out of the rears. Its odd for the rears to wear first, and if they are, I would have the brake bias checked, or stop driving backwards so much .

[Range Lemon]

Do you think I should try a different dealership? I rarely drive in reverse, Lol, so I recently noticed that rattling sound. I wonder how much I would get on a trade in?

[gooseyloosey]

Do you think I should try a different dealership? I rarely drive in reverse, Lol, so I recently noticed that rattling sound. I wonder how much I would get on a trade in?

Yes. Which one are you seeing now?

The rattling sound could just be a loose undershield. Some mechanics tend to leave off some of the bolts when putting them back. Did it start after it was at the dealer?

I would not trade it in unless you are conducting an economic experiment on new car depreciation or looking for an excuse to get a new one.

[AwfAxis]

Bonus parts!

[Range Lemon]

LR Paramus. I want to know what are the possible causes for the oil leak and how can I check to see if its still happening. I will crawl under the truck right now if someone can tell me what to look for. I did see oil or sonething greasy on the right corner of i think the oil pan under the truck. This was a twi days after the dealership repairs. What else could be damaged and what future issues should I expect? The accessory drive belt is also a concern. The truck seems to pull forward when I'm decelerating or pulling into a parking space.

[gooseyloosey]

You won't see much under there unless you take off the aforementioned underbody shield. There're a bunch of bolts holding it on. Plus any oil you see might be a residual spill from any work they did.

You could try the other dealership in N-NJ. FWIW I've heard more negative things about Paramus than some other dealers in NJ.

There's also an independent RR shop in the Paramus area that the out of warranty folks have had a good experience with http://roverspecialist.com/ but you will need to pay.

[Range Lemon]

Thanks. I'm going to call a different dealership and see what they find. I know the truck isn't completely fixed. BTW, the service guy that called originally said it was a spark plug that was covered in oil, but the report says oil was leaking on right side of engine near starter. So the oil gallery plug was replaced. What is a gallery plug?

[gooseyloosey]

oil "galley" plug.

Its a plug thats either threaded or pressed that seals a casting hole in the block. In the grand scheme of things (space/time continuim rips, supernovas, pulsars) its a minor issue.

[Range Lemon]

I just ran outside, opened the hood and started the truck. It is sounds like the engine is running too fast. Also the belts or something is making a winding sound. When I was standing on the passenger side of the truck and looking at the belts, I felt a lot of cold air blowing. Is that normal? The defroster, ac, heater, are off.

[RRToadHall]

I can't help but feel some time spent researching your rig would relieve alot of your reservations. There is nothing that you have described that is a safety issue, major concern or even anything more than an incinvenience. Yes a minor oil leak can be a pain. However it sounds like it was just that... minor and has been resolved free of charge. Low mileage brake pad replacement is completley normal and very much has to do with driving habits. There is a big difference between stopping a light weight Honda and a heavyweight SUV. As far as the sounds under the hood it appears you simply are not familiar with the rig. Sticking your head under a hood is never going to be a quiet experience nor is a V8 going to sound the same as V6 or 4 banger Honda. The "cold air blowing" is once again entirely normal, there is a great big fan up front. As mentioned above, in the grand scheme of thigns this is all minor and really not worthy of a state of panic or dumping the rig back on the dealer for trade.

[The Weatherman]

I have a couple of things that might help you. I brought in my 2010 SC, and one of the service men mentioned, "Boy, it sure smells like coolant." My dealer checked it out, everything is fine. No oil drips, no nothing on my garage floor. My wife's, same thing. "Boy, it sure smells like coolant." Checked the garage floor. Nothing. All the fluid levels are just fine.

The brakes. I brought hers in and our dealer said her rear pads have 2mm left. That's not much at all. That's with only 20k on them. I'm waiting until a sensor goes off or I hear a squealing noise.

Accessory belt? Well, I find that really hard to believe. You'd be the first that I've heard of. I hope it's okay, but even if it did go out, you'd be able to steer no problem. Braking might be a little harder, but you'd manage.

Like RRToad and the rest of the crew said, you're car isn't in that bad of shape.

When you start these up, they rev high. They even do it sometimes when the engine is completely warm. The fan makes a hell of a racket up front, but that's what makes it such a mountain goat. That's a lot of air moving over the radiator at a low speed. It's okay. Both of ours do it.

The HSE's normally aspirated 5.0L is a little noisier at idle surprisingly enough. It's just inherent in the engine I guess. My SC actually shakes though. If you're coming from a 4.4 or 4.2 SC, this is a completely different motor. It's fairly new, but it always runs. Hang in there. I acutally bought my HSE from Paramus, and the guy I bought it from had nothing but great things to say about them.

Unfortunately, you have a brand new version of a motor and some new electronics. Things are different. Your old 4.4 was around for a long time and all those little bugs were worked out. There are a lot of us with the new ones that are running great. Are they perfect? No. Are they better than most cars on the road? Yes. Try to hang in there. Again, we have the smell on both machines. Brakes, I think they're both low. Our dealer made my dad replace his 2006 SC brakes at like 12,000 miles. That's a money maker. We have sensors that tell us the brakes are low. Wait for those to go off. Oil leak? Eh. It's probably miniscule. Hang in there! You've been lucky with your old Rovers and they've run well. This one is not like the others. Be patient. You'll get there. I've had Nissans and Infinitis that were horrible.

[streetfish]

I'm sure you will be interested in this. I went to get my first service for my 2011 RRS HSE (only 6,300 miles on it) and during the service they found that the 'oil gallery plug' needed to be replaced because it was leaking oil. I was very surprised to say the least but I did remember reading this thread a few days earlier. So it seems that this may be a common problem - and it was actually at Prestige in NJ too so maybe they learned something from your situation. For the record, I had no idea I had a leak, and I didn't smell any coolant or experience any rough/loud idle. Got the car back last night and it runs great so far, but i only drove it 15 miles or so. Lets hope this is the last of the problems with it.

On another note, since it was a saturday and the shop closed at 12pm, they gave me a loaner until Monday night when it was finally ready. It was a brand new LR2, only 70 miles on it. I know I'm probably spoiled with my RRS, but what a stinking pile of crap car. It has zero acceleration, it very ugly inside and out, and very uncomfortable to even sit in (very narrow seats, I'm a big guy). I was dying to get my RRS back. Figures it would happen on a long weekend when I've got a lot of driving to do. I have to wonder who is even buying these LR2s, especially with the new Evoques out which are only a few thousand more. It would be nice if they gave a better loaner car - at least an LR4 or Evoque. It might help them sell a few more cars.

[gooseyloosey]

Range Lemon is probably gone. Wisked away by some other drama in her life.

But interesting to note that LR has some bad galley plugs on the new engines, or Prestige has found a new way to generate some warranty work to compensate for longer oil change intervals. Thanks for the update and time will tell if its a trend.

[dantheman1]

On another note, since it was a saturday and the shop closed at 12pm, they gave me a loaner until Monday night when it was finally ready. It was a brand new LR2, only 70 miles on it. I know I'm probably spoiled with my RRS, but what a stinking pile of crap car. It has zero acceleration, it very ugly inside and out, and very uncomfortable to even sit in (very narrow seats, I'm a big guy). I was dying to get my RRS back. Figures it would happen on a long weekend when I've got a lot of driving to do. I have to wonder who is even buying these LR2s, especially with the new Evoques out which are only a few thousand more. It would be nice if they gave a better loaner car - at least an LR4 or Evoque. It might help them sell a few more cars.

Haha absolutely true. I HATE the LR2's and their transverse engines and fwd biased 4wd system, but I'm grateful that I get a nice, clean loaner promptly. Honestly though, there are much better CUV's in that segment. LR would make a lot of money if they properly catered to it. I don't mean Evoque either, I mean something cheaper in the LR "brand".