Fix? Or scrap and buy new?

Hi guys,
it's been a long while since I have put anything up here. I have a bit of a dilemma and would appreciate everyones views. I have a GU ZD30 and have owned it for about 6 or so years. I have done a bit of work to it with general repairs and maintenance as well as slowly getting ready to do some decent camping with. Unfortunately the motor was a grenade and and the head cracked and starting leaking coolant into the cylinders. My options are to replace the motor with either the same motor or upgrade the motor to a td42 (provided I can actually find a reco engine, I have absolutely no idea where to even look for a reco motor). Or I can scrap it and sell it for parts and buy another car. If I buy another car it will probably be completely different and not a Nissan at all. At this point in time I am leaning towards a new car. What are everyones thoughts?

There was a bloke in Melbourne doing recos. 0400 033 377 I don't know if he's still doing it. Freight to QL might be too high, but Readies of Bendigo sometimes have good ZD's that are taken out for conversions to the TD42.

Personally, if I lived somewhere in lower QLD near some legally accessible beaches/driveable islands and had an emotional attachment to my current GU tight/best drivetrain would consider an LS1 petrol conversion for near the same price professionally converted as a TD4.2 variant + HP truly needed beach mods.
Decent old faithful pre-2006/7 replacement 4.2 donks are becoming too rare yet would personally pay the price for torquey mountain adventures or long reliable outback needs if required?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Depends how much you like your Patrol (other than it’s motor). I’m lucky in that mine has a TD42 motor, but that aside, having owned it for almost 10 years, & toured in it for the past 3, I’d have to say that it’s a car I love. It is so capable off road, still feels solid as a rock after lots of outback kilometres & I trust it. At 230k it’s not even middle aged yet. With the TD42i it is no race car, but with it’s 3” exhaust & a modest tune it is a pleasure to drive. Every time I hop out of the newer dual cab Hilux here & get back into the Patrol the sense of solid-ness feels luxurious (even though it’s a leaf spring DX). It’s not perfect but is pretty damn good.