Hi all, I'm a new member here with a North American 2003 Montero Limited with around 150K Kms. The car has been in the family since we bought it brand new and has been my dad's daily driver for 20 years and our part-time work vehicle.
Recently the car has been acting up, most likely due to being neglected.

Some problems I've noticed recently was the temperature gauge shooting up past the highest point within 10 minutes of driving it. I would shut off the car in-attempt to let it cool down. It would drop down a bit and I would continue driving.
--> I checked the fan and coolant levels, everything seems to be in order. What could be the issue?

Also, please watch the video as you can hear the engine noise which includes a loud humming noise, squeaking, and even ticking sound.
I told my dad to immediately stop driving the car and use our other car for the time being.

I'm hoping someone of this forum can give me some insight as to what the main issues are and what I should be expecting to replace as we plan on keeping this car.
I know it's quite difficult to diagnose issues through a video, but I really want to get some opinions from fellow Montero/Pajero owners before I take it to a technician.

Thank you all in advance!

 

Hello Stewiedcat,
The issues you are observing are somewhat common on Monteros.
1. Temperature gauge - that is just electronics malfunctioning. The engine is not overheating. It sucks and very unnerving to see the temp gauge climb past High... Makes your palms sweat in anticipation of a catastrophe. You can calm yourself down if you have a OBDII reader that can stream live data. Set it to show Engine Temperature and you will see that the gauge on the dashboard is showing erroneous data. There are two temp sensors on this system. One feds directly to the ECM unit, and the other to the dashboard. The problem is that there is a defect in the dashboard circuitry that results in displaying incorrect data. You can fix it by sending the dashboard to an electronics repair shop (expensive) or by fixing it yourself (cheap but risky).
But in reality the engine temp is most likely running exactly where it needs to be.
2. The noise on the video makes me think that it is coming from a bad serpentine belt and one or two bad idler pulleys. The clicking noise was definitely a pulley. I can't tell you which one. There are two idler pulleys there plus a tensioner pulley. Most likely it is one of the idler ones. You can take off the serpentine belt and wiggle and spin idler pulleys to see which one is loose and making the noise. Relatively easy and inexpensive fix.

 

FYI, If the engine is overheating, turn the heat on full blast (fan and temp) this will help cool it down. No A/C.

 

My 2001 Limited had the same issue with the temp gauge. Here's the post I used to fix it. It has been fine since, well over 4 years now.

https://www.pajero.guru/how-to-fix-the-faulty-temp-gauge-on-a-pajeroshogunmontero-nm-2001-1003/