Mini One Diesel 2004 - Cooling system help

[darbydoo]

Hi everyone
I have a 2004 mini one diesel, around 108,000 on the clock and am experiencing problems for the first time.

These include:

- heaters blowing cold air
- bubbling in coolant bottle (froths over when you open it)
- engine fan comes on almost straight away
-Squeaking noise from engine
- overheat once last week

From reading this forum, it could either be the head gasket, thermostat or radiator causing the issue.

Obviously would like to test the cheapest thing first - thermostat, but how do you get it out to test? My brother is a VW mechanic and is looking at it, but obviously not being a mini specialist, this is proving to be a bit of a challenge. Do you have to take the whole front-end off? At this rate it would take him hours just to do that.

any help appreciated!