blown head?

[stryker979]

For the past couple days, after driving my car for about 5-10 mins, I started to notice that the temp was increasing rapidly. I checked all fluids,etc. asap. Everything seemed fine so I made an appointment at the mechanic. Today he told me that my head gasket had blown and that the head itself might be blown, he said most likely it is considering in his experience this is a frequent problem with this engine. What do you guys think as to the probability of a blown head? The quote he gave me for replacing just the head gasket was around 1800 which I think is way to steep in itself. I am gonna get some more quotes but its gonna be a pain in the ass because I will have to have the car towed around to diff shops, if the head is indeed broken I know it is gonna cost a good deal. What do you guys think? I'm in college and don't have that type of money so as of now I really don't know what is gonna end up happening.

 

[oldman]

Humm...Let start with what he told you in detail why he thinks the head is blown. What tests and results did he run to come to that conclusion. Too bad you don't have the car so we help you can run some tests. In any case $1800 is toooo much.

 

[stryker979]

He ran a CO2 test and said the liquid immediately came back green, i think indicating a leak of some sort. He thinks the head is cracked because the car temp went into the red zone, which it did. He says the gasket is blown for certain which is believable. The head needs to be sent away for testing to see if it is indeed cracked. I had to get the car towed to the mechanic because as I was driving it there, couldn't have been more than a mile, it shut down and engine started smoking a little. When i tried to turn on the heat, it wouldn't work, cold air came through when the engine was clearly heating up prior to it shutting down. There was also a kind of knocking sound as I accelerated the car. All this happened very rapidly as the car had shown no signs of trouble previously, it just started to heat up a little about 2 days ago and then today shut down while goin to the mechanic.

 

[oldman]

Ask him to do a compression and leak down test. Was your car smoking when you last drive it? Are you loosing oil/coolant? Are they mixing? Maybe it's as simple as thermostate or fans but I'm familiar with CO2 test so some one else would have to pitch in on that.