Do i need a headgasket

[davetheman81]

Hey all, you guys are always very helpfull. first off the vehical is a bone stock 1992 talon tsi awd 6 bolt. My car was running great untill recently when i lost my power steering and alternator belt on the highway, it over heated and the over flow cap poped off. I towed thecar home and replaced the belts, and well i was at it, installed a vr speed fmic, new coolent, oil and filter, and bov. Let the car warm up, and drove it easy, it drove great felt great, never over heated, idles great, then added some boost and it pulled great too. The next day i took it out and when boosting full and shifting from 2-3 at 6 k i noticed smoke everywere, so i pulled over shut the car off and noticed 2 things, the over flow cap again is off, and the oil dip stick is up about .5 inch, and oil sprayed everywere. I fixed it all and continued driving, everythingfine untill the next day i made a pull and at wot the same thing happened. The next day i replaced the thermostat and put a spring on the oil dip stick, and relocated the overflow bottle, no smoke any more, still never over heats, no oil in coolent or vise versa. Here is the weird part, even with the car stone cold and with the thermostat closed, the coolent violently bubbles and erupts out of the waterneck when you start it and let it warm up the radiator cap off, and give it any throttle it comes out harder, could this be compression bloeing in to a water channel? I plan on doing a comp test on sunday, but i do not have a leak down tester. Should i do the comp test with the radiator cap off and look for bubbles?

 

[Ronnienormand]

•Maybe I'm misunderstanding, but if you see coolant leaking from the water pump, I would pressure-test it and pinpoint the leak and fix that first; oil seepage isn't necessarily abnormal.


•Typical symptoms of a blown head gasket may include these: bubbles of air coming up into your radiator (remove cap before starting); a leaking radiator; milkshake-colored oil; overheating; rough running; coolant or oil running from head; spark plug(s) that have a green tint (if green coolant); white-colored or sweet-smelling exhaust.
•White smoke from your tail pipe, or loosing coolant through your overflow. Take the cap off and rev the engine: if you see bubbles, or if it comes out, you'll know.


•A blown head gasket will leave a dark smell in the radiator. And you will have high back pressure coming though your radiator cap.

Take your car to a radiator shop to have a detector installed: If the blue liquid inside a "bulb" turns yellow, you have a leak.

Beware that if you drive for too long and it overheats, a blown engine will be your outcome.


•One of the signs is if the car is smoking really badly.


•A blown head gasket can go out in different areas causing different symptoms. Do a compression test to give you some idea. Don't confuse low compression for a bad head gasket, though. A bad valve can lower compression. And a bad ring. There's no straight simple answer to this question.

There are lots of clues you can look for. When in doubt and you have tried everthing, have the head checked out by a well-established machine shop first, to see if the head was the problem. This way you're not wasting your time replacing the gasket.


•My car once had a blown head gasket. I had a great deal of coolant loss. The engine lacked power and ran poorly. It had white smoke coming out the tail pipe. And it overheated very quickly. Also, it had water in the oil.

A quick way to check: Look at your spark plugs; if coolant squirts out, you definitely have a blown head gasket!


•Low compression does not necessarily mean a blown head gasket, but it is a good indicator if there is a sharp drop in compression on one or two cylinders, with no drop in the others. Sometimes a blown head gasket will cause a whistling or wheezing sound, but not always. It will not always cause water to enter the oil - or oil to enter the water - but they are signs to look for. Overheating will almost always occur, due to the exhaust entering the coolant. Check your overflow bottle for exhaust smells. Watch for bubbles or overflow of coolant from the radiator while running the engine. Check for muddy gray-looking oil or bubbles on the dipstick.

Does the car idle rougher than normal?


•Often (but not always), a blown head gasket will also cause deposit of water on a piece of cardboard held an inch from the tailpipe output while the engine is running (when this is happening, it is likely that the catalytic converter has been ruined and the muffler will corrode in short order as well). Sometimes drops of water will be seen dropping from the end of the tailpipe.

Another clue: Turn on the heater; often when the head gasket is blown an odor of antifreeze and synthetic rubber will emanate from the heater vents.


•Many of the symptoms of a blown head gasket can be caused by some other problem in the cooling system, without the head gasket being damaged. Conversely, other problems with the cooling system can cause a blown head gasket and/or warped head.

For example, a corroding radiator can send chunks of rust through the cooling system which take out the thermostat and water pump. If the thermostat is old, sticking and corroding, it can send those chunks through the system and take out the water pump or cause a blockage in the radiator, etc.


•Radiator leaks can be the primary cause, or a result, of failures in other cooling system components.


•Don't keep driving with the car overheated, especially if your engine has an aluminum head; you are likely to warp it. If it is warped beyond a certain tolerance, it cannot be planed and will have to be replaced when the head gasket is replaced.


•Also, although a head gasket job is beyond the ability of most non-mechanics, replacing a radiator, water pump and thermostat are fairly easy jobs in many vehicles for a good shade-tree mechanic friend willing to do them for the cost of parts. A buddy just replaced those three components for me, walking me through the process. Although it took 4 hours, the total cost for all parts (new) was $222, and it was not very difficult. He had access to parts at a discount, but even if he had not been able to get them at low cost, a bundle of labor charges was saved.


•One of the most common tell-tale signs is a milky-gray ring around your oil cap. When coolant enters the engine oil through a crack in the head or through a blown gasket, it evaporates and leaves a milky ring around the oil cap.

Another easy way to tell is to check your oil dipstick. Change your oil and pull out the dipstick. Make sure that you take note of how far up the dipstick the oil is. Top off your cooling system and fill your cooling reservoir to the top. Screw radiator cap back on and start engine. Run engine for about 20-30 mins. or until it reaches normal operating temperature. Allow engine to cool (engine must cool completely to get accurate oil reading). Check oil dipstick again. If the oil has a watery appearance and has risen noticeably up the dipstick, the you probably have a blown head gasket or a warped head.

A third hint is to look for a dripping, sweet-smelling liquid coming out of your tailpipe. Any of the above symptoms could be the result of a blown head gasket.

The easiest way to tell is with a compression meter. This replaces the spark plug and lets you know what compression each cylinder is running at. If your compression is abnormally low, then you have a blown head gasket or a warped head. (Note: check the repair manual for appropriate compression of each cylinder.)


•In most cases, you will either get water in your oil (or oil in the water), but water in the oil is most common. If your oil is milky looking, then that is probably the problem. However, you can blow a head gasket between cylinder and this is harder to tell but 2 cylinders next to one another will have low compression, but this would require some testing and tools.


•This can be detected in a variety of ways: One way is to note whether that part of the engine block is leaking fluid. This is difficult to determine since there are many other parts of the engine nearby that can also leak fluids, especially when a vehicle is parked in one place for more than a few hours. One of the best indications of a blown, or nearly blown, head gasket in most automobiles is when the cooling system appears to be malfunctioning. The cooling system's efficiency and performance can be directly affected by the quality of the head gasket.


•Water in the oil oil in the water white smoke (steam) from the tailpipe... This site has an abundance of info on the subject RxAuto Head Gasket Repair | Blown Head Gasket | Call 1-866-780-9042


•If your radiator is getting low on water often, this is a sign. The water could be discharged through the tailpipe on your automobile. Another sign is if your car motor has a miss in the engine. The water could be going in on top of the cylinders. This will foul the plugs and cause it to miss.


•It will start missing and white smoke will come out of the exhaust.


•There are a few simple indicators you can check for with the engine cold and not running: 1) contaminated oil - it will have a milky appearance from the water mixing in the oill 2) oil on the top of the coolant inside the radiator (if your vehicle has a remote header tank you may not get this); 3) Have someone crank (remove the coil lead or disable the elcectronic ignition) the engine on the starter with the radiator cap or coolant jacket bleed hose/bolt removed. If the coolant pulses up and down or blows bubbles, you could be in trouble.

If you find any of these symptoms move on to removing the spark plugs (label the plugs and the leads as you remove them, so you can put them back in the same place) and again crank the engine on the starter. Depending on how badly your head or gasket is gone, you may get coolant or oil coming out of the plug holes. Inspection of the plugs will also reveal problems during combustion: if you have rusty flaky deposits on the plugs, you may be burning off water; and if you have a heavy carbon, you are burning oil.

If you have any of the first 3 items listed (water in oil, oil in water, or pulsing coolant - but dont get any result from checking the plugs) change the oil and water as appropriate, then warm up the engine without the radiator cap on (or the bleeder hose/bolt) and watch for bubbles as the engine warms up. Put tha cap back on the cooling system and take the vehicle for a short drive, or run the engine till the entire system is up to temperature and then check the oil for contamination.

Having these symptoms is not always indicative of a blown head gasket; usually if the gasket is gone, there is going to be some warping of the head and or block of the engine.

There are a few other things that can give similar symptoms to the ones listed above 1. internal damage to water/oil galleries 2. damage to oil/water inter coolers if fitted 3. weakened hoses on the cooling system can cause pulsations in the coolant 4. leaking valve seals may drop oil into the chamebers 5. poorly bleed cooling systems or systems where there are high loops in the coolant jacket may have some bubbling.


•Visual inspection of the head and gasket, involving major engine disassembly.


•Check your oil. If the oil on the dipstick looks like chocolate milk, then there's water in it, and this is the surest sign of a blown head gasket or a cracked engine block.

Check your radiator coolant. If it looks brownish and foamy, that usually means there's oil in your cooling system, which is another sign that a severe breakdown has occurred.

Visually inspect the engine for leakages of an oil/water mix.

Loss of engine coolant with no external leaks, a continuous stream of bubbles can be seen with the radiator cap off, black gummy and sometimes crusty stuff around the radiator filler neck.

White smoke coming from your tail pipe, and the smell of anti freeze.


•Usually, white-color smoke coming out of your exhaust pipe is a good indicator.


There is some stuff you can get from your local parts store that can fix it if its not a major problem

 

[Saturdee]

Yeah you'll want to replace the headgasket for sure. Bubbles is a good sign it's bad. I actually did the exact same thing during winter, temp guage was maxed out and everything. I got it towed home, put the new belt on, and looked for any problems but luckily I didn't have any. You could have warped your head, and might have to get it resurfaced, MAYBE. Get a new headgasket, and go from there.

http://www.dsmtuners.com/forums/new...ly-drove-while-overheated-little-worried.html

Here's my old thread, you can check it out for any similarities. This was back when I first got my car, and new nothing about it .



Ronnienormand, I really hope you copy and pasted that. Good lord

 

[Deadpool]

I just did about the same thing with my summer daily Z28 Camaro

Now my weekend plans are changing 2 head gaskets on it. Figure I will get both while I am at it and it gives me an excuse to put on it's new heads.

 

[davetheman81]

thans for all the help, im going to get an mls head gasket, arp head studs, oem timimg belt, water pump, and tensioner, as well as all new exhuast manifod and intake manifold gaskets, and well the head is off, ill have some 272's installed with new cam seals, it only makes sence to do it all at once

 

[blackGSX2g]

thans for all the help, im going to get an mls head gasket, arp head studs, oem timimg belt, water pump, and tensioner, as well as all new exhuast manifod and intake manifold gaskets, and well the head is off, ill have some 272's installed with new cam seals, it only makes sence to do it all at once

Typically you will want to have the block & head resurfaced and let the machine shop doing the work know you will be using a metal headgasket. I've never had good luck with metal headgaskets holding high boost at the track, but know people that have never had an issue.

I usually recommend a set of ARPs, a good resurface, and the factory composite gasket for people who are just rebuilding the head.

 

[Tfitch90]

Use gates racing timing belt. Hell you might as well go all out with it now.

Thanks for the edit. Im still trying to get used to not using chat slang.