Headgasket? Or something worse.....

[2g 6 bolt swap]

Ok so i get in my car today after a long night of putting my car back together from an injector swap. I originally had 550s in my car and was tuned at 25psi on my 16g. So doing a couple pulls i was obviously running rich so i turned my afc down some on my high throttles. The third pull my UEGO read like 11.0 at the highest and then all of a sudden my felt like it lost power around 5k so i left off by putting the clutch in and it died. Coasted the car for about 50 feet then let the clutch back out and it was just pouring out pure white smoke. After i saw that i instantly turned it back off and pulled the car over asap. Now after this mishap my car only started giving it gas and once it started it was smoking horribly at idle. No abnormal noises are coming from the motor but it wont stay running without me giving it gas. Got the car towed to my house and went to town on the motor. Pulled the head off and found coolant on top of my pistions. But for some odd reason i found no cracks or pin holes in the hg. Motor has almost 8k on stock rebuild. There is no reason why my block or head would be warped either because my car has never over heated. Also checked inside of the valves to see if they had coolant on them and they were absolutely dry.

 

[SpeedAddict62]

Well its definitely the headgasket...no question there. If your cylinder is full of coolant, it isn't coming from anywhere else. It could have been from improper installation of the gasket, or even lifting the head.

More details are needed though: do you have a logger of some sort? You say you have a UEGO, but that isn't in your profile. What headgasket was it? Stock head bolts or ARPs? You can't be sure that the head/block are straight just because they "should" - take a straight edge and check them for flatness.

 

[2g 6 bolt swap]

Oh yeah sorry i forgot to update my profile. My UEGO is from AEMS just to let ya know. The head gasket that was put on there when my rebuild was done is just the OEM organic one. I also have arps, but the thing i absolutely dont get is that the head gasket itself looks fine.... but yet again you said something about the head lifting. I just took a flat edge to both my block and my head. Block is fine... but the head possibly looked alittle raised toword the middle of it. If i just slap an OEM one back on there without getting my head decked will it be ok? I want to upgrade to a metal headgasket but have heard of sealing issue. What would have caused my headgasket to go out so fast after my rebuild? Could high boost levels have anything to do with it? Bad timing cause this?

 

[SpeedAddict62]

Well the head lifting would be more likely with the stock head bolts...not ARPs. What were they torqued to when you installed them?

Yes, you can throw another OEM one on there and you should be ok, but I'm sure you would feel better knowing what happened to the last one. Were you getting knock at all (or do you know if you were)? I just realized, are you compensating for 850s with just an AFC? Your timing has to be insanely high.

Yes, the general consensus is here that if you want to run a MLS gasket, you really need to get the surfaces machined. Ordinarly, 25 psi shouldn't be a problem with a stock gasket and ARPs, but if I were to take a guess at what caused the leaking I would say it is a combination of running 25 psi + 850s controlled by an AFC (no timing control). High timing would lead to high cylinder pressures and an increased risk of knock, which would also create some very high cylinder pressures.

My advice at this point would be this: get another OEM gasket, make sure its installed properly (ARPs to 80 ft lbs with moly lube). Turn the boost down, and get something to log with. Ideally, you would get something that could adjust the injector compensation without messing with the timing, and give you full control of the timing tables.

Edit: and one more thing - search the forums for "headgasket" and you'll get more threads than you know what to do with. Most say the same thing: OEM composite or MLS (for more power) and ARPs.

 

[anteversion]

I will guess more on the turbo seals

 

[anteversion]

coolant is coming from the head lift.

 

[2g 6 bolt swap]

How could the head lift have anything to do with coolant in on top of my pistons and i have oil in my coolant. Im going to get an MLS OEM replacement metal head gasket tomorrow. Im going to put everything back together and then run a compression test first to see if i have other issues. I will update everyone tomorrow afternoon once i get it back together. Thanks for the heip.

 

[SpeedAddict62]

How could the head lift have anything to do with coolant in on top of my pistons and i have oil in my coolant. Im going to get an MLS OEM replacement metal head gasket tomorrow. Im going to put everything back together and then run a compression test first to see if i have other issues. I will update everyone tomorrow afternoon once i get it back together. Thanks for the heip.

Because the head lifting would cause the same problems as a blown headgasket. Basically you overcome the force provided by the head studs and the headgasket can no longer seal. So you have oil in your coolant, coolant in your cylinder, etc. Oil, coolant, and air/fuel charge are free to mix with each other.

You are going to use a MLS without a resurface?