Yellow valves

[90AWDTalon]

I blew my head gasket on the way to work this morning. I took the head off when I got home. The three cylinders that were still running after the head gasket blew all had yellow exhaust valves. What caused this to happen?

Also I have alot of carbon build up on my piston's, what's the best way to clean them?

 

[BISHILVR]

the yellow color is from the dye in the coolant that was being burnt in the engine when the gasket went bad.....

 

[Defiant]

Hm. I'd expect it was from the oil. What oil were you running?

The coolant should steam things off without leaving residue.

 

[90AWDTalon]

The one cylinder with out yellow valves was the one that was burning the coolent. I've been running Castrol GTX 20-50 and Restor. I do burn a fair amount of oil, before I got rid of my PCV valve it was probably 1 quart every 1000 miles on average. After removing the PCV its about 1 quart every 2000 miles on average.

 

[martyboss]

the one was Ok,you dont have to clean them ,but mashine schop =chek surface head have to be 100%flat ,clean top on block that is all.

 

[TSIfreek]

Yea the yellow valves are from the die in the coolant is all. My engine was also using oil also with 103k on it. I found that the stock 14b turbo seals were like sticks and not sealing and the valve guides and seals were leaking also. I have motor is apart just like yours and is getting stage 2 head work and freshened 14b by FP.
I would at least get the head rebuilt/cleaned up and use ARP head studs and eather metal or composite mistu head gasket. I have decided on going with the stock mitsu gasket because I only plan on running a ported evo 16g in the future with no more than 21 psi at the track.
I would also recomend running a full synthetic 10w30 oil. the 20w50 is hard on the motor to pump when cold and will cause more wear. ok on an all out 9000 rpm race motor but on a fast street car you wil loose 5 hp just by the oil pump trying to pump that heavy oil and will also loose MPG does more harm than good on the street.
I highly recomend a full synthetic mobil 1, or amsoil, royal purple, RL 10w30 is all you will need.

 

[kpt4321]

the one was Ok,you dont have to clean them ,but mashine schop =chek surface head have to be 100%flat ,clean top on block that is all.

English would be nice, please.

 

[kpt4321]

Since the only cylinder that did NOT have yellow valves was the one that was burning coolant, it wouldn't make sense that the coolant was making the valves yellow.

I wouldn't worry about it too much. Get a motor in there that doesn't suck, and it will be fine.

You can scrape the carbon off with a screwdriver. Make sure you clean and lube the cylinder walls after you are done.

 

[90AWDTalon]

I wouldn't worry about it too much. Get a motor in there that doesn't suck, and it will be fine.

Are you saying my motor sucks? Why?

 

[BISHILVR]

trust me here the yellow is from coolant burning...pulled apart plenty of motors with internal coolant loss problems and it's common.....if you don't buy it just ask your machine shop if i'm bs'ing you or not....as for the other cylinder that you think was the one burning the coolant....thats the one thats burning the majority of your oil...when oil is burned it leaves a black carbon mess on the chamber just like it looks in that one cylinder....when the cylinder is burning clean it leaves a white carbon residue on the valves and then when coolant hits it it leaves it's green/yellow dye tint on the white carbon deposits leaving the yellow looking valves you are see'ing....

 

[90AWDTalon]

I took the turbine houseing and o2 housing off since the car isn't running for now so I could do someporting to get rid of my boost creep. I noticed that the o2 housing side of the turbine housing was also yellow.

Also check out that crack, this turbo barely a year old.

 

[BISHILVR]

as i said...........................................

 

[90AWDTalon]

The cylinder that wasn't yellow wasn't running, I figured this was because of the blown head gasket. After taking the head off that cylinder was the only one that had an obvious spot that was blown. The gasket was blown all the way to one of the coolent ports. If the yellow is from coolent how did it into the other three cylinder's? The cylinder that's not yellow wasn't firing so it couldn't burn the coolent in the cylinder, that kind of makes sense, but not the other three.

 

[BISHILVR]

when the head gasket blows and a cylinder fills up with coolant, the coolant can "back up" into the intake manifold when the intake valves for that cylinder open and then the other cylinders draw the coolant in on they're intake stroke and burn it....also when you blow a head gasket you end up with compression (in this case prob 150 or so lbs) in the blocks water jacket which will then blow the head gasket to all of the other cylinders since the head gasket was never meant to seal 150 lbs of coolant from getting "into" the cylinders along with the original 150 lbs of compression on the other side of the head gasket trying to get "out" of the cylinders....and i'm sure if you think you can find a ton of other ways for the coolant to migrate into the other cylinders......

 

[90AWDTalon]

That makes more sense now.