Losing Coolant / Car wont start hot? Blown Headgasket?

[samuraichamploo]

Just got my car back from the shop after getting a new exhaust on, I have less than 10 miles on this engine/car because I only drove it for 2 days really since I am always doing work to it.
Anyways, I decided to go crusing tonight, and it started running hot.
My stock gauges dont work, but My sunpro gauge cluster had it at 250 degrees for maybe a minute before I could pull off the road (this was all city driving, no highway) I am using a clutch fan with a shroud. When I opened the radiator cap (obviously lots of steam as soon as I hit the release valve) But I was missing like half my coolant. Took 1 and 1/3 gallons of water to fill it up. I drove it home after that, And it stayed at a nice and comfortable 190 degrees for the 5 min trip back. I dont smell any coolant or anything when driving.. The only other coolant problem I ever had was a hole got punched into the upper radiator hose by rubbing against the alternator fan (That happens when U try to use a 302 rad hose on a 351w..) Anyways, any little tips or tricks I can do to check whats going on??? All the coolant that I see is still a nice green despite the fact that its primarily water and no coolant in there now... Oh and the car not starting, when I did drive it home, I shut it off, then realised I parked in my neighbors spot, So i tryed to start it and it just wont start at all... The strange part is I have a stok 302 starter in there when I have 12:1 compression. Whenever I started it earlier, it would always go vru... vru... vru... vru... then turn over. When I try to start it now, It sounds like its cranking like a high torque starter should. Very fast.

thanks in advance

 

[samuraichamploo]

Also, what damage could have been caused as a result of this? I am really hoping a worst case scenario of having to replace headgaskets and be done with it.

 

[samuraichamploo]

Oh yes, the last thing would be that the heater doesnt work, could that be related? I turned it to hot and full blast and it didnt get hot at all. A/C works fine though...

 

[RsStanG1987]

maybe your heater cor went bad. Thats very common on fox body mustangs. The heat could of cooked your starter. That happened to my crapmaro when i had it then i sold it and it wasnt my problem. Look at the heater core.

 

[seijirou]

ew that sounds bad. I hope it's just a blown headgasket, but you have defanently lost considerable compression because now the starter can turn the motor over easily. Unfortunatly you have aluminum cylinder heads so I fear you may have warped one or both. Did you let the motor cool off naturally before adding the cold water to fill it back up? If so you have a greater chance that the head itself isn't warped.
But by your description i'm 90% sure that you've lost your compression.

A bad heater core just leaks, it won't cause the air not to be hot. It only isn't hot if your climate control stuff is not working and not moving the flap over like it should. Or if there isn't coolant running through it due to blockage or shortage of coolant.

 

[samuraichamploo]

OK I just went out to the car, and I started it with no problem. It cranked maybe a little faster than normal, but otherwise it was fine. Idle was normal and everything
oil pressure at 55

 

[seijirou]

if there were no wierd noises when it was running, mebbe ya lucked out!

 

[samuraichamploo]

well thats good to hear, But where did all my coolant go????

 

[seijirou]

Have the baby pressure tested and see where she springs a leak Safer than testing through overheating again

 

[jrichker]

Do a compression test to find a bad cylinder.

If you had remained EFI, you could have done a cylinder balance test. It is much simpler than pulling all the plugs out of a warm engine to do a proper compression test.