? re: blown head gasket and repair options

jaymac

jaymac

New Member
Feb 18, 2004
995
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Northern Mass
#1
So I believe I blew my head gasket at the track last night (on my personal best 13.6 pass :D ).
There's water (and a little white gunk) on my oil dipstick, but no smoke from my pipes. This morning I put about 30 oz. of water in, between the rad. and the overflow tank, to bring the coolant back up to snuff. On a slow 20 min. drive to work, it hasn't overheated, and is holding steady @ 180*.

Obviously I'm pretty positive it's a blown head gasket.
Of course I want to replace the gasket(s), but I don't think I can make the time this weekend, but it's my daily driver :owned:
I want to run a bottle of that "head gasket repair" stuff, and see if that will suffice for the next week or two.

Now, how much damage is every mile I drive doing to my car if there's coolant in the oil??

I should change the oil as soon as I finish doing that "stop leak" stuff, right?
Or should I change it WHILE I do the stop leak stuff, or what?
Worse comes to worst, I "MIGHT" be able to replace gaskets this weekend, but it will be hard-pressed to impossible,espeially since all my friends will be @ Fun Ford Weekend, and not around to help me :(

Anyhow, thanks for any advice!
 
#2
You will ruin your water pump, radiator, and heater core with that stuff. I recommend checking to see how bad your head gasket problem is first, and then, limit your driving. Sometimes you can get away with it for a little while. Stop leak is one of the worst things you can use.
 
#3
:damnit:
not exactly the fairy-tale ending I was hoping for, I suppose....
Oh well, better safe than sorry!
So, how do I find out? Will acompression test be sufficient, or pull plugs, or what?
Order of Operations, anyone?
 
#5
It depends on how badly the head gasket it blown. I think changing the oil, leaving the filter alone, is a good idea because you will see how much water actually got into the oil. Then just fill it back up temporarily with the cheapest oil you can find. Also, if you can, do a compression test and make sure that you do have a blown head gasket. Why are you so sure? Is it using water? ...or was the dipstick that bad? In any event, if you still plan to drive for a while, the cheapie oil change is probably your best bet. I would recommend not driving it but if it's your only car then I suppose you gotta do what ya gotta do.
 
#7
hypothetically speaking, how olng could it take to ruin bearings (not that I'm feeling lucky or anything.)
I'm waiting for the headers to cool right now so I can do the compression test.
There are beads of water all the way up the dipstick, and if you remove the dipstick when it's hot, there is an audible escape of steam. It's staying relatively steady in temp, around 180-190*, and I'm babying it as much as possible.
If I have to, I'll get it changed this weekend. :(

By the way, what are the values I'm looking for in a leakdown test?
 
#8
update: took off my oil filler neck cap cuz I saw water around it, and the whole inside of the neck is covered in this yellow snot-mucus thick slime.
This is bad I assume.
I am not driving it anymore, and am planning on a swap this weekend.
Anything else I should know/ check?
 
#9
Sounds like you have the hard part done (diagnosing the problem).

Now all that is left is to stock up on oil, a filter, a set of head/intake gaskets, a case of Mountain Dew, and pull an all nighter to get the daily driver back up for work the next day.:nice:

Sorry to hear about your troubles

I wish you luck.
jason
 
#10
Thanks jason. I'm picking up 10 qts. of cheap oil to flush out as much sludge as I can today, starting to disassemble, then picking up head and lower intake gaskets and working little by little for the next 3 days to get it done...
Now I'm just hoping there's no damage to the heads/ block!!
 
#12
well, thankfully, there was not much water in the oil when I drained it- very little, really. It looks like most of it blew through the gaskets and onto the block/ accessories and eveything around it, so that's a good sign, right???
I started disassembly last night, today I'll pick up parts and have at it!!
God, I hope everything goes smoothly (as can be expected...)
I'll keep you updated!
 
#15
Good Luck Jaymac, let us know how it goes.



2002BLGT said:
ARP head bolts and 9333PT-1 felpro gaskets instead of the 8548PT-2 the 9333 gaskets are for the old 289 high performance engines and I have had alot better luck with those !!!!!!!!!
Click to expand...

This is a good peice of info, thanks.
Do you know the difference between the head gaskets? Is it primarily due to different materials, or what?
 
#16
update

OK, so it's all buttoned up>
Before I took it apart, I drained the oil and put in new oil ( not too much coolant in the oil, though).Than after the swap, I ran the oil briefly, then drained it and put in new oil, then ran for 10 min and drained that, and put in new oil and filter.
There is still an infinitessimle (super-tiny) amount of "condensation" along thetop edge of the dipstick. It almost looks like leftover condensation from inside the dipstick tube. But there is absolutely no water bubbles in the oil itself on the dipstick.
It doesn't appear to be using water (which I will keep a religious eye on anyway!), and the temp is holding steady right above 180*. I am, however, going to replace the fan clutch today, as mine wobbles and might contribute to overheating.

1.) Should I change the oil again to try to get rid of any more possible oil? When?

2.) Do you think lack of a dyno tune for proper a/f ratio could've caused head gasket-blowing conditions?
Beacuse otherwise, it's a low-horsepower, non-boosted, newly-gasketed motor that blew a gasket on a mid-13 sec. pass.
Any way to get some insight as to how it happened so it doesn't happen again? Perhaps the "blow pattern" on the gasket might help diagnose??
 
#17
Sometimes gaskets just let go... Especially if you miss a shift or powershift.

It's good to hear that you got it all back together though. Maybe this time, recheck the torque of the head bolts before you go to the track?
 
#18
srothfuss said:
Sometimes gaskets just let go... Especially if you miss a shift or powershift.

It's good to hear that you got it all back together though. Maybe this time, recheck the torque of the head bolts before you go to the track?
Click to expand...
yeah, but on an AOD, (no powershifting or missed shifts) what would cause that??

I will definitely check all the bolts again before I even go WOT....
 
#20
It blew above #7.
It started from a tiny (coolant?) hole above and to the right of #7 (between 7 & 8). It blew a line above the cylinder, and into the lifter valley, however it did not tear into or from the cylinder itself.
I was using ARP head bolts w/ ARP moly lube on the top and thread sealer on the top. They were torqued to 75 on top and bottom. Someone else applied the lube and sealer, so I don't know how much they used.
I did it this time, so I used a thorough coating of lube and selaer. i torqued the uppers to 65 (SPECIFIC instructions from ARP for use w/ their ARP moly lube), and the lowers to 72.
I will re-torque them in about 50 more miles.
Any thoughts?
 
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