Head gasket replacement

[Brodie320]

Hi, i suspect my car of having a blown head gasket, replaced rad cap, checked thermostat, wasnt one in there, white smoke from the exhaust. pushing all off the water out under load..as an example i left rad cap off and reved to 5000 for a few minutes and it just started fountaining in big loads...and seems to be pushing it all out the overflow when on the move.

Is it more cost effective to replace the engine with a second hand engine? or to remove the engine and replace head gaskets and replace a few other things while its out?..

Has anyone done a head gasket replacement tutorial? or rebuild tutorial for this engine?

[Nick Mann]

You get a lot of white smoke from these cars as they are warming up, especially if you just warm on idle. If it is still smoking after a good blast then it is not normal.
The coolant will fountain out of the radiator cap if you rev the car with the cap off. The coolant will reach boiling point without being under pressure. The pressure with the cap on raises the boiling point.
A coolant leak in one of the many hoses around the engine bay could explain your loss of coolant too so thoroughly check that it is the head gasket before you start down that road.
In the UK the gasket set is similar or slightly more than a second hand engine. The labour cost is more to rebuild than swap. I don't know if that is the same in NZ.

[Davezj]

You get a lot of white smoke from these cars as they are warming up, especially if you just warm on idle. If it is still smoking after a good blast then it is not normal.
The coolant will fountain out of the radiator cap if you rev the car with the cap off. The coolant will reach boiling point without being under pressure. The pressure with the cap on raises the boiling point.
A coolant leak in one of the many hoses around the engine bay could explain your loss of coolant too so thoroughly check that it is the head gasket before you start down that road.
In the UK the gasket set is similar or slightly more than a second hand engine. The labour cost is more to rebuild than swap. I don't know if that is the same in NZ.

Good answer nick
i agree with what nick has said.

[Brodie320]

Thanks for the reply, i put a bottle on the end of the overflow hose going into the engine bay and took it for a drive up a big hill...checked it afterwards and it had pushed water into the bottle.... got radiator checked the other day..have about 3 leaks..could the leaky radiator explain this?...have talked with mechanics, about 5 of them actually and they all seem to think that its a blown head gasket..

[adaxo]

If someone b4 you (not sure how long you have this car?) drive it with leaky rad then there's a big chance it was running without or very low water then yes HG failure could happen.

[veegeeta]

mine always pushed water out of overflow and i myself had tried everything from caps, thermostates radiator ,hoses ect. last job was to do head gaskets when i pulled of the heads i found that rubber like a bike tube was blocking the water ports in block and head on the rear bank . there for it would build up pressure in the cooling system and push all the water out of the overflow. My head gaskets were all fine they are steel but i bought new ones anyway. I had the heads pressure and crack tested and all were fine . so cleaned out the pesky rubber put all back together with arp head studs and i have no more problem. Now im not saying that this is your problem but if some one before you used cheap hoses sometimes they have a inner skin that comes off and blocks up the water ports. I read a lot on people having heating issues with these cars problem is they dont usually go as far as i did and find the problem they just replace the engine. I seem to be the only one that has found the problem and fixed it. might be something to look into. good luck

[elnevio]

Has any longlife coolant (usually the pink OAT stuff) been mixed with the standard glycol antifreeze? This can cause sludging/blockages.

[Brodie320]

Im going to replace the radiator and see if it makes a difference, if that doesnt fix it i will be buying a replacement engine to run in it for now and will work on the other engine while it is out....any tutorials of head removal?

[billybobboot]

Just do a sniff test can buy a kit for about £20- £40 a nice local garage may do it for free if you just ask them to do a sniff test nothing elts.

[Brodie320]

bit of an update on this..i ended up replacing the radiator, fixed the problem for a week or two, then just started doing the same thing again..driving up a big hill it will overheat under load...i think im going to have a go at replacing the head gaskets, the car is now being built into a cheap track / clubday car and some theifs set the interior on fire and ruined it...car now has no interior installed and will get a manual conversion and whatnot...first thing is to replace the headgaskets, are there any tutorials on this?...i never seem to get an answer on that question lol..asked it twice already.

[Brodie320]

quick note to add...i am not using any coolant at the moment. just tap water as i wanted to test it before wasting a mixture of coolant...this wouldnt make a huge difference would it?

[elnevio]

Corrosion can start occurring surprisingly quickly, which is especially bad for the small bore waterways in the block.

Because of the price of an engine gasket set, most of those folk needing it have often opted to change the whole engine instead.

Although we have many articles in the members' area covering almost every aspect, head removal isn't in there AFAIK, though there are perhaps a few posts here and there about things like head bolt reuse and torquing instructions.