Head Gasket, burnt up revistied

[Guest]

As you all know, I had a problem with my car after running it with no water, All the while I was having problems with the high temp. Pulled the heads yesterday and found that the rear pistons on each side were clean as new. The head gasket was trickling water into the cylinders all the while.It did not start missing until recently, The block is in great shape and the heads are at the machine shop now being reworked. Both gaskets leaking at the rear what does this mean? That they were defective? The mechanic said it was an easy fix so I guess I will be riding again soon.

[JohnG]

RE: Head Gasket, burnt up revistied

The leaks occured due to the considerable temperature that the motor underwent while it had no coolant in it. All the parts possibly distorted and the seal between the gaskets and the two surfaces (block and heads) was broken, allowing water to work its way by. They had probably been doing a good job for tens of thousands of miles until that happened. With a little luck, the distortion went away when things cooled but the sealing ability of the gaskets was gone.


The questions you haven't addressed are whether the heads have been checked for flatness and cracks. Flatness would be check on a perfectly flat surface with a feeler gauge. The shop manual has the specs on what is unacceptable and requires planing. The cracks are revealed with "magnafluxing", a pretty standard procedure.

Make sure and use Fel-Pro head gaskets and intake gaskets so they don't have to be re-torqued.

While the heads are off perhaps think about replacing the seals on the valve guides? Easy and cheap to do now, hard later.

[Guest]

RE: Head Gasket, burnt up revistied

Thanks john, The engine was rebuilt in December so it did not have 500 miles on it as of yet, I just left the machine shop that rebuilt the motor and they flow checked it, checked for cracks and made sure it was still true. They said everything thing was ok and yes I do have the felpro gaskets. The car should be back together tomoorw night. Since the season is over I am in no hurry. I am only sorry that I did such a thing, however there is a bright side to the story, the water passages in the rear of the block had some blockage due to the old radiator, they cleared that, now that I have a newly cored radiator with new heads and gaskets it will run just as good or better. My intake in the front and the back of the motor was leaking oil a steady small stream that's another reason I was glad to go back into the motor now it will be sealed up tight. I ordered one of those high voltage coils so I could gap my plugs wide, When I first got the car out the shop it ran like a bat out of **** now it will run that way again. now to carlise on friday for some new carpet! ;-)