SumDumbGuy

Ok, I've been scratching my head and I need some ideas before I start tearing the motor apart.
I put a fresh 327 in my Camaro about a month ago and it's losing water. I found that the heater core was leaking and leaving my passenger side floor soaked. Yesterday, I bypassed the heater core and went straight from water pump to intake, filled everything back up and went for a drive. I didn't check the coolant level when I got home but the reservoir is empty again. There are no drips under the car, oil is clean, exhaust is clear. Yesterday, I also ran the motor with the radiator cap off to see if there was compression in the radiator because I thought it might be a head gasket. Everything seemed fine. The only other thing I've noticed is when the radiator is capped and the motor gets hot, you can see air bubbles pushing out into the reservoir.
Other than this, the motor runs like a top. I'd hate like heck to tear apart the motor because I overlooked something obvious.
Please help!

TNT_Z28

Take off one or bothof the valve covers and look at the insides of the valve cover(s) to confirm it's not disappearing inside the motor.

Apeiron

Did you replace the cap?

SumDumbGuy

TNT_Z28 - I will do that after I get home from work. If there is milky condensation on the valve covers, that means the intake gaskets are blown correct?
Apeiron - Replace the cap? The radiator cap? No, but that's on my list of things to buy after work.

Apeiron

If there's milky condensation under the valvecovers it means there's water getting in the oil somewhere, but it doesn't tell you anything about where.

blackbmagic

You fill you cooling system with water in Michigan?

Could be a head gasket leak, you wont always know by looking at the exhaust. That'
s only if it gets really bad.

Use a head gasket leak detector, its a simple cylinder filled with a blue liquid that changes color when exposed to gasses. You seal the bottom of the cylinder on the top of the radiator while the cap is off, and then pull vacuum through the top thus pulling any gasses through the liquid. If the color barely changes or doesn't change at all your good.

Check your intake manifold as well. Could be getting through there.

SumDumbGuy

The motor was just put together and since I was planning on flushing the system soon, I only put a gallon of antifreeze in it and filled the rest with water. The weather is finally above freezing. Once I flushed it out, I would have added more antifreeze.
I've never heard of a head gasket leak detector. Makes sense how it works, but how could air through the radiator differentiate between a bad head gasket or intake gasket?

Apeiron

The intake is under vacuum, not pressure. If it was an intake gasket leak, water would be going into the air path, not air getting int the water path.

blackbmagic

Its not air through the radiator, when there is a blown or cracked head gasket exhaust gasses leak into your cooling system. This leak tester will detect that.

We use the lisle kit at our shop, its cheap, easy to use, and it works great.


Look at the intake manifold, as well as the water pump it could be leaking from parts of the intake manifold gasket that are not part of the air intake.

StrahlZ28

The bubbling in the reservoir could be from air bubbles getting worked out from the loss of coolant from the heater core/loss of coolant from bypassing.

TNT_Z28

as i said before, check the valve covers first. its about as uncomlicated as it gets.

ive had this problem twice before. on one motor, it was an intake gasket. on the other it was a cracked edelbrock intake manifold.

in both situation, coolent was getting into the oil

TNT_Z28

sorry, walked away from the computer screen and my co-worker thought he'd be funny.

SumDumbGuy

Ended up tearing the motor apart, found a crack in the #6 cylinder wall. I guess it's back to the drawing board. Thanks for the help though everybody!