I'm going to try to make this to the point, because it's driving me crazy. I was goin pretty fast down us1, stayin at high rpm's for a while, stressin the engine out (boys will be boys) but anywho, I stopped at a light and noticed my car was shaking, as if it was misfiring. I parked in a parking lot and popped my hood, I had coolant spewing out of the coolant resevoir so I did not dare open the radiator cap. I checked the exhaust and I could clearly tell the car was misfiring. I took it home slowly wondering what it could be. A friend suggested it was a foul plug or bad wires. I figured if it was just a plug i'd be alright, but I forgot it was overheating (Maybe my water pump failed?) So the next morning I took the car to work, avoiding idle speeds (since thats the only time it was misfiring) and when I got to work, I noticed I had white smoke pouring out of my exhaust. I popped the hood, checked the oil - it was all gone. I opened the radiator and it smelled funny. I figured I had blown a head gasket. I took it to my mechanic in the condition it was in, the white smoke stopped for a while and the engine was really cold, I had been running it for 30 mins+ and the fan was just blowing cold air, the radiator was not even hot. I took it home from him and my temperature guage redlined hot. Got home, again the radiator was extremely pressurized. Next day I bought new plugs, I knew this wouldn't fix my head gasket but atleast it might fix the misfiring. I installed the new plugs and I cant tell if it's the same or worse. Now i've got new wires but theyre not installed yet, if they dont work ill check the rotor and cap, I have no clue why else it would misfire. I started the car up this morning just to see what happens again, I squeezed the radiator tubes and I felt nothing going through, the radiator again got very pressurized, and did not get the least bit hot. Now not only did the car misfire, puff out white smoking, pressurize the radiator extremely, but i also had water shooting out of the exhaust. What in the hell should I do, it's a fuel injected 3.8

Well white smoke means your burning coolant, which isnt good.....but you say all your oil is gone? please tell me you filled it back up and if you did is it leaking again??

Indeed, I filled it back up again. I put a quart and a half in... ran the engine, turned it off, checked it. Drove home, let it cool down completely checked it, also checked it this morning and it's at the same level.

From what I can tell, there is no coolant leaking in the oil, im not sure if theres oil leaking in the coolant since the waterpump isn't really moving the water around. When I run the engine and take the oil cap off and cap it with my hand, there is no pressure, and there is no pressure or bubbles or anything coming out of the dipstick when it's running.

I think i speak for alot of people when i say.....what the hell did you do i dunno man

Head gasket time

oh well hopefully ya didnt cook anything else

Before I got the car, someone told me it was supposed to have the gaskets changed but the leak was patched (i have nfc what they meant with that) and I had the gasket kit, it was missing a few pieces and back then I couldn't tell a carb from a piston, so i just got rid of it, I didn't know parts broke (years ago)

So, before I get down and dirty taking this fuel injected monster apart to get the heads, Is it 100% positively a blown head gasket? It'd be a real disappointment to get through all that work to find out that wasn't the problem.

And how can I make sure I cover everything that was damaged so I don't have to take it apart again

Someone also just suggested that I might have spun a bearing, which bearing?

hey Canyon hooa hooa,

The parts stores sell a little kit to check for combustion gasses in the cooling system.
It takes a sample from the top of the radiator.
Kit cost about 10 deckets.
Fill it with oil to the full mark on teh slipstick.

Wait till it's COLD, fill it back up with water, don't worry about coolant right now.
Leave the radiator cap off.
Crank it and let it idle till it heats up (termosnat opens). Check the radiator for water puking out of it.
If it's puking and bubbling real good get ready to high roll.
Use the test kit and see what the results are.
Be careful and don't get burned.

Hike leg and let a couple rip...... that's why they call it laughing ghass!!!

Edit: You may have a spun bearing but you didn't describe the symptoms of one. Would have to confer with my Krystal ball or tarrot cards to tell which bearing was spun.

I really don't know poop about these things but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night.

Heheh, you're a trip man

I've gotten a little further in the process, let me elaborate.

As far as the misfiring goes, I changed the plugs and wires, the old plugs had about a 70 gap, and it's supposed to be 52, so i set the new plugs to 52 and installed them with the wires.

There is still misfiring, but it is not as hard as before, so I guess that's better than nothing, but at this point im sure im losing compression.

Pressure builds in the radiator (The water bubbles when the car is on), it over heats INSANELY, my car has aluminum heads and ive got a feeling theyre warped because my guage was redlining on the way home. White smoke and water shoots out of the exhaust, it also cranks weird.

Hopefully when I take the heads off I will not find any vertical scratches because i dont know what im going to do then. I'm going to call Horsepower Sales tomorrow and ask them if they have a full head replace kit, with new gaskets all the way through the engine. Fel-pro has a kit for 75 bucks and full head bolts for 30, but I'd have to order online, horsepower sales might have it ready for me to pick up the same day.

Help me out guys, hold my hand I'm scared I've never disassembled my heads before, and don't even mention reassembly

Canyon,

Well it sounzds like you have a bad head gasket or two.

You should be able to see where they have blowed out when you take the heads off..
They usually blow bwteeen cylinders but can break between the cylinder and the water jacket. You'll see where they are busted whrn you pull the heaDS.
bE CAREFUL WHen you pull the headsnot to damage the gaskets and destroy the evidense so to speak,

If youe heads don't have a lot of miles you can getthe heads surfaced to flatten then out so new gaskets will seal.
If a lot of miles you can get them surfaced and a valve job. It's a good time to get the 30 degres back cut on your valves if you have avalve job done. Most shops will do it for a couple of dollares more.

The block deck needs to be checked to. You can check it with a machinist scale to make sure it's not warped too.
Only thing with pulling the heads is most everything has to come off the engine to get those heads off.

Be real careful with your new gasket selection. Done want to git one that is fatter than the one you got now.
this is an important thing. A thinner one would be awright but not a thickern one.
If you had like a .051 gasket on it, look for a .039 one.
FelPro gaskets are good. Don't skimp on head gaskets, get the good'uns.

Get some of those freezer bags to put your bolts and nuts in. That's what Ido since my memory went so bad I can't remember where all them things go, Ha.
I tore down a model airplane engine one time. Aren't they all about the same?

thats about all, I canthink of right away but theres a lot of pretty smart doods on heer. I bet they had suome good advize.

Buster

Compression/leak down test every cylinder. That's my advice.

As far as removing them, it's not fun. Get a haynes or chiltons. They list the complete steps and give all the torque values and tightening sequences.

When my car blew a head gasket, i just put a known flat ruler from corner to corner and checked for gap under it. Didn't find any. You're block will probably be ok. Iron can take a lot more heat related stress then aluminum.

Dont forget to cut a few farts too.

If your still driving it and its still over heating constantly?Its toast,not just the gasket but the whole engine.guarantee'd your heads are warped rings are dead Once you overheat an engine so bad that its pukin water out the exhaust,its fugged up.
Then you try to fix the miss by changing plugs and wires and run it somemore(meanwhile its still pukin water out everwhere makin it worse)
thats fugged up X2

Yip time for a new engine,i wouldnt even bother throwing a nother dime into that one.Just dig a hole in the back yard invite some buddies so you can all pay your last respects Dont forget the beers The good thing is now you can call up Gm and order that new 572!

may i be the first to suggest:
http://www.sdpc2000.com/catalog/120/...ate-Engine.htm

BTW, when you start the car and the radiator pressurizes, its done.

I've got the Haynes manual so far it's been a savior

As far as the bubbles in the radiator, of coures it's gonna do that if the gasket is cracked, isn't that one of the main symptoms?

I don't think it's gotten that bad, it only overheated on the drive home, and I knew getting it towed home would cost more than a 572 motor

I don't 'still' drive it, I drove it home the minute I noticed the smoking at it hasn't moved since. I cranked it up to check the misfiring because I've got nothin better to do. I'm taking it to a friends shop next week where I'll have a good enviroment to begin the work, it shouldn't be anything more than warped heads since they're aluminum.

As far as the piston rings go, I've had a few friends blow head gaskets like this and I've never heard of anything else going, it'd be quite a bitch to change the rings and such, especially because I'm looking to just fix this thing and sell it, so I can buy somethin else that I can do some performance work on, maybe a TPI 350 thirdgen... but that's not the issue right now, the issue is fixing this thing for as cheap as possible and selling it



If I had the money for the 572 it'd be sittin in this car right this instant, but the problem is right now i'm flat broke and I need a car to get to work and run errands, I've got nothing.

But then theres always the great possiblity of me putting the engine together and a ring going, then it's back to ripping it down, so what else should I check while I'm in there.. the engine is on maybe 90k miles and for the first 80k it was never floore

Sorry dude i was under the impression that you were still mucking with the motor trying to figure out the miss,while it was still over heating mybad.well if you havnt started it since you got it home you might be ok.Kinda sad really i was hoping it was toast so you could get that 572

you should of put more then 2 quarts in it should take at least 5 and bluesomke means it is buring oil sometimes people make mistakes and mistake blue smoke for white smoke

I did not put more than a quart and a half because that's all it took for it to reach 'Full' on the dipstick. I'm positive it's not just white smoke.

PS It hasn't been losing any oil.

ok you said it lost all its oil and that scared me

Oh, Woops! No that's not the case

Here's a little background

I Just got this car 4 days ago, it's a family member's car and was given to me because they got a new one. I figured the person who owned it took good care of it and checked the fluids but i forgot it was a woman, so the oil was extremely low. I was planning on doing a full tune up on it either way and replacing all of the fluids, but i guess i was too late and the gasket already blew, most likely from low oili.

Now I can only hope there is no serios damage to the block/heads/pistons

LOL caught me off guard

My mom is the same way, her intrepid with 50k acts like a 300k car

I hear that man, before I got my hands on this car, it went through two trannies, a radiator, two rack and pinions, 7500 front end alignments, and *** knows what else.

Maybe I should junk this engine and swap in a 305.

Actually thats not cool because right now i dont have a car, and the swap w/ AOD -> manual conversion would take a looong time.

So I better fix these heads and get it back on the road asap, then I can grab an engine from the boneyard and start rebuilding it when ive got a daily driver

??? gear boxes?

See my first post in thise thread.... would keep the better handling and add lots of power!