After some "messing around" I parked the car but left it running to discuss a few things with some guys shooting video, and after a few seconds, it started blowing whitish smoke that smelled like coolant... Ok, I hop in the car and nurse it home before it overheats or does anything else funny. Park it, radiator empty, oil looks fine. I pull the plugs:



7 of them look like 1, 3 and 4 (they all have a light side and dark side, these are just turned in different directions, they're otherwise dry with some carbon soot on the last thread).

The second one in this pic came out of #6. Basically pretty similar but wet. Interestingly I don't smell any coolant (honestly it smells exactly like the rest, no real gas smell... it smells like a spark plug). Honestly I'm somewhat surprised. Burning coolant usually looks like a spotless steam cleaning chamber. The plug does not usually come out wet. I'm still expecting to find a pushed head gasket, but this isn't what I was expecting to see. I was worried because this cylinder head had a significant core shift and I hit water porting a couple of the exhaust ports and had to weld them and re-port them- I was a little worried that I'd see all dry plugs and another leaking exhaust port (they were pressure tested after I repaired them but **** can happen).

Any other thoughts?

Secondly, anyone have any opinions on plug temp (these are fairly cold Autolite 103's)? I know, this isn't make a pass, cut it off and pull a plug. The fact is that this car sees a lot of street miles and these plugs are too dirty to really see anything on them even if I did make a hard pass, I realize this. This is a fairly low compression small block (it's built for boost), but enough port, cylinder head, cam... that it wants to rev >7000rpm but it spends most of its time tooling around on the street (with an OD trans and 3.0 rear gears), I know, not exactly a matched setup right now without the boost. If this was a more stockish setup I would say that the plugs are too cold, but right now I'm leaning that they're OK considering the use they got. I've had a bunch of people tell me to run a colder plug in this setup, something like an Autolite AR94 or a NGK TR7 or 8 (I have one high load area in the tune where it's detonation prone, but it's high load, low rpm, someplace that it shouldn't really spend time in).

 

But what does it taste like?

 

Reading this sentence doesn't inspire confidence in the welded head , my guess is gonna be that through many heat up/cool down cycles the welds finally failed ....

 

Popsicles , with a slight undertone of BBQ chicken .......

 

I have no worries about the ports that I welded, they are much better than they started- once I broke through I knew that I either call that head junk or I was committed so I just cut back till I had a nice spot to weld to and filled the rest in with weld, it didn't cost me anything to weld it and the machinist that pressure tested the head owed me a favor, I do some welding for them, they do some work I don't have the equipment to do for me.... Anyway, it was tested to some crazy pressure (he knew I planned on turbocharging and knows I'll push things too...). What I was concerned about was that I ended up welding 2 ports and replacing a guide (I broke through right next to a guide), but 2 are just as ported, and I was worried there might be a really thin spot in ports that I didn't weld. I'm not sure what I expect to change in an exhaust port to cause them to start leaking if they test OK.

Either way, since the plug is wet I doubt I'm leaking coolant into an exhaust port.

Cherry popsicles... LOL

I don't know if you're serious about tasting it (I know coolant tastes sweet, never thought of tasting what's in a chamber but have tasted all sorts of stuff on the outside of the engine trying to figure out leaks before...). I did wrap it up in a plastic baggie last night figuring it will concentrate the smell some. I threw it in a car... then drove a different car today

I just went to go get it and had a sneezing fit (I don't know, pollen or something?) and now am stuffed up so I'm not touching it till I clear up some.

 

I'm only a lil bit kidding. Taste test will reveal antifreeze right now. Probably be able to taste the difference between gas, oil, atf... Antifreeze isn;t always stinky, but it always seems to taste sweet in the tiniest quantity.

 

Well, right around dinner time (probably slightly before you replied) I went and opened the baggie, smelled it- it didn't smell like antifreeze at all, and then licked it- hum... somewhat sweet...

 

 

Careful, you'll spoil your dinner. Always save dessert for last

 

While like usually we agree, I don't think any NA combination should need colder than a NGK 6 (depending on the cross an autolite 103 and 104 both cross to a TR6, so this is roughly a TR6 or slightly colder) I've had a number of internet experts and a tuner that I trust suggest running colder in this engine.

FWIW, these are not that old, I believe I put them in last fall, they probably have about 1000miles on them, likely less.

LOL.

I had an interesting conversation with a UTI grad/ASE tech at a local dealer that works out with me... do you know some of the new guys out there have no clue that antifreeze tastes sweet and can't tell automotive fluids by taste? (I need a shocked emoticon)