I think I may have blown my head gasket. The water in my overflow is brown, I wasn't sure if it was just a dirty radiator or what. I flushed it twice and its still brown. Is this oil? I have access to an LT1 motor with 80k on it for $500 bux. I'm thinking about making this investment now...

 

What procedure did you use to flush it? Did you get the fluid that is left over in the engine, hoses, and heater core?

I've never heard of Rusty Coolant being a sign of a blown head gasket. Are you exhibiting other symptoms?

Does the fluid at least look better now after the flush than before?

Sorry for giving you the 3rd degree! :-)

 

If you have a blown head gasket you are going to have water in you oil not vice versa... Your oil on your dip stick will look like chocolate milk and there will be water droplets on your dip stick and sometimes you will be able to see it in your oil refill opening as well..

what you see in your over fill tank is rust . we all get that in there after metal begins to rust in our blocks as it is sloshed around in our cooling system.
Buy one of those radiator flush additives and follow the directions.

save your money and buy NOS !!!:lala:

 

Thanks guys, wasn't sure about the rust situation and that it looked that bad. My overflow looks like chocolate milk. I ran the prestone radiator flush as per the directions and after that instead of putting in Antifreeze, I am now running prestone superclean. Per the instructions it tells you to drive 3 to 6 hours with the superflush in the motor over serveral days if necessary. So I've been driving it to work all week and will empty it and flush with water. Hopefully this helps... The reason I thought I may have blown a head gasket is that the performance of my Camaro has diminished, I may just need to check my TPS settings, idle air control and timing...

 

Hopefully, the flush will help.

You should never let your cooling system get that bad. The coolant has rust inhibitors in it. When it is that old it doesn't provide any protection and you can start to have problems.

I went through what your doing now one time. I put the super-flush in and flushed my system, soon I developed radiator and heater core leaks. Hopefully you won't.

I learned my lesson though!

So, then I thought with my superior cooling system maintinance my current car's radiator would last forever. Nope, the plastic side tanks both cracked!! Go figure!

 

the water in the oil is one symptom, along with an increased fluid level on the dipstick. also look for condensation on the inside of the oil filler cover and the very top of the dipstick.
so is lotsa bubbles in the radiator, with the cap removed and the engine running, at temp. if the gasket is failing at a water jacket, it'll exhibit this.

 

Well guys, i found out whats making my water so rusty, no matter what I do to flush it. I have a bad ground, which is causing electrolysis. This is making my water rusty no matter what I do. I replaced the ground, flushed the radiator twice with water, and now its been clean all weekend. i didn't put any antifreeze in it, I just let stay as water so i could see the ammount of rust. My ground wire was frayed pretty bad... I would have been flushing this thing forever... Just a FYI

 

I'm an unbeliever!

OK, maybe you did have a bad ground wire but I'm not buying the electrolysis thing. Your car was grounded otherwise it wouldn't have started or run. I think your system just had a lot of rust in it.

Anyhow, if it works go with it. The best part is, you don't have a blown head gasket.

 

If it weren't ground at all, you are right it wouldn't run, but it was ground to the block fine. The ground that goes to the inside fender wasn't good and the plastic sheathing was missing from the wire.
The wire was exposed and rusty. I didn't notice this nor think that this would cause my rust problem, but low and behold, this is my problem. I had a friend of mine who is a mechanic by trade check it out. This was the entire cause for my rust situation. BELIEVE IT!

 

ANT87:

OK, I did some searches on the net. I did find some mentions of a bad ground path to the body causing problems where current flows through the coolant. So, maybe your right? I'll have to try to harder to keep an open mind!

 

Ripleys believe it or not I tell Ya....

 

um .......not