Hi, im new here, yeah I'm a girl. I love cars, no I'm not gay. I own a 98 Plymouth Neon 2.0 DOHC ATX, stock motor. Ive had it for two years with NO problems until this year. The head gasket blew in Feb. and I got it back in May, 877 dollar job. Well, two days ago it overheated for the first time, ever. It didnt even overheat when the head gasket blew. It shot up to hot and dinged so I cut it off and coastedit to my bf's house.It wasnt leaking anywhere. All it did was blew the coolant into the overflow. It was full of antifreeze, and oil. The fans run when the car is on. I let it cool down anddrove it home (10+ miles), with no problems. I took off the thermostat to check it, its working. Hooked everything back up and started the car, it sputters and stalls out if you dont give it a little gas. It didnt do this until I removed the thermostat. Well, I tried going back to my bf's house today and it started overheating again. I pulled off the road and turned it off, antifreeze had poured out of the thermostat housing where the rad. cap goes in, my bf didnt tighten it up when he replaced the rad. cap so I think that may be part of the reason. The only thing is, it overheats going up steep hills at around a constant 3000 rpms. I filled the antifreeze back up and got it to his house, let it cool, then returned home. I let it sit for around 3 hrs and flushed out the rad. I started it, again with the sputter start, and let it run. While I was inspecting for leaks, I noticed white smoke pouring from my muffler. I called auto zone and they immeadiately said head gasket. I was like WTF? I just got it back a month ago. So I called my mechanic and he said to drop it off and he'd run a compression test on it. A code also popped up in the "check engine light", it was something like the Coolant Temp. Sensor saying coolant was too hot, but its running at normal temp between the two times its overheated...AZ said the sensor could be bad, so I bought one...could this be the whole problem? My mechanic said no, but the people at AZ said maybe? Anyone know anything that may help with diagnosis until I get the call from my mechanic? Someone else said piston rings, but my mechanic said he didnt think that was the problem either. The only thing I KNOW that is wrong with the car is that one of the Wrist Pins is bad, my mechanic said it wouldnt get any better or worse...is this true? I love working on cars, but I'm not familiar with the internal stuff yet so I dont mess with it.

 

sounds like the head gasket to me.have your mechanic check the cylinder head for cracks and make sure it's not warped.

 

Make sure you get all the air out of the system. Start the car (engine cold) with the rad cap off and let it run for awhile. This will allow the air to release.

 

If the coolant in the overflow bottle was milky green, somewhere in the engine oil and coolant are mixing due to a leak/crack. Normally a good sign of a bad head gasket. Clean off the entire engine and let it run and see where the leak originates from.


Oh, welcome to the boards [sm=smarty.gif]