When your head gasket blows, you usuially have bubbles in the coolant, and white vapor from the exhaust, what else?

I was driving, and i looked down and noticed @250 on the temp guage, holding steady. I shut her down and rolled into a parking lot and filled up the radiator.(leakey rad is my prob) idk how long i was driving for before i noticed it, but at worst it was about 2 quick miles on the freeway, and best, prolly a few hundred feet. I was disapointed when i refilled my coolant, with water,because it started to foam and then disipate(with the motor running), but then i filled up my coolant jugs, with water,when i got home, and noticed that the one bottle that still had some coolant left in it started to foam. It may not be bubbling because of a blown hg then. In either case, what kind of place would i go to for a compression test?

thanks.

 

My girl burned my truck, she overheated and killed the motor. Both of my heads were cracked, and #7 piston was fused to the cylinder wall. Your oil will be milky color, steam will be blowing out of your exhaust, no power. You can also do a compression check and that will narrow it down to which head is cracked. What symptoms are you having?

 

lol, ok...i doubt its blown. another close call i guess. It doesnt have any of those symptoms...and i checked the radiator again with the cap off and running, it doesnt bubble either. Its humid here right now so the exhaust looks like its steaming, but so does my buick right now too...ill check that again in the morning. thanks.

 

I know ifwas your head gasketyou would know immidiatley. It happened in my ranger and it was blowing white smoke all over the place. I'm not sure exactly what would cause your problem, but I'm fairly sure it's not as severe. Sorry to hear about your luck though.

 

Now you know, if you see the temp rising and your truck sounds like a boiler, pull over and wait it out. Thats good that its nothing major.

 

Yeah, good call on doing that. I've at least 3 friends who have blown thier motors just by not doing that. 1 to coolant. one to oil, one to being an *******.

 

I had a funny feeling about letting my girl use my truck, she called me and asked me where did she put the gas in. She had been with me many refills. Its kind of my fault because she wanted me to take her sister to the airport, and I said Hell No. I should have said Hell Yea.

 

i had a dodge minivan years ago that blew a head gasket. it would overheat quickly, no matter how much water i put in. the cylinder pressure was leaking into the water jacket area, pressurizing the cooling system, and blowing the water out the radiator cap, and disrupting the water pump flow. milky water didn't show up in the oil right away, but did a few days later after i kept screwing around with it. good idea from kiki to use a compression gauge you screw in the spark plug holes and see what you got.

 

Napa sells a tester for under 50 bucks, that "sniffs" for hydrocarbons in the cooling system. Part number is "BK 7001006". Very easy to use. All you need to do is drop the coolant level about three inches then put the tester in the radiator opening for one minute while squeezing the bulb on top of the tester. You will know for sure then.

 

Great timing for this post. I just returned from a trip to Canada, hauling a stripped down VW Bus for a friend. My truck kept blowing coolant and almost red-lined when I got to Port Huron. Once I got through inspection and she cooled down, I checked the radiator to see that it filled with almost an entire bottle of coolant. We thought it was a blown gasket, but I have great power and nothing showing up in the oil or exhaust. Same problem occurred on the return trip to Illinois, so I spoke with a mechanic my dad knows, and the mechanic stated that it could be either a blown gasket or stuck thermostat. I am leaning to the thermostat, because I never did get much decent heat in the winter out of that truck when the outside temp dropped below 40ยบ. All the way from Illinois to Oklahoma, the truck was blowing coolant, and when I got to a friend's in Joplin, BOOM, she's back to 250ยบ. I pull over, and she's low on coolant again. I am going to keep an eye on it this week (sans trailer) and see what's happening. I have a new thermostat ready to go in next weekend.