Maybe this is a stupid question, but would a car run with a cracked block? I am looking at a Mustang that has the "freeze plugs" out. The car runs. If it had a cracked block, would it still run?
sbftech said:expansion plugs out? Like popped out? If so the block is junk
sbftech said:ya they dont just pop out, the block twists, flexes and then they pop out.
sbftech said:ya owners replace expansion plugs when rebuilding, NOONE just replaces them with the engine in the car for no reason. Its not a wear item. Hey what do I know
sbftech said:in the last 20 years and dozens and dozens of my own personal engines it has never happened to me. Furthermore in my 9 years working at Ford I never saw it once. The one time I did experience it was when a friend I built a motor for (351w) was at the track, popped a plug and ran over his own antifreeze and clipped the wall. This was a serious HP application and the block twisted and flexed resulting in the plug popping. In my experiences it has never happened. Something has to happen to make this possible. The only way to make sure everything is fine is mag the block.
Ya it will run, for how long? Who knows. The worst case scenario is you pop another one back in, it pops out later, you run over your own coolant and hang on. Most likely what you suspect is what happened. That water has a long way to expand and must exert a fair amount of pressure to pop the plug out on it's own. I would err on the side of caution and use it as a bargaining tool to get the car for next to nothing.1bad89lx said:Fair enough. I'm thinking they didn't have the proper mixture of coolant/water over the winter and the plug (s) popped out. I was mainly curious if the car would run at all if the block was cracked. The car seems to run fine for what little time we had it running.