1997 cobra blown head gasket, what next?

[michaelyons]

I just found coolant in the top end of my motor (80,000 miles). Gonna drop it off tomorrow to figure out if it's got a cracked head, or just a blown gasket.

Here's a little background on the car. Mostly boltons, h pipe, catback, msd coils, pro flo maf, k&N, and a sct tune. That's about it as far the motor. Anyway, it started smoking about 2 days after I bought it. I haven't put many miles on it. Shortly after is started to smoke i noticed it hard to start. I figured must be water in the combustion chamber. I pulled the pcv valve and there it was. No water on the dipstick yet, but it's deffinately in the top end. I assume it's the heads, or is there anything I might be over looking.

If it is the heads, is there anything I should do while they're off? I'm staying NA and don't want to dump a bunch of money into it. It will be a daily driver. Should I stick with the stock heads, or upgrade to the 99 up heads. Factory cams? porting? valve job? Is there anything worth doing?

Any suggestions will be appreciated. Thanks!

 

[bhuff30]

Where did you find the coolant? Underneath the valve covers, on the valve train? Or did you find the water around the intake and between the heads? There's a huge difference. It sounds to me like you are just seeing coolant leaks outside of the engine, not mixing with oil, but please clarify it.

These engines aren't bad about blowing head gaskets, especially without power adders.

 

[98COBRA281]

These engines aren't bad about blowing head gaskets, especially without power adders.

+1 very rarely do 4.6 blow head gaskets, even with a power adder its very rare because they have MLS gaskets....

 

[michaelyons]

I thought the same thing about the head gaskets. That's why it's taken me 2 weeks to come to this conclusion. It's been smoking for a couple of weeks. I've been looking at the dipstick for signs of oil in the crankcase, but haven't found anything. It was hard to start last night and continued throughout today. I pulled the pcv valve just out of curiosity today, and saw the light brown creamy mixture of oil and water. Is it possible that the intake is leaking into the top end and down the valves to the cylinders? I'm stumped.

by the way, the car seems to run fine except for the smoking and hard starting. It's throwing 2 codes regularly. po171 po174. both banks running lean. it also idles rough from time to time and takes some time to come back down to idle. Both of these last 2 problems are intermittent.

Thanks for the reply's. I guess I'm hoping for a suggestion that doesn't involve putting it in the shop. I'd hate to pay a few hundred dollars to find out it's a leaking intake gasket or something simple. But, i fear the worst.

Mike

 

[bhuff30]

So how about some more details? Where is the smoke coming from? What color is it? Do you have to add coolant or oil at times?

The milkyness on the PCV is nothing to be concerned about. That area typically can have milkyness due to moisture from the crankcase (specifically blowby).

 

[96SCstang]

as stated above alot of motors will have a little bit of that milky stuff on the pcv or oil cap. it's jut normal moisture in the crankcase. dodges are the worst with this. now your running rough problem could have everything to do with the two very important codes you have stored in your computer. it sounds like to me you have a vacuum leak somewhere. if you are familiar with the ways to check for a vacuum leak than do it, if not than just take it to a reputable shop so they can take a peek at it. i dont think you have a head gasket problem at all....just a lean running engine because of another problem.

 

[michaelyons]

The smoke is coming out of the drivers side tailpipe for the most part. I get a little out of the pass. but not much. It is deffinately white smoke. I have been having problems with the coolant/overheating since i pulled off the cap while the car was running. I was trying to see if there were any air bubbles or if the level war rising/lowering due to exhaust gasses in the system. When i put the cap back on (all while the car was running) it started having overheating problems. It seems more like an air pocket than actual overheating. I've jacked the front of the car up and burped the system a few times. It helped alot, but it still runs a little hot sometimes. between 200 and 210 for the most part. it heats up when you run it really hard, to about 230. I'd do the compression check myself, but i havn't had good luck with the cheap gauge sets. i'm worried that it'll get stuck in the head and I won't be able to remove the piece. Any suggestions before it goes to the shop this afteroon?

 

[eliteJAE]

Sounds just like mine when I blew a headgasket, it would overheat from combustion gases leaking into the coolant system. I didn't see any milky oil/water mixtures, but my gasket was fried I saw it myself when u got my heads taken off.

 

[michaelyons]

YIKES! Not what I wanted to hear. Were your heads warped? Did you determine what caused your gasket to fail?

 

[eliteJAE]

yea i know, i was pretty distraught myself when it happened

the way mine started was that every now and then it would overheat just like yours and it would spit out coolant because it got so hot. So one day i was cruising down the freeway and it turned off on me. Turns out almost ALL the water had either been spit out or evaporated from the heat and the block was running under load almost bone dry. I cussed a little, filled it up with water again, and it ran fine.

So about a month later im on the freeway again and my car suddenly starts shaking violently, the CEL is flashing at me, and i didnt know wtf was going on. Turns out the driver's side gasket was fried and water was pouring into two cylinders, so only 6 cylinders were firing. I was getting billowing clouds of white smoke coming out of the exhaust while it was runnig.

Had a mechanic pull the heads, the one with the messed up gasket was pretty charred and noticeably heated, but he was able to plane the bottom of the head enough to make it even. Im sure there was some warping but obviously not enough to screw up my heads. The only thing he did make sure to let me know was that I should by some of those cheap head gaskets, the ones that are made of that cheap fibrous material instead of straight up metal performance ones because the cheap ones would seal better with some of the imperfection the head had.

so all in all, he pulled apart my motor and planed and cleaned my heads/valves, while also fixing some other things like broken tensioners, etc. With some new seals/gaskets it cost me about $6-700 total but thats because he fixed alot of other little things, labor itself was 350 not sure if thats good enough although he pulled the entire top off and resurfaced the heads, etc.

im guessing it blew because of the times it overheated, which were caused by the faulty gasket in the first place, because i tried EVERYTHING else to make it stop overheating, from replacing the t-stat, to cleaning the rad, etc.

if you get it fixed, BUY NEW GASKETS, ALL OF THEM lol

i made the mistake of not buying new manifold gaskets and now i can hear a leak

other than that my car is fine, its been fine for over 16,000 miles

good luck man.

 

[michaelyons]

Thanks so much for the reply. Mine started smoking a few days before the overheating, but pretty much the same story. I drove it to the shop today (about 300 ft from my house). I had to pull plugs 7 and 8 and spin the motor to clear the water/fuel (it kind of smelled like fuel, IDK). I was expecting it to cost a lot more! Was this a shade tree mechanic or an actual shop? I'll keep you guys updated on the outcome. Thanks for the input!

Mike

 

[eliteJAE]

it was a certified mechanic that works at our local ford dealership, but he did it on the side, most mechanics do work like that on the side. Try to find a mechanic like that if the shop wants too much

yeah i had to drive mine like a mile or so to the mechanic too, it just sputtered while throwing white clouds of smoke, im lucky it didnt hydrolock lol

good luck man.

 

[michaelyons]

I talked to the shop today. The test showed that there is a head/headgasket problem on the drivers side. He's going to pull the motor out the bottom tomorrow and send the heads to the shop. I'm going to take the strut tower, upper intake, and valve covers and have them powder coated while it's down. What would you do with $1500 while the car is apart? Is that enough for any head work, cams, headers, forged rods and pistons????? any ideas or suggestions?

Mike