Head Gasket Blown?

[rizz89]

Hi guys,

got a r34 GT-T NEO, checked my coolant this morning and it is dark brown. there was a little bit of sludge on the bottom of the radiator cap and i put my finger in the coolant to find really small traces of oil.

from my experience when the head gasket is blown the coolant is a lot worse, but I'm not a mechanic. i have checked a lot of other forums but can't get any specific info that matches up to my issue.

i have had the car for 6 months and there has been no problems with cooling system it always sits just under half.

Not sure if the following information will be valid but over the weekend i took off the stock turbo and put a high flowed VL turbo, i used my old waste gate and bolted it to 2 plates that were bolted to the side of the compressor housing, i assumed the plates were flexing because it wasn't boosting very well. i then changed the plates to something a bit more sturdy and took it for a drive, on my old turbo i was running 12 psi and when i tested this new turbo it boosted to 17 psi i then straight away turned the boost down to 8 psi. could this have caused me to blow the head gasket when it over boosted?

[portaz]

Wouldn't think 17 psi would kill it, what was condition if turbo when u got it? Did u hook oil and water lines up correctly? Doesn't sound good but if your not using water or oil get a good radiator flush and then refill with coolant. If it comes back you need to go to radiator shop and get it co2 tested its really all you can do other than guess.

Scott

[TTT]

had you checked the coolant in the past?

is your oil milky coloured?

does the car blow steam (like plumes of white smoke) at first start up?

17psi from a hiflow turbo on a non tuned motor can cause problems but not really a BHG.

If it were me I would:

Dump the coolant, flush the radiator out with a hose.

remove the thermostat and flush out as much of the coolant/water out of the engine by sticking the hose in there..

dump the coolant/water in the overflow tank.

and if real keen, I'd undo the massive bolt under the turbo on the engine block which is to drain the remaing water/coolant from the engine.

Change the engine oil and oil filter - Use cheap oil here cause you're only doing it to clean it out if it's all milky and will dump it aftre like 2 drives.

Put it all back together, fill it all up with demineralised water, bleed the system, drive around without thrashing...for half an hour keeping an eye on the temp gauge.

let it cool and check the radiator again... if it is dirty or has lost water, then you probably have a blown gasket.

what you do from here can cost between $15 to whatever it costs to pull the head off, have it resurfaced, new head gasket, put it all back together etc etc.

[r33_racer]

Did it sound like it was detonating when it was overboosting?

[GTSBoy]

When I bought me Neo it was all very very nice......except for the cooling circuit. It took 2 months and 8 changes and 2 muchout treatments to get it to clean up.

If this is the first time you've looked in your radiator, the coolant could have been full of rusty grunge the whole time. Some people simply have no idea about looking after that sort of thing. You may have inherited it.

[_x_FiReStOrM_x_]

Is this an auto trans? If so, the auto trans cooler/heat exchanger inside the radiator may have split. Check the auto trans fluid inside the trans for traces of water too (just incase). If it has split, you have 2 options: replacement radiator, or block off the stock trans cooler outlets by linking with a piece of hose and run an external cooler instead.

You can buy bottles of cooling system oil remover (500ml from memory) which you add to the cooling system to break down the oil and flush it away. Works really well!

If none of this applies to you, please disregard

[rizz89]

Oil isn't milky jut a bit murky and very small traces of oil, no steam or white smoke.

I only hit full boost once but it sounded ok.

I have checked the coolant every now and again because of summer but when i changed the turbo we lost a lot of coolant, after i filled it it was ok but i checked after 2 days of driving and filled it up again and thats when i noticed it was dark brown.

Na its a manual.

Hope this is enough info for your queries.

Thanks for all the suggestions i will definitely try them out.

i really don't want to change the head gasket just looks like so much work to get everything off, i had a hard enough time trying to make this other turbo fit.

Please, if you have any more advice or queries on this topic please post it, as i have one more question.

sorry to go off topic but there was 1 other problem that came with the turbo swap, after i stretch a gear i sometimes pop it to neutral to decide what gear i will select next, which all depends on the traffic situation. sometimes the engine has enough time during this process to go back to idle which was fine before i changed the turbo i would just rev match and select a gear, now only after i stretch a gear it will go lower than idle and turn off, not sure why???

before i changed the turbo, when the engine was warmed up it would idle at 1000rpm now if it decides to idle and not stall it idles just under 800.

Any ideas ???

Also just wanted to say that i love this forum and you guys are so helpful and honest

[GTSBoy]

That would be the new arrangement between AFM and turbo (something must have changed), affecting the way the AFM is reading the air flow, giving you a low signal and stalling.