iplayloudly

Well I just finished swapping my headgasket. This was my first timing doing such a job, but I did everything by the book, and torqued everything to spec. Now that everything is back together, I'm noticing what looks like a small amount of oil floating at the top of the coolant in the radiator. Having said that, I did spill oil everywhere when taking the head off. I'm hoping this is just from residue left over from that spill. I thought I had gotten it all cleaned up, but maybe not.

I've never seen what an actual blown headgasket looks like. Here is my old one. Does it look blown? I do see a few "breaks" in the black part, but I'm not sure if that would cause it to actually leak.





Also, I have one more question. After putting everything back together, I ended up with one part left over. I thought I had done well labeling everything so this wouldn't happen, but apparently I missed a piece. Anyone know where the heck this goes?

mbrishke

sorry i cant help you. but i just wanted to ask you how difficult the job was. And do you think it was worth the money you saved to d.i.y? im about to start the same job soon :\

xRiCeBoYx

iTrader: (22)

for me, the job was definitely worth it. If you wanna see tips, tricks, and my lessons learned, click the link in my sig. Also check out the head gasket DIY floating around.

When I changed my head gasket, on your second picture, I had a small break in the black coating between cylinders 2 and 3, and when I got the head resurfaced, the guy told me he had to shave off .004" to make up for a divot between cylinders 2 and 3

as for that piece.. I have no idea what it is either.. lol

iplayloudly

well i think its worth it if you have a spare vehicle to drive, which i do. I had a lot of down time (getting the head checked out, then only working a couple hours each night getting it all back together). I think the job took me around 16 hours of work total.

I did forget to mention i had the head professionally checked out. They told me I was good to go.

sdaidoji

iTrader: (1)

DIY was definitely worth - after doing the job and running the car, the spare car started to act out and now i have spare cash to fix the spare car too (clutch). 3weeks total time, not sure how long at the job, since a lot of time was for cleaning stuff and others. The oil is normal, after some time, flush the system again.
The breaks in the coating are the blown parts, yes.

BlueEM2

iTrader: (1)

You can't tell because parts of the gasket actually stay on the block/head so its very hard to tell where it was leaking.. you can usually see a white piston though