We had been breaking the new motor in for a little while then with no warning noticed steam coming out of the tailpipes! So we pulled the plugs and there it was. Water in the #1 cyl. The heads were done by LE and the block bored by a very well known machine shop. Is there anything LT1 related to cause this? A blown head gasket this EARLY into the whole thing doesn't make any since, neither does a cracked block.

 

Anything with the intake maybe?

 

Your only real option is the head gasket. The intake is dry as far as coolant is concerned. Either machining error or assembley error.

-Shannon

 

Definatley not worried about assembly error. Whats the possibility of the block being cracked? Isn't that farley uncommon?

 

if its a new motor maybe they didnt torque it down correctly?

 

No we spent quite awhile just torqueing just the heads. There is no better way in that aspect. I think I just have a warped head and it got by us and back onto the motor.I am pulling it off tommorow and will check it myself again then take it to a different machine shop to be checked them hopfully just milled a little. I have heard a lot about warped alumium heads, not very much about cracked blocks (fingers crossed). Thanks for the opinion though.

 

could be the coolant passage in the head having too thin of a wall and when up too operating temp, gave out on ya dumping coolant into the cylinder??could be a popped had gasket, could be someone forgot too put thread sealer on some of those cylinders head bolts, could be a cracked block (doubtful) could be a warped head, usually takes a while too do that tho (from what i have seen)
could be...could be....could be

 

Exactly...

 

How obvious would a warped head be? I took a precision straight-edge to it and can barely see a couple spots that might be uneven.

 

Any ideas?

 

Did you use ARP head studs? Mine leaked like crazy.

Just wondering.

Eric

 

Nah, just plain ol' bolts.

 

What kind of head gaskets did you use? When my 385 went together, we used Fel-Pro gaskets that had been sitting in the trunk through the winter and part of the summer...they didn't crush down evenly (yes, they were torqued properly) and I had leaks all over the place. They crushed to 0.039" in some spots and others would only crush to 0.045". I'm not sure what screwed them up...they were either crappy gaskets to begin with or the temperature changes from sitting outside in the car messed them up. A new set of gaskets (same brand and everything) fixed the problem.

 

I believe we have the same gaskets, Fel-Pro. Mine we also left out in the shop for a while but not really any kind of extreme weather. Pretty mild. I forgot to add, there has never been any oil in the coolant, or coolant (milkshake) in the oil when drained. But there is definatley coolant in the cylinder.

 

P.S. The gaskets look fine to my untrained eye.