Ok, ever since last year it seems my Z has a head gasket leak, but a very small one. It happened about 200miles after doing the hotcam kit, if that would affect it at all. Here are the symptoms. The car starts and runs fine, doesn't really smoke either. But the breather tube always is covered with a slimey white/yellow/brown goo. Also after driving if I pop off the cover on the breather tube there will be steam.. So I thought this must be a head gasket leak, but it doesn't seem to get any worse, and when I change the oil there isn't any sign of water in the oil, from what I can tell. So is there any other way that fluid could be getting in there? Or is it possible that I just have a very small head gasket leak? thanks

Aaron

 

By breather tube do you mean the PCV valve tube? Id say it has to be the gasket, or else you are in some ****. If its not a gasket either its leaking through the head or through the block. I cant see any other way of it getting in there. Does white smoke ever come out of the exhaust? Is your coolant ever low? Does it run fine? Any other symptoms?

 

By the tube I mean the filler tube for the oil...sorry. The car starts good, idles fine, runs pretty strong. There might be a small puff of grey/white smoke on start up if the car has sat for a while...But its nothing huge. It doesn't seem to be low on fluid either...If it is its not by much cause I haven't been able to tell so far. One thing is the plugs on the passenger side head looked a little wierd, a couple had almost a crusty build up on them, VS the driver side looked great. I would think the passenger head has a tiny leak but it seems like when most ppl get a leak, its much worse.

Aaron

 

HMM, if youve had this for a while...and thers no smoke and no low coolant, it doesnt sound like coolant is getting in there through a gasket or block or head. Man I dont know Im stumped, I cant figure out where the steam or crusty fluid would come from other than coolant....shoebox, mindgam, injuneer???any ideas guys?

 

Not true... It could be a case where on a cold startup coolent does get into the combustion chamber and only then. Once the car warms up and all the gaskets swell up a bit the gaskets become tigther thus sealling better and stopping coolent from going thru the "bad" gasket.

On a cold start get behind your car and check for white smoke or a sweet smell. There are also some sites out there with pictures of spark plugs and how they might look in different scenarios like oil, coolent, rich, lean, detonation, etc..

IMO I think it is the head gasket so don't take the lazy way out, if all sighns point to leaking head gasket just replace it.

 

Well since you have a 94 Camaro which is most likely got an oil cooler, I bet your oil cooler is leaking coolant into your oil, they are known to do that, take that thing out & bypass it

 

He said hes passenger side plugs looked funny, with little crusties on it and I just checked a site which confirms crusties mean coolent in those chambers.

 

Good call niterider, forgot about expansion.

 

Those are the exact symptoms I had. You have a bad head gasket, no question. The longer you avoid it, the greater danger it poses to the engine. You may eventually have a cold start on seven cylinders - I did. It will run for a bit on seven, then clear the coolant and fire on all eight. Pull the plugs - one will be fouled, and that is the cylinder. Don't bother listening to the folks who will tell you the plug will be clean - it is misfiring, and will be fouled. You will also find the yellow goo on the underside of the intake manifold, and the valve covers.

Get ready for some fun.

 

As crazy as it sounds Im almost happy that I have a head gasket leak cause now it gives me an excuse to pull the heads, and since im there why not throw on some ported heads instead to go with my hotcam...oh wait thats right If I remember right I was planning on throwing in the 230/236 on 110lsp once I did my heads...woohoo

 

Hey Niterider could you post a linky to that websight.. Thanks so much.

Aaron

 

http://www.gnttype.org/techarea/engine/plugs.html

Heres one...

 

Thanks a lot, my plugs on the passenger side were kind of a cross between the splashed foulded and the ash foulded plugs. It was 3 of the 4 plugs that looked this way if I remember.

Aaron

 

It's time to pull the heads off buddy. It's never a budget job so now you might as well port them, rr, springs, cam if you don't have one? You know how it is or else you woulden't be here on this wonderfull money draining message board.

 

Oh I know how it goes...I've been looking for some decent ported heads for a while now to go with the hotcam, but since half the work would be done im thinking I might wanna yank the cam and go with the 230/236 on a 110lsp.

Aaron