Hey guys, need a lil imput on what might be the problem with his car. I am quite the novice mechanic myself, but he can't even change his own oil, so he defers to me to help him out. His car is a 1998 Camaro with 3800 series with V6, auto trans. He was cruzin down the highway and heard a flapping noise... (no he wasn't whacking off) so he pulled over and killed the engine, but at this time hadn't had any problems with the vehical. He looked under the hood but didn't see anything out of the ordinary and after about 5 min started it back up andthe flapping noise gone. After driving it down the road about 2-3 min it started overheating suddenly. He let it cool off and put water in it because the coolent was empty. He drove it the rest of the way home stopping twice because it was still overheating even though the coolent was still full. The next day after starting it he noticed his engine had a noticable rough idle and viberated. After examining it myself I noted both cooling fans were working, but his antifreeze was brown as crap. Thats one thing I know needs done but also noted a possible leaking seal on his engine just above the belt and below the air intake (pointing to area in picture attached) After running a few minutes a white steam or smoke started emiting from it drawing my attention there. The longer the engine ran the more that would emite. Also there is alot of white exhaust coming out of his tailpipes... I told him to take it to a real mechanic but he's a cheap bastard and wants to make sure its not something I can't do myself first... So here I am, other than a coolent flush I think the rest might be beyond me, but figured I'd see what ya'll thought first... sorry this is a lil long, just wanted to make sure ya'll know what all happened.

 

Sounds like a blown headgasket. Is the oil milky?

 

I don't think it is milky... looked normal to me... though it seemed like it was really full of oil... dip stick is weird... all twisted... but oil was way above the full mark... said he had oil changed last about 2 months ago...

 

Another vote for head gasket.

Do a little more investigating. Is the car smoking out the exhaust? Is it actually using any coolant? How hot did the car get when it overheated?

 

It is smoking white smoke out of the exhaust when it heats up idling. It never quite touched the red mark because he always shut it down before it came to that point.

A blown headgasket's a pretty big job, huh? We talking $500 to a g? Remember neither of us are inclined to do this stuff ourselves. So we talking garage time here.

 

take it to someone that has the propper stuff to test it, sounds like head gasket.

 

Would Autozone be able to find out? I don't want to have him take to a local garage where they'll charge him $80 or so just to look at it.

 

no, you need a mechanic.
there are plenty of members in the texas area, try that section maybe someone who knows a bit more will be willing to check it out at least