[lankyman]

Hello, i would like to confirm if anybody can tell me how you know your head gasket is blown.
Now i know the obvious which is when you open the oil cap or remove your dip stick you will see a milk colouring in the
oil itself.
I have a scenario where i have had my head gasket repaired (first time for the cars life) last year, and now it is broken again exactly 1 year later (i think).
I only see water on the ground, and it is exactly the colour of my antifreeze.
I have gone under the car but i do not see any hoses leaking, at least to my eyes. I have driven the car and it seems to drive fine i dont feel any weakness or jurks.
When i looked under the engine though i did see where it is dripping but i an not tell exactly where it from though.
It is dripping from the area just above the exhaust where it joins to go to the tail pipe, thats as accurate as i can be.
I have taken it in to the mechanic but i have been informed that the gasket is blown.
I would like to know though which types of scenarios are possible - example, is it notr always hat you see milky water and oil mix? stuff like that. I can also say add that my water bottle has been losing water plus minus 500 ml on a 4 week to a month average. The car is 285000 km old.

Thanks

 

[lankyman]

I would like to know what parts i can change whilst the head gasket is being seen to. Is it safe to say a new water pump can be installed or is it not possible because it is not part of the same area?
Im not sure what is involved with removing a head gasket and which areas are available for working on.

 

[g4vvq1983]

Hi there in South Africa i believe,,,,,well head gaskets can fail in may ways, they can leak oil out the side of the head and run down the block, you can get oil and water mixed in sump and header tank, you can loose compression, you can get load of steam or water coming out the exhaust pipe, a certain amount of pure water is normal, coolant isn't, ...i would say if you had a head gasket done last year and it has gone again the head is either cracked or warped....you would need to make sure its flat...

There is a test you can do to see if there are any combustion gasses in the cooling system, with a chemical test kit, you always get a certain amount of sludge in the coolant, and in the rocker cover etc, if you do a lot of short runs....may be worth flushing the cooling system out and changing the oil and filter and see where you go from there...good luck from Fred in Essex. UK.

 

[lankyman]

Hi there in South Africa i believe,,,,,well head gaskets can fail in may ways, they can leak oil out the side of the head and run down the block, you can get oil and water mixed in sump and header tank, you can loose compression, you can get load of steam or water coming out the exhaust pipe, a certain amount of pure water is normal, coolant isn't, ...i would say if you had a head gasket done last year and it has gone again the head is either cracked or warped....you would need to make sure its flat...

There is a test you can do to see if there are any combustion gasses in the cooling system, with a chemical test kit, you always get a certain amount of sludge in the coolant, and in the rocker cover etc, if you do a lot of short runs....may be worth flushing the cooling system out and changing the oil and filter and see where you go from there...good luck from Fred in Essex. UK.

Yes Mr Essex Fred Man, I hope you are looking after yourself.
Anyways so my head gasket was replaced last year but my mechanic was trying to help me to save cost so we did not go the engineering way and he just used his naked eye to put back together the gasket .
So yes technically they may have missed that there is no proper seal.

The mechanic i have gone to now is a different one andi hope he will be doing all the tests necessary .

He says they will do compression test and all that stuff.

I am paying about 279 pounds for this job, probably not easy to compare in UK live style terms, but what do u reckon? i men ita a S load of money for me.
I just hope it gets done properly.

I wanted to ask you, it is worth while asking him to change my water pump?
I think mine might need changing?
I mean is the head gasket an items which makes sense to change the water pump?
Like i know when you change the Cam belt then it is useful to change the watwer pump, which i only learnt early this year,.,...,

So for my case now with the head gasket, what do u say?

I also think i need to the service my alternator....it is original bosch and i dont think it has ever ever ever been serviced...but my battery light comes on faintly on the dash board....i only see this at night probably because it nice and dark... funny thing is, if i stop the car and then crank it again , the light goes off. so bloody weird.

I do notice though when i run mu lights and put my wipers on and put my fan on the light comes on slightly..... so i suspect this is the alternatior?

I have a new battery..... and alll of this started before with my OLDer battery about 3 months ago... i thought it was justy the battery...... but it looks like the alterbnator is causing this?

is this sounding correct?

 

[g4vvq1983]

Hi there, i think its Neil?, i cant remember what car you have, is it a Corsa C, think it is, mine is a 3 cylinder one. well the water pump only wants changing if its noisy, leaking or worn...if it runs off the CAM belt if it has one, would change it, if it runs off the fan belt i wouldn't, unless its leaking or noisy, regarding the Alternator, you may well be right it might be on its way out, but before you do i would make sure the terminals on the back are all clean and tight, and same with earth leads from body to engine and battery leads etc...that might cure it....you can do a test with meter to make sure its charging properly....i mean to change either the pump or alternator could cost you about £200 each uk money, regarding the head, what you need to do when its off is to clean the face properly...and put a "straight edge" across the top and make sure its flat. you can use feeler gauges under it....ok, i just spent £148 having 2 tyres fitted and track done lol....your price above doesn't sound too bad to me...from Fred in sunny Essex.

 

[lankyman]

Hi there, i think its Neil?, i cant remember what car you have, is it a Corsa C, think it is, mine is a 3 cylinder one. well the water pump only wants changing if its noisy, leaking or worn...if it runs off the CAM belt if it has one, would change it, if it runs off the fan belt i wouldn't, unless its leaking or noisy, regarding the Alternator, you may well be right it might be on its way out, but before you do i would make sure the terminals on the back are all clean and tight, and same with earth leads from body to engine and battery leads etc...that might cure it....you can do a test with meter to make sure its charging properly....i mean to change either the pump or alternator could cost you about £200 each uk money, regarding the head, what you need to do when its off is to clean the face properly...and put a "straight edge" across the top and make sure its flat. you can use feeler gauges under it....ok, i just spent £148 having 2 tyres fitted and track done lol....your price above doesn't sound too bad to me...from Fred in sunny Essex.

Its Imre or James.... Imre is the Hungarian name.
anyways i have the Opel Corsa B 1999 model which was born here in South Africa in Port Elizabeth 1.6 ie engine. Lol from sunny Essex? is it really sunny there now?

 

[g4vvq1983]

Ok sorry James, its not very sunny here, i'm watching Wimbledon tennis, they have the roof shut, its raining here, were about 35 miles away, i went down there about 4 times in the distant past...about 1970, we have had some hot weather about 30 to 35c at times.....ok cul Fred.

 

[lankyman]

Cool , yeh i know you get about 3-4 months of Summer if lucky.

But i dont know Essex could be amazing lovely place.

Im in Johannesburg where i stay in Kensington its okay , its a very old and large area they say the biggest in Johannesburg.

So yes i am here again with my Opel Corsa B 1999 1.6 issues, i just wish i can do some stuff myself and learn, i have sadly according to my recent mechanic, blown my gasket.

I got home from the hospital on Sunday from a Sinus scan and as i parked i heard this sizzle. I checked the floor and u saw this lovely puddle, well it seemed that way.
My bottle was still with coolant... but it was under he min mark. About 750 mils.

Strange enough though i drove the car 10 kilometers and it stood outside the new mechanic-to-be's house and there was not a puddle on the ground i really dont get it.

Anyways i did clean it before i took it to him and i also started it in my driveway and let it idle andi did see water leaking on to the exhaust or through it, kind of exactly where the fork part starts on the car....hard to say exactly where, but left middle back....standing in front of the car. I crawled under atfer jacking the car up but.
With my experience and from what i could see in the left over light of the afternoon, was no pipes leaking but i did see what looked to be the water coming from the block or the engine , the metal , so i dont know .

really sad about it.

The thing is i didnt hear anything weird about the engine and i didnt feel anything strange, and i also didnt lack any power , i mean besides that it is old for 285k on the clock. I dont know....

and last year i had blown my gasket and i drive home it was jurking a little and then smoothish and then jurking and i definitely saw white-looking smoke.... though it was 8 at night and no light at that time.
I can confirm that my mechanic at that time whom i was going to for 12 years, had fixed it for me but he did it to save me the money which i appreciated, so there was no engineering involved and he did feel that it was fine.

I mean thats why i dont understant that it is broken now, but i have to trust the mechanic i have taken my car too...


Some guys on the forum told me to check my heater valve, but i dont now what / where it is or what it looks like... can it be that ?

Remember, Fred,long ago i did a heater matrix bypass because my footwell was getting leaked on to... so instead of hassling to replace the heater matrix radiator....we just did a bypass -never a leak again ever!...
BUT as time went on then bloody hell i dont know but i was looking water slowly...and it was especially noticed when i was in bumper to bumper traffic.

please comment and feedback on what i have said and give me your 69 cents