Head Gasket questions

I fear my head gasket may be showing early signs of going bad. My car never over heats, doesn't smoke, or any of that crap. But I noticed some gray crap under my radiator cap :frown:. So I was wanting to jump on this asap. The motor still runs real strong and I've not had any problems yet. If the motor has never over heated or had any of those problems would machine work to the head or block still be needed? Also, how much do you guys think a shop will charge me? If it costs too much I think I'm just going to put my body work off to the side for now and do a dohc zc swap.

oh, and this is for my d16a6.

It might be that some deposits in the cooling passages have come unlodged and relocated to the cap. Go run a compression check to find out if any of the cylinders have gone bad yet.

It might be that some deposits in the cooling passages have come unlodged and relocated to the cap.

What kind of deposits?

What kind of deposits?

Over time the metal in the passages starts to corrode. This is something that always happens and why old radiator fluid turns a funky orange / other odd not good color from the rust particles.

well the gunky stuff on my rad cap smells like petro.

Well, the compression test it is!! You could always do an oil change and see if there is coolant floating around in it.

i did do an oil change and didnt see any coolant.

if you do need a headgasket (though your car sounds ok) get one for a D16Z6 or D16Y8. They are metal and a little thinner than stock (little higher compression but nothing crazy). Even honda dealers are using these head gaskets on rebuilt A6's from what i've heard.

Get a radiator flush done at a Firestone or local place like that. It's about $60 I believe and it'll be worth it probably for you. Did you ever over heat the car at all? I overheated my crx cause a hose leaked and it took about a month for the headgasket to finally go. It ran fine and didn't smoke but sooner before that I was noticing the coolant level getting low, oil in the resivoir and the radiator.

nope, never overheated. im thinking on just doing the zc swap.

you guys have any idea how much a swap would charge for the head gasket?

I was once told it would be around 4-5 hours of labor minimum, so take an average shop rate x that.

I wouldn't worry about ur motor. I sounds to me like it's doing just fine. Those deposits are normal from a 13-17 yr. old car. Just do a compression test and that'll tell you whats up. I just think ur over reacting. Just take out ur radiator and run the hose at full blast thru it or just use a powerwasher to blast out the deposits.

More then likely a "Leak Down Test" would probably give you a better result, then a C/T in this case. The leak would have to be pretty big, in order to show-up on a compression test. Exspecially when cylinder differances can be as much as 28 psi, between the four...