What kind of life after new head gaskets?

Pearl Red XR7

Registered User
I have read the many posts about how and when to change head gaskets, but I am wondering what to do after I get them in the car. Do I baby the car for a few hundred miles, do I crank it up and do a few 0 to 60 runs to expose them to what the real word will be like? I rember after I had the lower end of my GTA rebuilt I could not floor it for the 1st 500 miles (god that was hard) I had to speed up and coast down change my speed often. Thank you in advance for the info.
 
life after head gasket sucks... ur pretty much broke... and just drive the car normally like if it was a lil GEO METRO... take the belt off ur blower to prevent u from doing anything stupid.... thats what i am gonna do... for the first 500 miles...
 
There is NO break in...Maybe let the engine warm up and cool down once.Either they seal or you have other issues..IE warped or cracked head.
 
My head gaskets were done on Wed and I raced it on Sat. I wondered about that, too, but if they're done right there's no problem.
 
Drive carefully for about the first 50 miles to be sure you didn't screw something up when reassembling, but the HGs themselves don't require break in. Mine didn't. However, I had problems with hoses that weren't tightened enough. :)
 
Sweet!! Thank you guys for the input. Wish me luck this weekend for the rebuild. I warped one head 0.04 and had one exhuast valve leaking, I'm being charged $160 for the testiing and other work. After all said and done I might get out of this for under $500!
 
Failure

Well I have failed at installing new head gaskets on my car. After 30+ hours of work and a lot of money it is running worse that befor. After the new head gaskets it has water in the oil and a horrible miss and makes puddles behind the exhuast tips. I feel so dumb, as I really thought I could do this. oh well.
 
Sounds like your head gaskets are leaking again and if you now have coolant in your oil your bearings are now shot. Dont give up and good luck!

Shane
 
quick35th said:
Sounds like your head gaskets are leaking again and if you now have coolant in your oil your bearings are now shot. Dont give up and good luck!

Shane
How quick do the bearings go? I only ran it for about five min, with no load. the oil is still fairly dark.
 
Pearl Red XR7 said:
How quick do the bearings go? I only ran it for about five min, with no load. the oil is still fairly dark.

I couldn't tell you how quick they would go but its probably better safe than to be sorry later on down the road a few thousand miles and you spin a bearing.

Shane
 
Jumped to conclusions

Pearl Red XR7 said:
Well I have failed at installing new head gaskets on my car. After 30+ hours of work and a lot of money it is running worse that befor. After the new head gaskets it has water in the oil and a horrible miss and makes puddles behind the exhuast tips. I feel so dumb, as I really thought I could do this. oh well.


The water in the oil was leftover from the tear down; I wanted to run it for a few min to make sure I was not leaking anything badly so I did not change the oil right after. It just slipped my mind there would be a little water in the oil.

.The miss was a plug wire off a plug as well as mutable vacuum leaks and a wire being pinched between the intake plenum and intake manifold. After two weekends I finally got all the bugs worked out of it. Then she started to purr like the cat it is.

I still have no clue about the water coming out of the exhaust; it stopped after like 15 min and has not returned.

The real lesson I learned from this is: Do not work an 8 hour shift then work an extra 15 hours on your car and think it will fire right up with out the use of strong drugs. lol

I now declare the head gasket install a 100% success.
 
Pearl Red XR7 said:
The water in the oil was leftover from the tear down; I wanted to run it for a few min to make sure I was not leaking anything badly so I did not change the oil right after. It just slipped my mind there would be a little water in the oil.

.The miss was a plug wire off a plug as well as mutable vacuum leaks and a wire being pinched between the intake plenum and intake manifold. After two weekends I finally got all the bugs worked out of it. Then she started to purr like the cat it is.

I still have no clue about the water coming out of the exhaust; it stopped after like 15 min and has not returned.

The real lesson I learned from this is: Do not work an 8 hour shift then work an extra 15 hours on your car and think it will fire right up with out the use of strong drugs. lol

I now declare the head gasket install a 100% success.
good job......now arnt u glad u didnt give up.
 
Ack... don't leave coolant in your engine oil. The coolant will get mixed with the oil (as much as it can) and get pushed through the lubricating system and into the bearings. It'll overheat in the bearing rapidly since it doesn't lubricate anything, and leave acidic deposits that damage the bearings.
 
Mike8675309 said:
Ack... don't leave coolant in your engine oil. The coolant will get mixed with the oil (as much as it can) and get pushed through the lubricating system and into the bearings. It'll overheat in the bearing rapidly since it doesn't lubricate anything, and leave acidic deposits that damage the bearings.

It was only in there for like 5 min. (at idle no load on motor) after I was sure that evreything was holding I changed the oil and filter. After I ran that "fresh" oil for 2 days, I changed the oil and filter again. The oil was never really light in color so it could not have been much water it start with. I do agree that prolonged running with a water/oil mix will put you on your feet walking. All is fine now. Also I have drained and refilled the cooling system 2 times (with water for the 1st time) as well just to be safe.
 
water out exhaust

did you remember to use thread sealant on the intake bolt ..or the one that calls for it..it will flow... like a river if not ....dave
 
when my hg went i drove it prob 3 miles home with water in the oil , i coasted as much as possible i changed hg and oil ran it about 30 miles then changed oil again , that was 20k miles ago and no bearing trouble yet going on 225 k miles. one time i put a hg on a honda and drove it for about 4 miles and it was still steaming out the exhaust , i tore the head back off and found no problems , i believe it was just burning the old coolant out of the muffler
 
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MercsSC said:
did you remember to use thread sealant on the intake bolt ..or the one that calls for it..it will flow... like a river if not ....dave

Um...I don't think I did. :confused: I did not use any sealant on any of the bolts. What bolt needs it? I have the 3.8 N/A (the weak motor).
 
i dont remember using any sealant but its been about 2 years im thinking on the passenger rear one of the bolts may have had some teflon on it i just put it back in the same hole i had no prob with that on sc or na 3.8 ive done
 
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