Quote:
Are you ignoring the fact his engine oil is disapearing?
To the OP, oil pressure is higher than water pressure, so depending on where the systems are leaking into each other the flow could be all one way.
It's also possible for a headgasket to blow, but still have perfect cylinder pressure. And it's also possible for the cooling system to still work as well.
How much oil is it using?, is the coolent milky?
|
But my oil *isn't* disappearing. After replacing the coolant about 5 days ago it looks mostly healthy but with a touch of oil to it.
I guess I should have mentioned the spark plugs were a bit black but from the looks of them they have never been changed in 169k miles.
Quote:
|
The spark plug would probably show signs of coolant in the cylinder. You might just have brown ugly coolant in you car. You should be able to tell by just dipping your finger or a with paper towel in the coolant while either slighty warm or cold. The coolant would have an oil slick on top. Is oil disappearing? What is the exhaust pipe look like? What color of smoke or steam comes out the exhaust?
|
I'm going to go buy a manual today and see what is up with the car since it's not exhibiting any of the symptoms to suggest headgasket (primarily a tendency to overheat, coolant in the oil, or the smell of lean exhaust/white smoke).
The exhaust pipe just looks old and rustyish but that's the nature of the beast on these cars.
I have previously blown a headgasket on my DSM so I know what a car looks/feels like when it's at the end of its life. After looking in my coolant today and seeing just a little more dark in there (along with the smell of oil) I rechecked the oil and found..zero coolant still. And the car still had the correct amount of oil in it.
However, I went with Ninja7's advice (and the Haynes after finding the cars have Automatic Transmission Fluid coolers in the radiator) and actaully looked at the automatic transmission to find that there was a little coolant in there. It's not terribly low on fluid but it's low enough that it probably has a leak in the radiator that's been going on for a while. Mix that with an extremely old coolant system that hasn't been flushed and Ta-da..."oil" in coolant.
Problem soon to be solved with a $50 radiator.
Thanks for the help everyone,
Daniel
