Blown head gasket?

[jaybee]

The wife's 95 Windstar 3.8L suddenly decided to blow all the water out of the cooling system into the overflow bottle.  It's a nasty brown color and at the time was foamy.  Hmmm, a Ford 3.8L with blown head gasket, not a big stretch.  I haven't pulled it apart yet but did a compression test tonight.  Results are 1 cyl @ 140psi, 1 @ 130, 2 @ 135, and 2 @ 115...but not adjacent.  The plugs all look alike and none are wet.  The lowest 2 cylinders (3 and 6) are 82% of the highest and therefore within spec.  I had some stop leak in it to deal with a weepy timing cover gasket and wonder if it plugged the leak...temporarily of course.  There is no water in the oil nor oil in the water.  I can't think of any alternatives other than head gasket, am I overlooking another possibility?

[purplepickup]

I had a problem a while back with casting porosity in the ZZ motor in my pickup and had to change blocks.  Hope you don't have to go there.  Hopefully yours is something simple.

[dragrcr50]

as a retired service manager at a ford dealer i would say the statement about a leaking timing cover is a tell tale sign of a blown head gasket as well as usually they would have been wet enough to be in the pan and  have bearing problems as well with that particular automobile, good luck...........sw

[wayne petty]

i have found out that those motors only go 103K- 110K on head gaskets and timing cover gaskets.... i have also seen a lot of timing cover gaskets leak.... so i automaticly replace them.... when doing the heads...

i always use hylomar on the head gaskets.... available from goodson...

and lately... i have found several with clogged cats.... so while the heads are off... take the shop vacuum or compressed air and blow backwards through the tail pipe...  cover the motor... so you dont blow expencive hard metal fragmemts into any openings...the front part of the honeycombs turn to powder and block the cats...  blowing backwards frees it up and removes it from the system....

and the biggest problem that i have found... is the coolant bleeder bolt/screw on the top of the intake manifold heater hose fitting..... the white round plastic warning sign that says to bleed it here degrades and leaks under pressure... just a tiny leak.... not even visable...  the fan blows any coolant off... but when the engine cools off... the coolant contracts and it lets air in...  take out the bleeder bolt... clean the threads...  clean the bleeder hole... replace the plastic warning with a 14MM id opaque nylon oil drain plug gasket... and install the old ring over the hex head to remind other techs...

oh... and i think that motor uses bungie head bolts that need to be replaced...or they will break later on...    

to test for bungie bolts... put them together overlapping the threads completely...  if they fit together perfectly they are not used bungie bolts...    bungie bolts do not streach in the block... only above the block...so only have the threads will be pulled ...

bungie bolts real name is torque to yeald... fastners...


hope this helps.....  


wayne...

[jaybee]

Thanks for the feedback, that explains a lot.  I've already replaced head gaskets on this motor once, 110,000mi ago.  They went early on this car and I was unaware of the "secret recall" they had on early 3.8s.  The timing cover started leaking shortly thereafter.  It was tough to find, too.  I knew it was leaking somewhere because when it was hot you would sometimes catch a whiff of antifreeze smell after you stopped the engine.  About once per minute it would drip from right between the timing cover and belt tensioner directly between the cat converter and the heat shield so nothing ever hit the hit the ground.  And only under pressure so I had to pressurize the system to 15psi with shop air to make it leak while I went underneath to look.  It used maybe a quart of coolant per month so every 2-3mo I had to put more coolant into the overflow, but it didn't get bad enough to suck air.  With a leak that small and the prospect of taking everything off the front of the moter I figured stop leak was a good solution, at least until I had some other reason to undress the front of the engine.  Yes, it has torque to yield bolts.  One positive, I put everything back together with blue Loctite or antisieze so it should easier go get apart.