Stangatic

Hello All,
I recently freshened up a 302 engine that I had in my 66 mustang and believe the block may be cracked or the heads are warped. What do you think?

The 302 was re-manufactured and only has 5,000 miles on it. It has 10.5 compression ration, a mild cam, 500 elderbrock carb, performer intake, and everything else is stock. About 7 years ago I took the car to the track and over revved on a shift. Unfortunately, a rocker stud broke and so did a valve on #5. Fortunately the valve wedged itself in between another valve and didn't nick the pistons. Before I knew how to work on cars, I took the engine to a mechanic to have it fixed, but things were never right with the engine was after that. It consistently blew oil out the tail pipe and I even found oil in the intake. To make a long story short, 6 years ago, I took the engine out, sat it in the corner of the garage, and replaced it with another engine that recently died on me.

About 2 months ago, I thought I would break down the old engine to see what could have caused all the issues and found out that when the mechanic did the work to the driver side head, he reused the head gasket and put a load of gasket sealant on the head gasket. I instantly knew that this was causing all the oil problems. I went on further to inspect the engine and noted that there was extremely lite wear on the cylinder walls. I assumed that all I would have to do is put new head gaskets on and everything would be fixed.

Well..... I started the engine Monday and smoke started to billow out of the breather on the heads. I thought that this could be something wrong with the PCV valve, but checked all that. Then yesterday, I realized that the smoke coming out of the engine was not smoke from oil and appears to be smoke from water since it's basically steam and evaporates really quickly. I also saw that the exhaust gases are clear as can be so no oil is getting out that end. I checked to see if I had any water in the radiator and saw that basically 1 gallon+ was gone. My only assumption now is that the head may be warped and is allowing the water to go straight into the engine or the block is cracked. Does anyone have any suggestions?

mjr46

did you check the oil...ie pull the dipstick and see if the oil is all milky??? also you should of never reassembled the motor without having the head deck surface checked and the valve guides checked for wear.... but that's hindsight now

Stangatic

I did check the oil but didn't see anything and I believe that is because I filled up the radiator with straight water to make sure that there were no leaks during initial fire up and so that the paint on the engine doesn't get destroyed if there were to be a leak.

Do you know how much a place would charge for checking the head deck surface and valve guides? There is an engine builder close to where I live and I planned on stopping by there tomorrow, but want to know what a good price range is if I go that route.

mjr46

should be under 50 bucks, where in MD are you??

Stangatic

Southern Maryland, Calvert County. Thanks for the info! I will give this a try before dishing out a couple grand on a new engine.

mjr46

first I'd find out where the coolant is going before tearing it apart, pressure test the system to see if it drops pressure and if no external leaks are seen , while still having the system under pressure, pull all the plugs and rotate the motor over by hand and see if there is any coolant/water collecting in a cylinder = internal issue, normally I'd use coolant and when it burns in the cumbustion process it'll make clouds of smoke if it's a bad internal issue and green is easy to see coming out/ in the cylinders if doing the process by hand as I stated

Stangatic

I will definitely give that a try! Hopefully that will narrow things down.

Thanks!

decipha

if you are getting water mixed in the combustion chamber you can find which cylinder it is rather easy since the piston will be 'steam cleaned' if you have access to a bore-scope you can pull each plug one at a time and take a look in there