Head gasket?

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Kloofvreter

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My car is giving trouble and I'm already expecting the worst. It started overheating (I pulled over every time the guage hit 3/4) and losing coolant and developed a missfire. There is no coolant leak that I know of (none dripping anywhere that I can see), the oil is still clear, and the coolant is still clear (they are not mixing). There is no smoke or funny smells anywhere. Head gasket?

(BTW 2000 BMW 323i E46, so were talking money here :eek:)
 
thedutchman said:
maybe there is some blockage or something in the pipes.
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Would a blockage cause a missfire and coolant loss? :confused:

news24 said:
Is your radiator fan working?

EDIT: I pretend to know something about cars but I don't know jack
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This is not such a stupid question! :) My radiator fan was in fact not working, and I don't know for how long it was not working. Got that sorted, but didn't fix the problem. It might be the cause of the problem though. :eek: :mad: I made sure the car's temperature never goes above 3/4 (it's usually on 1/2). The coolant loss I cannot explain, neither the misfire.

But who knows, perhaps a gasket can blow in such a way that the oil and coolant doesn't mix?
 
When you say the oil is clear, where are you checking? Best place to see if water is getting in your oil is on the oil filler cap. Take it off and check on the inside of the cap, if there are white spots on the cap, probably a damaged gasket. Otherwise, it might just be as simple as a faulty water pump.
 
Are you losing power? That's a big symptom of a head gasket going (loss of compression), isn't it?

I used to have a '84 BMW 318i (not that it's anything like yours) and it lost power and was overheating. Turned out it was indeed the head gasket. In fact, it was a combo of the gasket going, and overheat causing the aluminium head of the beemer itself to buckle. End result - catastrophic engine failure.
 
I had a problem with overheating on a merc, went to silverton radiators in pretoria, they used some gadget to check the pressure, result will either be radiator problem or head gasket. mine was the bad news and after few months the good news also had to done...
 
Another tell-tale sign to look out for when assessing if the head gasket is gone, is to inspect the spark plugs - if one looks very different to the rest (typically very clean compared to the others) then it's fair confirmation that the head gasket is gone.
And a compression test as mentioned by others would also be a good idea.
 
The top was taken off today, gasket blown in four places. Head went for testing, still fine thank fsck. This was caused by the radiator fan failing, which in turn caused the expansion tank to burst and somewhere along the line the gasket went as well.
 
Slootvreter said:
The top was taken off today, gasket blown in four places. Head went for testing, still fine thank fsck. This was caused by the radiator fan failing, which in turn caused the expansion tank to burst and somewhere along the line the gasket went as well.
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Make sure you check the pressure relief arrangement in the cap - it should not have allowed the pressurisation and damage to the expansion tank.
 
AAAAH ok so it was the cylinder head and the head gasket :mad: All nicely fixed now. Now I have to fix the hole in my wallet :( :o
 
Slootvreter said:
AAAAH ok so it was the cylinder head and the head gasket :mad: All nicely fixed now. Now I have to fix the hole in my wallet :( :o
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Probably a big one? BMW = BMtroubleu.

I had a 318I 2003. Had endless electrical problems. Would missfire, central locking won't open. Everyone had to get into the drivers door. (Not funny if you are at a shopping mall)

The agents could not find anything. I kept on replacing coilpacks. One day the fuel pump packed up. Replaced that and voila, all the other problems disappeared. I quickly sold it. Just show if one small electrical thing is faulty, it will affect other items.
 
Head gasket isn't a big deal unless it warps the cylinder. It's only 1-2000 to replace by itself. But you need to catch it very early because if it warps the cylinder you're talking another few thousand to have it smoothed. I had exactly the same thing - radiator leak caused the gasket to blow, car was overheating, loss of power, etc ('88 316i). Luckily it was caught in time.
 
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