Blew the rad,and the headgasket!!

Pilkie

Pilkie

Active Member
Hi all.
As some of you know the V8 blew its rad on arrival at Stoneleigh on sunday. :(
Fortunately it was at the top so didnt loose too much water,but LOTS of steam!!
Managed to get home the 80 miles with 2 stops to check and top up.
It seems the reason was the headgasket that I have suspected for some time has decided to leak a bit more.
At least I hope it is and not a cracked head!!
I have replaced the rad with a s/h recon one I had in stock,and thats cured that!!
But it doesnt take long for the pressure to build up,but will not blow the pressure cap.
However when I leave the car for 15mins,then go to start,it jams up,wont turn over,so its is obvious that water under pressure has leaked into a cylinder!!
Before I do any serious damage,when I get to my destination I release the pressure and all seems well when I then start it later on.
I have all the bits in stock to do the job,but am first thinking of bunging a bottle of K-seal head sealer in and see what happens!!
Have any of you had any good or bad experiences with head sealing products?
What do you recommend as good or to avoid using?

Cheers Dave
 
i've had no personal experience, but looked and researched a lot because the K series has an HG leak from the back of the gasket (it just dribbles out when it's cold)

Cross-forum internet average seems to be it's a get-you-home job. I've not put it in the midget because of the risk of bunging up the already small parts of the K and the heater matrix. It's a right pain in the rear to get out as well, apparently.

Mind, for every horror story there are a few who swear by it, and some who run it in the system so it takes care of any leaks.

It apparently uses copper bits that melt together in the high pressure bits that arise when there's a leak.

that might not have been very helpful actally :|
 
doesnt always last that long but in terms of buying you space to do stuff in your own time it's fine. used it on the advice of grimv8
 
My sons K series 1.6 Rover had the rear of headgasket leak, bunged in some K-seal as he was only running it to the test was out, (it had lots of other issues, non safety) and it was still OK 3,000 miles later as it drove onto the low loader on the way to becoming Chinese fridges. I would have to think long and hard about putting it in a car I liked though.


John.
 
It will only be a temp fix,as I dont want to tie up the drive or garage with a stripdown as the MG is due back from the paintshop and has to be reunited with the chassis this weekend!!
I can at least use the TR6 while the rover undergoes heart surgery,but I dont want to put the rover under the MG,"on the ramp" and leave the TR6 outside at night!
Will give it a dose of K-seal in the morning,give it a run,and see how it goes.
 
Hi pilkie , why not bypass the heater matrix with a piece of pipe if it;s only a temp fix ? save filing that up with the stuff , as it's not as easy to remove /flush out as the rad .
 
Right,engine ran up to temp,k-seal bunged in and water topped up,allowed to tickover for 15mins to circulate.
Lets see if it works and how long it lasts!
 
I'm a bit doubtful that this is a good idea if the leak is big enough to cause a piston to hydraulically lock. Youi run the risk of bending a con-rod or worse.I've used Bars Leaks etc on a Cortina that had a crack in the head but only enough to cause it to misfire on starting
until the plug dried off .Even then it only worked for a month or two
 
Sorry to hear of the miss hap, wishing you luck that it may sort you out till a permenant fix is done :)
 
Update!!
After I had replaced the rad,I got lock up problems almost every time I left it for 15mins after a nip up the road.
Today put the K seal in and have not had 1 instance of lockup,even after a 5m drive and then leaving it for the afternoon.
As long as it lasts till next week,that will do for me.
 
Hi

Was your car the white 3500 parked at stoneleigh ?
if so, I noticed you had replaced the door to glass seals ( rear nearside ). Which ones did you use JRW or Scott's ?
How do you find them ?
I have bought the JRW's but not yet fitted. I am a bit disappointed with the look of them and also that you have to cut them yourself.

Pat
 
Hi Pat.
Yep that was probably mine,was parked close to the entrance door from about 11am,after moving it from where it overheated.
TBH I dont know who they were from,but I can tell you I didnt like them,but had nothing else at the time.
They have no stiffness to them,its just a strip of extruded moulded rubber.
The ones I have now got are from Scotts I believe and are pretty firm,sadly I got them after doing a full strip and repaint last year,so havent got round to fitting them yet,but they will need slight trimming to fit,"use the original as a guide for trimming before fitting if theres enough left of it!",not like the ones on there now that had to be carefully cut,and will distort if the securing fixings are put on too tight!
I can tell you that if you can get some seals from a Vauxhall Omega,they look VERY similar to original shape,just need trimming down for a great fit!
Regards Dave
 
I'm looking at using this on my 03 BMW 320: http://www.steelseal.co.uk/steel-seal-- ... ir-1-p.asp

The (now ex-)girlfriend decided that she wanted to drive my car while I'm in Afghanistan to keep the miles down on her new Audi coupe.. fan relay went, so instead of leaving the car alone, she removed the fuse and kept driving it. Hit a traffic jam, blew the overflow bottle from top to bottom and damaged the head gasket. As it's a cheap runabout for when I'm home, I'll put some steel seal in when next back and continue to use it until the engine dies completely.

Although if the SD1 is ready, I'll be using that this time :)
 
Hi Pilkie,

When you replace the head gasket, will you fit the new one dry or use a sealant? I have seen arguments both for and against.

Ron.
 
Hello Pilkie, do we know what caused your head gasket to fail initially, it would be interesting to see what you find when you take the offending head off. If it was overheating then maybe your thermostat is faulty in not opening fully or not at all, will you be checking/replacing this, or possibly your water pump impeller/vanes worn?? usually overheating causes the head gasket to fail, did you notice any rise in temp prior to failure or maybe it was a faulty gasket? Either way it will be interesting to see what you find.

Hi Ron, (nice to have you back) I'm also sourcing a decent head gasket set for my engine rebuild and last one I obtained (here in Australia) was a VRS composite gasket set which I fitted to my P6B when I last did the heads on it. As the composites were a graphite based material I was a bit loathe to fit them dry so I used a smear of silver anti-sieze compound when fitting them, I was going to use the original tin gaskets but on hearing the composite ones give a better seal I opted for those, if I recall they had copper seal ring at the outer row of head bolt holes only (why just those I don't know) anyhow they looked the same as the Rimmer Bros picture of their composite gaskets. I'm wondering what other reputable branded sets are available such as Elring or Victor Reinz etc, I believe the VRS gasket sets available here in Oz are indeed Victor Reinz product??? as the last VRS set I had, had Victor Reinz packaged exhaust manifold gaskets so was wondering if a fully branded Victor Reinz set is available down under??? My latest offering sourced by my engine reconditioner had a rear main oil seal that was 1mm narrower than what came out, so I'm a bit dubious about using it and will take it back and see if he is amiable to try and source an alternative with correct width oil seal, The seal was black as opposed to the "Gaco" orange one that came out, Q. Where they originally (the orange one) a viton material used?

below pic are the (four packets off) exhaust manifold gaskets supplied in my last VRS gasket set, thay look to be a good quality make (packet doesn't actually say made in Germany, but Victor Rienz is a German company, could be made in china to their specs for all i know) it is a three layered steel gasket finely spot welded together, so would like to know if a full gasket set is available from them???

IMG_5116.jpg


IMG_5114.jpg


it was the first time I had seen these compared to what is usually supplied in an aftermarket rover gasket set

IMG_5117.jpg


As much as i have googled so far I haven't as yet been able to pin down an actual Victor Rienz gasket set for the rover V8 (indeed if such a set is available) but I'm waiting for a response from Elring supplier in UK to see if they do one for the V8.
Scott
 
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