HEAD GASKET Bora 2.8 experience...anybody?

[BOR444]

Anybody blown a head gasket on the bora V6 before or seen the aftermath? Any obvious tell tale signs?

[Umai Naa!!]

What are the symptoms you're experiencing with it?

[BOR444]

Start from beginning...
So I bought a 4 motion with the diagnosis being the injector drives faulty in the ECU. All indicators pointed to this when I took possession as it was pissing out fuel from the exhaust ad running rough. So I bought another ECU and with the wonderful help of Gav from" OPTIMUM CODE" he switched the ignition chips and coded the ECU to working order. I then installed the new ECU and It ran better but still horrible! Took it for a drive and it didn't have the power to get up the hill to get back my house. Blowing white/grey smoke and when I checked the coolant resivour it had lots of tiny bubbles in it. Next point of call was to check coils and plugs to see if any moisture/ coolant was visible but strange enough there was not even a sceric of moisture? Oil seems fine without any visible signs of water or moisture mixed in.
So that's where I am at the moment. I'm baffled really as some signs say yes it's head and some signs say not really?

Dev.

[Umai Naa!!]

Could always do compression and leak-down tests, and maybe test the coolant for carbon monoxide contamination.

[dylan8]

Has it been scanned yet With the new ecu?

[BOR444]

Has it been scanned yet With the new ecu?

Mate i have not scanned after new ecu install, the codes before we cleared where-

[CraigR]

If it had blown a head gasket, you'd have a nice white milkshake under your oil cap, and the temperature would be going north.

[Bora Sport]

The easiest way to diagnose this is to go to a radiator shop. They can test for exhaust gas in the coolant as suggested by Umai Naa!!. Bubbles in the coolant and steam out the exhaust are other signs. Generally a blown head gasket will pressurise the radiator/and the coolant level will go down and the temperature will go up.

You won't tell anything by looking at the coils but you might be able to suss something by looking at the condition/colour of the park plug electrodes. You don't necessarily have to have water in the oil with a blown head gasket. It depends where the gasket has failed.

[Umai Naa!!]

Spot on.

The last one I did, failed at the combustion chamber. So low compression, but no milkshake in the coolant. The combustion pressure just pumped the coolant out the overflow bottle.

[beale187]

I'll be following this one closely Dev as I think mine head gasket went kaput yesterday also.

[Bora Sport]

They're not something that typically fails unless they overheat. You should get heaps of warnings of either low coolant or high engine temperature. I remember fanging up a mountain in summer here in Queensland with the air on. I didn't realise that the radiator fans had died. It started beeping at me and flashing messages to stop etc. etc.

So I did. And luckily no damage done.

[beale187]

On similar topic, once the head is off for repairs anybody have any mods they think it would be worth doing?

[beale187]

btw Dev i've got the diagrams for head gasket replacement if you need them.

[BOR444]

Cheers Michael,
I am currently working on two 4Motions at the moment
My Black one needs the tappet cover gaskets replaced as the seals failed around the plugs and coils drowning them in oil, and my silver one still needs proper diagnosis before i can go any further. It is frustrating AF!

Dev.

[beale187]

tappet cover gaskets

Common problem I think, my V5 had the same issue.

haha I bought a 4mo (black) as a spare from work, then my daily (white) cooked itself yesterday. Glad to see I'm not the only tragic out there with 2 4mo's. Neither of which work.