nhzero

It's been a few years, but to update everyone, it ended up being a pinhole leak in the head gasket such that when the cylinder was under pressure, gas leaked significantly into the coolant system, but very little coolant got into the cylinder under negative pressure. I know because the only person I could find to do the work was a shadetree mechanic in Oxnard, and he showed me the tracks on the head and through the gasket where you could see the line from the leakage. Unfortunately, the guy racked up $250 in parking tickets on my car and then destroyed the valves by improperly synchronizing the timing chain when he put it back together, so from my perspective, three different shops turned down my $3000 job that I really, really, wanted them to do, and this jerk ended up costing me over $11,000 in a totally lost vehicle that I can't sue for because he's broke. Moral of the story: H6-3.0 engines are not immune from head gasket issues, but when they do have them, they are *tough* engines. There was very minimal machining required on the heads even after overheating 10-15 times.

FYI, it has now degenerated to the point that the bubbles are coming into the overflow within 30 second of starting the car, and the alternator heats up and starts having voltage regulator breakdown (headlights surge bright and battery lights on dash flicker) within 5-10 minutes of starting. If I drive 30-60 mph with low revs, I can get it to drive around 60 miles before the temp starts climbing. The reason I'm updating is that I've now had it in three shops, and all don't want to change the head gasket since they can't find coolant in the oil or see white smoke in the exhaust. Can't trade it in since it smells like a glycol factory, but can't afford another one outright. I'm a little stuck. Anyone know a shop in NW Los Angeles or Ventura County that will actually DO the work, preferably for a reasonable cost, but after 6 months of this, just doing the work at all would be nice...

If you decide to junk the car, I'll pay the cost for dropping the engine and shipping it to me. I can't get my shop to repair my head gasket, and I can't find an H6 motor around here for anything...

My normal shop (excellent shop, by the way, won't do work until they see positive proof the car needs it!) triple checked it for hydrocarbons with the chemical check in the coolant: zero hydrocarbons. They also rolled the dice and used the California smog machine: zero issues. It now fills the overflow tank and has 1/4" bubbles rolling out of the overflow line at the rate of about 1 per second within 10 minutes of starting the car. The mechanic has seen the bubbles, but won't pull the engine to do the head gasket because he says he doesn't have any indication of a head gasket leak. The car still has great power, especially when the coolant is full, but when it gets low, there is some minor roughness, and the alternator problem show up. He wants me to continue driving it and mark down how often I add coolant, even though I gave him a good log of the 4 gallons I added previously. Should I just clean the engine and pawn it off to a dealer? I hate to do this to someone else...

I love that you are asking about what career you should have in order to buy a specific car. When I was 17 in 1994, I wanted a new Civic EX. I ended up getting a 1994 Civic - in 1999. Do what you love in a way that will pay your bills. Will that require some compromises? Absolutely. One of those compromises is that you will never be able to buy every (or sometimes even ANY) new car that you desire. That's the way life rolls...

Replaced cap twice - both OEM & same issues. I don't think it's the cap.

I got home late last night due to the blessing of mild temperatures and few hills on Hwy 101 South. This is particularly providential as the King City area is not known for mild July temps. I lost around 4 gallons of coolant via the overflow weep hole from SF to Ventura County. On steep hills I had a surging alternator (headlights would go bright with brake/battery trouble lights flickering) when the coolant was low, but beyond that, if I kept coolant levels up it did pretty well, although it did get progressively worse. Still no oil loss, white smoke, or coolant in the oil. It's in the shop now; I'll let you know how it turns out.

Replaced the radiator cap with the flush in Fresno and again in Mt. Shasta. Both OEM. I'm now in the Bay Area. I ended up doing very well until the high spot at Willits on Hwy 101. I then had it climb uncontrollably even with max heat and fan, so I stopped for an hour and added about 3 quarts of water. It has done very well on everything other than hills, especially with A/C Fans are fine. If anything, they are turning on too soon as they start within 30 seconds of starting the engine warm. The mechanic in Mt. Shasta told me it held a pressure test, but then later it sounded like he only did a chemical test for exhaust, which he said came out negative. Coolant does NOT gets sucked back in properly on cooling. Here's what I've come up with: a) coolant looses about 2.5 quarts per 4 hours of driving, all out the overflow no coolant in the oil c) no white smoke that I can see d) A/C makes it worse e) runs okay briefly after filling up the radiator, but it doesn't take an hour before I have to turn off the A/C on hills f) temps over 80F make things much worse, which may be why I never noticed this problem driving at ~50mph on surface streets of Ventura County.

2001 Outback VDC, 108k total miles. Tricked out, all options. Had this car about 8 months (from 89k) with no real issues beyond topping up the coolant by about 1/2 quart a few months ago. This week while going over the Grapevine pass, I had the car overheat with large amounts of bubbles coming out into the overflow tank. I limped into Fresno and replaced the thermostat and all hoses, as well as flushing the coolant. It got to just before Mt. Shasta, where the overflow was bubbling again about 5 minutes before the passenger top hose nipple cracked off the radiator. CHP gave me the "best shop in town," where they swore up and down that they couldn't find any trace of exhaust gas in the coolant and they couldn't in good concience replace my head gaskets because they never go out and there were no indications. They replaced the radiator, thermostat (again, and OEM, again), and put in new coolant, with conditioner. They drove it up the mountain and swore it was strong. I got halfway over Grayback pass when the coolant smelled again. Lots of bubbles in the overflow, added 2.5 quarts of coolant, and it made it to Oregon Caves. Now it starts to push 3/4 temp any time I head up any kind of hills. I'm seriously close to calling this car a wash, but I know if I try to trade in a car 750 miles from home I'll get bent over. Should I push the head gasket through the I-5 again, try Hwy 101, or just spend a couple days trying to get a different car? Thanks! Nate