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Old 12-16-2014, 12:26 PM   #25
hdhype
 
Join Date: Nov 2011
Location: Georgia
Posts: 37
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hdhype is an unknown quantity at this point
It's embarrasing, but I'll write out everything about what happened, so others may save themselves the trouble of shooting. It was a long case of multiple problems producing the same symptom.

During a rebuild, I didn't take the time to chase the threads in the block for the head bolts. Because I didn't do this, and since I was using head studs, it's possible to have the stud not sit all the way into the block. What happens is that when you tighted the head down, you will notice that some of the studs sit higher than others. I didn't notice this at first, but this is important.

While torquing down the head, I don't remember feeling like I had stripped any of the threads, my wrench was clicking that I had reached the right amount. (I think it was 80lbs). Long story short, I decided to rebuild my engine to help fix/upgrade it. I noticed that a few of the head studs felt loose and easy to take out. This leaves me to believe that they had came loose(stripped the threads). This produced some weired symptoms.

While checking the coolant, I didn't notice any significant amount of bubbles while idle, or by simply tugging on the throttle. Just the random bubble every once-once-in-a-while, which I thought was just small amounts of trapped air. I imagine under load and boosting, it produces more bubbles.

The coolant resivior keept filling up and not going back in, which is also a sign of a blown headgasket. I kept telling myself that it couldn't be it, because I had JUST replaced it. (This is because the threads had stripped and I didn't know)

I finally decided enough troubleshooting was enough. I didn't want to be in denial anymore, and I want to find the solution to my problems and fix it. So I bought one of those coolant leak testers, and that sonofabitch changed colors on me, telling me that exhaust was getting into the coolant.

Another symptom I noticed that may have been effected is that my boost was all sorts of crazy while accelerating. It was jumping all over the place. Which I believe to be because it was pushing the head off the block while boosting. but that's just speculation.

I never noticed any white smoke coming out of my tail-pipe. Possibly because the headgasket wasn't broken, and the head was somewhat mostly tightened down, which allowed it to stay sealed until boosting.

As for the stripped threads for the head bolts. I'm fixing/upgrading it by going to the GTir 12mm head-studs, and tapping the threads to 12mmx1.75.

People who say that fixed the problem but don't tell you how they fixed it are the worst kind of people. Among other kinds of people.

Another thing I noticed is that the E-fans I had recieved for my radiator had the wires backwards. Because of that, it was blowing the wrong direction, which would allow my car to stay cool while not in motion, but overheat while driving. When I checked it first, I just put my hand down next to it and felt for the ait, and it felt like I was blowing the right direction. It wasn't until I put a sheet of paper in front of it that I noticed that it was spinning the wrong direction.
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