1983 - My Head May Be Gone
- Thread starter Bluey
- Start date
Depending if the exhaust is leaking into the coolant or not, yes. Any auto center that has exhaust gas analyzer equipment, (used for emissions testing), can take the probe that is normally installed in the tailpipe and put it into the radiator overflow tank. If the probe detects unburned hydrocarbons, (exhaust), this is concrete evidence that the head gasket has failed. This is usually caused by antifreeze not being changed often enough, because antifreeze eventually starts to turn acidic and will eat away at the gaskets/seals in the engine, including the cylinder head gasket. It's unusual to have a crack in an engine block.
If you can't find an auto center equipped with an exhaust gas analyzer, better quality auto parts stores like NAPA and Carquest will have cylinder head gasket leak test kits you can purchase to use in diagnosing the problem.
What are the symptoms the car is showing? What is the year/make/model/engine and how many miles are on it? When was the antifreeze last changed?
If you can't find an auto center equipped with an exhaust gas analyzer, better quality auto parts stores like NAPA and Carquest will have cylinder head gasket leak test kits you can purchase to use in diagnosing the problem.
What are the symptoms the car is showing? What is the year/make/model/engine and how many miles are on it? When was the antifreeze last changed?
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The car is 1983 Corolla wagon. The km are 128000 so the mechanics think just that which can be speculated by the mileage and the fact that the car is 30 years old. He told me it may have sat too long and that's what damaged the head gasket and or the block. I'm hoping the block is not damaged and with that low mileage I would imagine not. Can I pressure test the block without pulling from the car?