Blown head gasket??

[redsand]

Okay need some opinions/thoughts before I tear this car apart. I am not an engine/cooling expert at all...do more wiring/interior etc.

403 olds 79 trans am. newer rebuild. Customer drove the car without issues. Throw a belt on the highway and continued to drive for about 12 minutes, he could not tell me how hot it got. When he shut it down, a minute later he said he heard a boom. It actually blew the upper radiator off the rad. Not the hose the actual metal brased connector.....stock overflow....It built a hell of a lot of pressure or I had a bad cap.....so I got the car back and replaced with all be-cool rad/fan/overflow...ran great, burped properly stuck around 180....Customer got the car back drove it for about 2 weeks and now this morning white smoke is coming out the tailpipes and the car gets to 220 in about 5 minutes...I told him to let it cool down and check the rad fluid level...My guess is that I am still having some kind of pressure issue and I lost a ton of fluid out of the overflow and basically running dry again.....So I have a pretty good feeling that the head gasket are toast with the smoke but wanted to bounce if off of you guys? He also said when he shut it down he heard a bunch of gurgling?

1) Any idea what might have caused the pressue issue prior to the be cool instal? would a threw the belt would the 12 minutes of hell have started the distruction with the pressue / head gasket
2)would a blown headgasket create the pressure and gurgling he is hearing with the be-cool setup.
3) I there an easy way to tell blown head gasket before I have it delivered back from detroit that he can check?

any help would be greatly appreciated.

[66larkgs]

defs sounds like a blown head gasket! the gurgaling he is hearing is caused by combustion from the cylinders going into the cooling system. one nice check is the hydrocarbon test. You can take a emission sniffer and wave it over the radiator cap and if it picks up hc/co's that means you have a bad head gasket. another way is the dye test which is a tool that you put a liquid in and put it where the rad cap goes. when it turns to blue it means you have a leak, it picks up co and hc's.
to me it sounds like they blew a head gasket. fixing the head gasket is one thing but why it happened is the other. did they throw the belt.. or did the water pump seize? all things that you need to lookat. too small radiator before.. do your homework so you only fix it once.

[redsand]

They threw the belt for sure...no seize with the water pump....the really odd thing is that I cant figure out is that I think something is causing it....the pressure...feels like exactly what happened with the 3 core rad that blew....put in great rad / fan / overflow and same thing seems to have happened except this time the head gasket blew...so what I am not sure about is is this second time just residual from the first and finally the head gasket blew....Had him start it up...stuggling to stay running. only had him run it for a minute....

I am going to replace the water pump for sure also. again, any ideas would really help.....based on the smoke and it running like crud....

[Vicinity]

White smoke = 90% chance of head gasket

Antifreeze burning is always white.

[66larkgs]

what about doing a cooling system pressure test. put the tool where the radiator cap goes and pump to 15 psi and it should hold for 15 minutes. when a car is overheating and you shut it down the coolant temp will spike from not being circulated. it sounds like a bad head gasket. could have had a sticking thermostat causing your issues and now it finnally did not open or open all the way.. you can test them by putting them in water that is 180 -190 and watch them open.

[Johnny Blaze]

Yeah a basic pressure test will tell you a lot.

12 minutes of driving with no water pump can destroy and engine for sure.

Very likely a blown head gasket, warped head or cracked head.

You will probably need to have the heads magnafluxed if the gaskets look good.

If the water pump is not siezed or leaking it probably does not need replaced.

[BuzzKillian]

Here's another thought... Overheated the first time and blew head gasket, but not bad enough to suck water into the cylinder. Leaking head gasket allowed enough pressure (along with the overheating) to build and blow out the radiator.
Install new radiator.... Head Gasket still blown, but gets worse and starts blowing out water (still getting cylinder pressure in the cooling system). What water is left starts getting pushed out the exhaust (white smoke).
I had a head gasket blow and had to have a radiator guy put a gauge on it. The Cooling system was building pressure as soon as the car was started. Other than that I had no idea the gasket was blown.

[redsand]

Thanks to all I will let you know what I find

[66larkgs]

any news??

[Johnny Blaze]

Ummm, yeah

[Johnny Blaze]

Any news?