Hgf?

[ryan.wilkinson]

Is there anyway to check if you have a potential HGF?? I know about the coolant usage, but if this isnt too bad (someone recently posted a thread of 1ltr every 200 miles!!) any other ways to stop the invevitable?????

[RobS]

Ryan

 

One quick way is to check your dipstick. If it's a creamy brown colour you need the doctor !

[tazbaz69]

emsulication in the oil on dipstick?? sometimes ur heater will not blow warm if ur HG has gone also. another indication is steam from exhasut more than ur normal exhasuted water.

[ryan.wilkinson]

This is the quandry.

 

Both my dipstick and oil filler cap show lovely clean oil, my heater works (as much as they ever do!) but I am using about 500ml of colant every 300 miles? Cannot see any drips or leaks but am very confused.

[tazbaz69]

could be ur water pump leaking coolant back into ur gallerys and not showing much of trace in ur oil, good thing to try is open ur sump plug slighty and see if u get water come out 1st. If u have added to much coolant it will burn of in the compustion process and u will loss some of that over process of time but from wat ur saying it doesn,t seam u have HGF as yet. The water pump was another problem with the K series on the cooling side of life. Has the car had a head gaskest in its life so far??

[ryan.wilkinson]

Tazbaz

 

Cheers for that but you have lost me a little. Is water leaking from the pump into the gallerys (what the hell are these??) bad?????

[tazbaz69]

u have small gallerys inside the engine block which takes oil round the block to allow the cooling process and return to sump, the water jacket is close to theses gallerys and can take some of coolant should ur pump have slight leak which in turn lets some coolant dissaper so it seams from ur header tank. Normally this ends up in ur sump, and goes around with oil in the block and is burnt off during the combustion process which could be reason ur lossing water

[SpoonZ]

slightly off topic but

 

im guessing everyone carries around a bottle of coolant for emergency top ups.

 

whats the mix on this 50-50 water anti-freeze? anyone use "radiator relief" and is this a sub for anti-freeze?

[tazbaz69]

not sure wat mixture is off hand, normall tells u on the anti frezze bottle u buy. Rad relief, never used it to date but sounds like its good thing. I hear the rads hold alot of crap due to the way the rad is mounted in the so doesn,t allow all the shit to fall to bottom. I,m guessing once used to it could lower the temp by few 0c

[Wuddie]

Sounds like the same problem i had, had a very slight coolant loss, this got traced to a slight split in a pipe...this got fixed, and then with the added pressure of a fully working system My Head Gasket finally gave in.

 

Until it goes there really is no way (apart for a pressure test, which can cause a weak head to fail) to check for this.

[ryan.wilkinson]

Does anyone know how much remedial works costs to stop HGF? Is it just a case of changing the HG or is a lot more work needed. I assume that should it go bang its a few £'000

[Steve G]

Same with mine for the 2nd one. Fixed a small leak on the radiator, the increase in pressure then lead to HGF...

 

Steve.

[steve-n]

When i used to own a '72 MGB Roadster, I flushed out the cooling system and replaced it with "For Life" cooling fluid. The fluid had a higher boiling point and lower freezing point, it also changed colour (from RED) to another colour, to indicate possible HGF. The only draw back is that you have to top up the system with For Life and not water.

 

I'm really tempted to flush out the system and put in "For Life"

 

What do you guys think??

[tazbaz69]

well its the small plastic dolws in the block which break casuing HGF normally. They where replaced with Metal dowls which seam to have solved the problem. I did my head gasket with new gaskets all round, cam belt, water pump, dizzy cap and plug for £300-350 easy

[GCCK]

For serious HGF prevention consider a remote thermostat and an oil cooler. Plus of course, the steel dowels. Some also say an 82deg thermostat (instead of std 87 - or is it 89? deg) is safer but apparently this is less than optimum temperature for a K-series. You could also just try replacing the thermostat - they can stick or become defective.

 

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