On Mon, 1 Dec 2003, robertmstewart wrote: > I noticed that when I purchased my Van from the Florida owner that the > gasket seals around the heads head caked on dried oil. The compression test > on the van came out very good considering it has 150,000 miles on it. > > My question is when should I replaced the head gaskets? Bad head gaskets generally leak coolant, not oil. (Well, that's not necessarily true on diesels, but it is on Wasserboxers.) I bet if you look closely, you'll find that the oil is leaking from under the valve covers and running down to the bottoms of the heads. A set of valve cover gaskets will cost you maybe $10, and you can put them on in 15 minutes. Maybe 30 if you really have trouble getting the valve covers off. This is an easy repair. > I have thought of putting in synthetic oil in instead of the 20W50 I > currently use but I wonder if that will cause the slow leak to get worse, > any ideas? Fix the leak first, then switch. :)
David Brodbeck, N8SRE '82 Volkswagen Diesel Westfalia '94 Honda Civic Si -- For Sale '86 Volvo 240DL wagon |
Please note - During the past 17 years of operation, several gigabytes of
Vanagon mail messages have been archived. Searching the entire collection
will take up to five minutes to complete. Please be patient!
Return to the archives @ gerry.vanagon.com
The vanagon mailing list archives are copyright (c) 1994-2011, and may not be reproduced without the express written permission of the list administrators. Posting messages to this mailing list grants a license to the mailing list administrators to reproduce the message in a compilation, either printed or electronic. All compilations will be not-for-profit, with any excess proceeds going to the Vanagon mailing list.
Any profits from list compilations go exclusively towards the management and operation of the Vanagon mailing list and vanagon mailing list web site.