Date: Tue, 1 Jul 2014 11:03:51 -0400
Reply-To: Ken Wilford <kenwilfy@COMCAST.NET>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Ken Wilford <kenwilfy@COMCAST.NET>
Subject: Re: Vanagon salvage hopefully (long)
In-Reply-To: <CAAtTkO-P8iDUnYXb7eCj2HNcFMSkH7OooFgp9JaXUZoqR46GiQ@mail.gmail.com>
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I concur with Dennis, broken head stud most likely.
Ken
On 7/1/2014 10:30 AM, Richard Koller wrote:
> Greetings all,
> My tale begins on a high note. Some background: subject is '91 carat
> autobox, 180K miles total. I recently replaced leaky head and head gasket
> after 13 years and 120K miles. Replacement head was used with approx. 100K,
> checked it for leaks using " poor man's method " I poured pure propanol in
> all the openings of the head and it did not leak.
> Oil pressure was measured a year ago and had between 5 and 10 psi at idle
> normal running temps. Van ran very well, and passed Maryland emissions last
> week. Mileage was improved since head replacement. I thought all was
> relatively well.
> Then last weekend I'm driving 65 mph on Capitol beltway in Md. far left
> lane. I thought the van seemed a bit sluggish but I was going up a hill so
> did not worry. Suddenly, I feel a slight jerk/miss in the engine and van
> begins to slow. There was no banging or knocking or any untoward noises,
> but when I looked in the rear view mirror, I see the beltway engulfed in
> blue smoke from my van. Luckily its a Sunday morning and traffic is light
> and I manage to maneuver the van to the right side of the highway right at
> an exit. Time elapsed at this point is about 60 seconds. As I get on the
> off ramp, I notice the coolant level light is blinking and I quick turn off
> the ignition and I manage to coast to a safe spot off the road. Naturally
> I'm curious as to what has just happened. I look underneath first and see
> some slight dripping from above, there's no smoke or steam coming out of
> the engine. I remove the engine cover and don't see anything obvious, no
> rods sticking out of the crankcase or oil covering everything. I do notice
> some brown frothy stuff near the breather tower however, so I check the oil
> level. Here's the low note. The crankcase was full of an oil antifreeze
> homogenate, so something obviously had catastrophically failed inside.
> After I had the poor victim towed home, I drained the crankcase and
> collected a couple gallons of the evil mixture. The coolant seemed to be
> draining from the whole system because I popped off the bleeder bolt from
> the radiator and the flow increased. Must be a big hole somewhere. I
> popped off the valve covers and everything seemed in place no loose rocker
> arms or springs. There was the foul goo in one side, almost none in the
> other. Anyway, does the List wisdom think there's hope to salvage this sad
> powerplant? I know it will have to be completely disassembled. I'm
> concerned that the cat may have been trashed by all the oil burned through
> it any insight on that? The ATF was uncontaminated by the way. Might this
> be a failed oil cooler by chance? Any and all comments, strategy etc
> welcome.
> Thanks,
> Rick Koller
>
--
Thanks,
Ken Wilford
John 3:16
www.vanagain.com
Phone: 856-327-4936
Fax: 856-327-2242
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