Thank you sir may I have another...
- Thread starter gtsfirefighter
- Start date
I'm having some significant coolant issues and I'm beginning to fear headgasket issues. One radiator cap will not let the system pressurize and sucks the reservoir bottle dry and I can smell coolant. The other cap will let the system pressurize and I smell no coolant....but...it's causes my reservoir to slowly fill and overflow. Now, here's the kicker. When I'm out boosting in it, it'll blow coolant out the reservoir not matter which cap I have on it.
Not sure what's going on just wished it could be black or white instead of grey-ish. I don't believe that head has ever had a retorque so I'm going to start there maybe this weekend. I've done leakdown tests, that's how I've found all the other bad hoses with pinhole leaks. After those were fixed I did another and it slowly lost pressure. The engine runs great. No smoke, no sputtering. No milkyness under the cap and the oil looks good. So I don't know. Frustrating but I've made myself a promise to be patient with this car and bring it back it's luxury appeal and maintain its performance.
Not sure what's going on just wished it could be black or white instead of grey-ish. I don't believe that head has ever had a retorque so I'm going to start there maybe this weekend. I've done leakdown tests, that's how I've found all the other bad hoses with pinhole leaks. After those were fixed I did another and it slowly lost pressure. The engine runs great. No smoke, no sputtering. No milkyness under the cap and the oil looks good. So I don't know. Frustrating but I've made myself a promise to be patient with this car and bring it back it's luxury appeal and maintain its performance.
I rather hate to say this but I'm thinking you may be correct with the hg assumption. Coolant being pushed out of the resevoir is usually 1 sign, it just might not be bad enough yet to be pushing any/much coolant into the oil system, thusly why you don't see any bhg milkshake. Seems to me that it is just starting to let go and let just enough compression by resulting in, when it is holding pressure, slowly filling to overflow then it blowing it out in boost. Just my $.02 and what I have personally seen from vehicles with bhg.
I'm trying to do a retorque and something simple is a problem. Finding an auto parts store that has a deep socket 12 pt 14mm so I can get on those arp studs. I'm hoping once I can locate that I can get the retorque done. Crossing my fingers that solves the problem. Also ordered a new OEM radiator cap from Toyota today and it'll be here tomorrow.
The 91 blue car in my sig was doing the same thing to an extent when I bought it. It had the original HG and was pushing it out the reservoir. But it did no matter what kind of driving I was doing. This car seems to only do it under boost.
The 91 blue car in my sig was doing the same thing to an extent when I bought it. It had the original HG and was pushing it out the reservoir. But it did no matter what kind of driving I was doing. This car seems to only do it under boost.
Sears is the easiest place to find it. Get the 3/8 drive because the walls are too thick on the 1/2 drive and it hits the head. 14 or 9/16 will work but yes definately deep well. Got mine yesturday and got the head off with no problem other than the discomfort of finding out that 4 of the nuts had backed off slightly, 1 of those to the point of where I could have almost turned it using just my fingers. Though I neglected to do a retorque after 2 cycles like I should have, was too lazy/busy with work at the time when I did the hg and arp's. No bhg signs though but I did put a Titan mhg in it instead of a stock replacement. Not retorquing after 2 heat cycles can cause the nuts to be backed off and then it creates bhg. It does this due to the different expansion properties of the head and block and studs. ARP's should have been torqued to 80 ft-lbs so hopefully for you it is just that a retorque was not done initially and doing so will solve the problem, though it may just band-aid it. Either way, good luck man!
I tried Sears but they didn't have an individual one to sell and I wasn't going to buy an entire set for one socket.
I ended up getting one at the NAPA down the road from me and it worked just fine.
So I did the retorque. Several of the nuts were easier to break loose than I think they should've been. Number 9 and 13 on the exhaust side broke loose very easy and thats the area of the head where I was seeing what appeared to be wetness at the back of the block where it and the head meet. Was going to retorque to 90 but mistakenly torqued to 95.
Anyway. I ordered a new radiator cap from Toyota yesterday and picked it up today and put it on. I also put the old thermostat back in it. I replaced it with a "fail safe" thermostat that if it fails, it will fail in the open position only. There was nothing wrong with the old one I just changed it for shits and giggles. With the new one, I was noticing that it would take forever to warm up and I'd see coolant freely flowing right after a cold start up so I decided to throw the old one back in.
After I put it all back together I drove off and drove it pretty hard, boosting everywhere. There was no coolant spitting out of the reservoir bottle and the system was holding pressure. Now the coolant was getting pretty close to top of the bottle but I think that has to do with the fact that it was way over the HOT mark when I started out and the level rose like it was supposed to after it warmed up. So I'm hoping this just isn't a band aid fix and it cured the problem.
Will keep yall posted.
I ended up getting one at the NAPA down the road from me and it worked just fine.
So I did the retorque. Several of the nuts were easier to break loose than I think they should've been. Number 9 and 13 on the exhaust side broke loose very easy and thats the area of the head where I was seeing what appeared to be wetness at the back of the block where it and the head meet. Was going to retorque to 90 but mistakenly torqued to 95.
Anyway. I ordered a new radiator cap from Toyota yesterday and picked it up today and put it on. I also put the old thermostat back in it. I replaced it with a "fail safe" thermostat that if it fails, it will fail in the open position only. There was nothing wrong with the old one I just changed it for shits and giggles. With the new one, I was noticing that it would take forever to warm up and I'd see coolant freely flowing right after a cold start up so I decided to throw the old one back in.
After I put it all back together I drove off and drove it pretty hard, boosting everywhere. There was no coolant spitting out of the reservoir bottle and the system was holding pressure. Now the coolant was getting pretty close to top of the bottle but I think that has to do with the fact that it was way over the HOT mark when I started out and the level rose like it was supposed to after it warmed up. So I'm hoping this just isn't a band aid fix and it cured the problem.
Will keep yall posted.
Congrats on the hopeful fix!
Now what does that picture show other than bugs. Is that a new wrinkle on the header panel? Results of some Bama heat? or just a reflection in the photo?
Now what does that picture show other than bugs. Is that a new wrinkle on the header panel? Results of some Bama heat? or just a reflection in the photo?
Can you read? Haha. It used to say Toyota. Julia, the girl who bought my 86.5 and now has Jay Blue, let me have that off my poor destroyed 86.5
Ken, first time I've been on long enough to look around at threads so this is the first time I've seen this one.
I hope this isn't a bhg. I'd feel awful about it, but we never drove it so I wouldn't have known it was leaking. Hopefully the retorque does the trick along with the new radiator cap. I'm glad you're making her new and improved. She'd been sitting in our yard untouched for what seemed like a year. Keep up the good work.
I hope this isn't a bhg. I'd feel awful about it, but we never drove it so I wouldn't have known it was leaking. Hopefully the retorque does the trick along with the new radiator cap. I'm glad you're making her new and improved. She'd been sitting in our yard untouched for what seemed like a year. Keep up the good work.
Good to hear that it seems to be fixed! I was really hoping it wasn't bhg, even though my posts did seem kinda doomsday! I was just trying to throw some info out there that would help and sometimes I tend to go all worst case scenario as that is my luck. Love that badge btw.
suprahero;1822897 said:
No worries Jay. There was no leaking issues the entire 700-something mile trip back from Alabama. I'm hoping what I did fixes it.
jmoneydtb;1823065 said:
With these cars it's easy to assume the worst and it's actually better to assume the worst, and hope for the best. I'm not 100% convinced it's "fixed". I really haven't gotten to drive a good distance yet. We'll see. If it's not, I'll continue on from there.
Oh and thanks for noticing my badge, haha.
Well an update. I took the car on a couple hundred mile road trip to my buddy's deer lease and it did really well. I'm not having any of the issues as before, however, I swear I can still smell some coolant after driving it. I did a leak down test again yesterday and after pumping it up to about 13 psi, I could ever so slightly hear a high pitched hissing. It was coming from the exhaust side I think toward the front of the engine. So I've got to try and investigate that. The pressure did leak down but it did so pretty slowly. But other than that I'm pretty confident in the car right now. I've got the ball joints and tie rod ends sitting in my house but I just need to find the time to get them installed. The front end is pretty squirley.
Check freeze plugs as well as the hoses/lines. I've found that 4 of mine were leaking, this is after replacing 1 when the car was still ran. After looking into all of the water ports in the block, head, in the water pump, etc.; I don't think I will ever again run water straight from a faucet or hose ever again. There is so much build up it is crazy, plus I already know the water system for this town is better described as a "sediment transport system".
Yes Scott we made it through. The supra was safe in the garage at home. I was at work and the Lexus stayed parked inside the bay with the ambulance and fire truck all day. I don't want a repeat of last year when I lost my beloved SC300 to hail.
When I have the time I'll remove the accordian hose and associated crap in that area and pump up the system again and look for a leak. The area around the turbo water return line on the block looked a little suspicious, like maybe it'd been wet so I'll start there. I might have to break out the soapy water.
When I have the time I'll remove the accordian hose and associated crap in that area and pump up the system again and look for a leak. The area around the turbo water return line on the block looked a little suspicious, like maybe it'd been wet so I'll start there. I might have to break out the soapy water.
If you don't have it already, that would be a great time to switch to a N/A Power Steering Reservoir.