I just fired up my B18c5 after a complete rebuild. It ran fine, had good oil pressure at first but seemed to drop slowly as it warmed up. I figured this was normal because as the motors warms up oil pressure normally drops a little then levels off. I decided to shut it down to check everything out and to top off water. When I pulled the rad cap I notice clean oil floating to top of rad. I drain the coolant into a bucket,to find clean oil floating on top of coolant. I installed a new fel-pro head gasket w/ arp studs during the rebuild. This is not my first rodeo changing head gaskets. The only difference this time was that I didn't resurface the head. I figured this was not needed since the motor never overheated, just spun a bearing. Tomorrow I will recheck oil for milky oil. As of now its clean and clear.I guess I should had brought the coolant up to temp to build pressure to see if coolant bled into oil. Am I missing something? Could the oil cooler between the filter and block be beading oil into my coolant. Should I had coated the threads of the head studs with a thead sealer? Do the studs screw into the blocks water passage? Has anyone ever experience this after a rebuild?

 

Bump...... Am I the only one who has had this problem after a rebuild? Gonna bypass oil cooler today to try to eliminate this problem before I buy another head gasket.

 

Did you torque the head in the proper torque sequence in the manual?

I know sometimes people use cooper sealer for the headgasket as well.

I would double check the head, even though it did not overheat, at least use a straight edge.

 

always resurface the head

 

this may or may not have been the problem depending on what was done. not only should you do the head, you should do the block as well, they are often distorted. AND YOU MUST USE A VERY FINE RA WHEEL IN THE LATHE!! when you resurface. if it's not made specifically for MLS gaskets it will leak, period