Hi all,

I have a 99 accord that has a small, or as i have been told "weeping" coolant leak. I know its my head gasket. I took it to a shop and the mechanic said it was a very tiny leak into cylinder 3. He said that it was ok to drive for now because the leak was so small. Car starts fine. Car runs fine. No oil coolant mix. Losing very tiny amount of coolant in overflow reservoir. Fill it up once a month IF that. The point im trying to reach is it ok to drive the car in this condition?! I have to say even though the mechanic told me it had a 30,000 mile window, i just don't know how much i trust that diagnosis. Any input would be GREATLY appreciated. Thanks in advance.

 

If you don't have the means to fix the issue then it is ok to drive just monitor your coolant regularly. I wouldn't solely rely on a 30000 mile window. You don't want combustion gases in your coolant.

 

Torque the head bolts? Might be worth a try...

 

I wouldn't those bolts are torque to yield.

 

well money is tight right now, but its also the fact of me dumping between 1500-2000 on a 99 accord with 160k miles. Like i said, it runs fine right now, no issues at all. Just tough to say a car with a leaking head gasket has no issues, lol

 

Honestly heres what you do its gonna need alot of attention and coolant every now and then. I'm not sure about 99 but there should be a bleeder valve maybe on the thermostat housing. I would say every two weeks depending on how much coolant you are burning get the air bubbles out because eventually the combustion gases building up could cause big air bubbles which would cause your engine to run hotter which would worsen the head gasket so keep on top of coolant level and inspect spark plugs around the same time to see if the leak is getting into other cylinders. Later on when you know you need to change the head gasket you will run hot more often and experience power loss or sputter. So I would get that done well before 30000 miles

 

thank you so much for the input! How would i get the air bubbles out through the bleeder valve?

 

yes if you can't find the bleeder valve you could just take the radiator cap off and get engine to operating temp then you'll see the bubble when they make it to the top of the radiator let run and add coolant as needed until major bubbles are out you will probly see small bubbles once the thermostat opens a few times don't worry bout the small ones because you are getting combustion gases in your coolant as you run it just ensure the big ones are out.

 

X2 to roncourville's advice. If you can't afford to fix it right now, just drive it but monitor the car closely. I don't know how the guy pulled 30k miles out of his ***. The leak could get bad in a week, could be a year. If you want to keep the car, start saving now for when you have to finally fix it.

I would...
-Check the oil and coolant levels every few days
-Check the spark plugs occasionally
-Change the oil more often
-Once the car wants to overheat, or you see oil in coolant and/or coolant in oil, stop driving until fixed
-DO NOT use any type of headgasket stop-leak crap

The only thing most people worry about is avoiding blowing the motor when the leak gets bad. The equally important thing a lot of people overlook is long-term damage while the engine seems to be running okay, like bearing damage caused by coolant being in the oil.

 

How did your mechanic determine that it has a head gasket leak is the question I have.

 

i believe he pressure tested the cylinders, or when he checked cylinder 3 (because it was shooting a misfire code) he may have saw the coolant in there

 

My wagon was doing the same thing when I bought it but was losing about a quart every 200 miles, probably much more than yours. Aside from a miss for one or two seconds after a cold (overnight) startup - and losing the coolant - never any drivability problems. Excellent compression, no radiator bubbling, no water in the oil, no white smoke, no oil in the water, plugs were uniformly very light tan, no air in the cooling system EXCEPT if I let the overflow tank run low. After taking the car on several multi-thousand mile trips including high altitude and very high temps I decided to do a leakdown and found head gasket leaking on 2, 3, and 4. The only thing I can think is that the HG leaks on those cylinders was so small that it was just sucking coolant into the chambers but wasn't allowing oil into the coolant or vice versa. Took the head off and it was flat, the block was flat, and a new head gasket fixed the problem.

Keep an eye on the coolant and oil as suggested by others. You might get many more miles out of it.

 

thanks again guys, reaLLY APPRECIATE IT.

 

 

The only way to determine specific cylinder 's coolant leak is by the color of the spark plug.If the #3 cylinder is misfiring because of the gasket problem - I wouldn't call it a small leak.What kind of a mechanic would tell a costumer to drive on a three cylinders????????

 

i believe the wires were melted in cylinder 3 ( probably from when the car overheated) which is why it was misfiring. I dont know if it had to do with the leak. But the cylinder works fine now that he replaced the wires. No issues starting the car at all. Cranks right up.

 

If your car is running fine right now, you can actually just run it and pull each of the wires one at a time and see if the engine starts to miss a bit. If if doesn't, then you have an issue with that particular cylinder. If you do it now and cylinder 3 doesn't show a change when you pull the wire then that means that cylinder isn't working and then you should do a compression test on all cylinders. If that cylinder shows up bad then you can confirm you have a problem. yeah, the spark plug in cylinder three will show up green or the color of your coolant will be crystalized if it's burning coolant in the combustion chamber.

 

thanks, will have my buddy (mechanic) try that out.

 

I've read many threads saying they are not. TTY bolts are the ones where you will have to do that Torque Angle for last before you're done. In this case, it's not with these Honda Head Bolts. I've re-used my dad's '94 Accord EX head bolts twice now and no leak so far. Ran great and stopped overheating ever since I replaced the HG the second time as the first guy who did it probably didn't do a good job torquing the head bolts down or didn't know the torque sequence Honda recommends which is why it still kept on overheating.

But yeah, I've always replaced mine with Honda head bolts just to be on the safe side no matter what.

I believe that is what my beater with an F22B1 is doing right now. It sometime idles rough for the first 3-10 sec at cold start.