I'll make a long story short:

Got the car tuned last week, everything went pretty good on the dyno made 460hp on pump gas and 570 on race but hit some kinda bottle neck. Go to make a couple street passes on pump gas and over heat every time I get into it. I figure the head gasket went or the head is lifting since the stud have been tq'd an unknown amount of times. The overflow was full so I definitely lost the seal somehow. It was just strange to me that it made it through a bunch of dyno pulls then street driving it goes.

Anyway, I take it apart today and see this (pics below). Has anyone ever seen the sleeve flake apart like that on the top? These are GE sleeves, they're OLD, but the previous build of the motor had 30k miles on it. I re-ringed/honed it and put it in my car. I also noticed a "rust mark" on the #2 cylinder. Pictured as well.

You guys ever seen anything like this? Do you think this would cause the head gasket to fail early? It's hard to tell if it went, it was a .030 cometic gasket. You guys think I can get away with just a new set of studs and a new gasket?? I REALLY don't want to pull this motor, and I don't know what to do about the deck area/sleeves because if its no good its basically trash at this point.

Opinions NEEDED. Thanks.

 

Here's the head gasket. Based on my crude knowledge, looks like #1 cylinder is where the head lifted hence the "steam cleaning" around the cylinder area.

I'm more worried about the chips in the deck and the #2 cylinder wall looking like that.

 

damn those are old sleeves!

 

call golden eagle and see if they can help you out

 

There is still enough material there for the gasket to properly seal.

 

I don't think I would have ever considered that block without it getting decked. The corrosion and chipping as you put it, is really disturbing and should have been addressed.
I realize people wish to make things work with the risk of re useing some things; but $150 studs on a turbo build are mandatory and clean deck mating to the head. Sorry the gamble didn't quite work out.
It always costs more to do it twice than to do it right first.

 

Time to retire that old girl. Sometimes you just need new stuff so you don't waste time and money working on stuff all the time.

 

Thanks for the reply's guys....

The car did have ARP studs in it, but like I said they may have been torqued a bunch of times.

I know its an old motor haha, my spare is just as old. The h23 I have was the 2nd one GE ever sleeved.

I'm sure golden eagle would help me out or offer some type of discounted service, but I honestly have no desire to pull this car apart again. It was running fine, no smoke or anything and the problems didn't start till we switched to race gas.

I talked to Jason Hunt for a while about it last night. He suggested new studs, new gasket (OEM), and put it back together after I check the surfaces for flatness. So since that doesn't require too much investment of time or money, I'll do it and see where that goes. Worst case is it blows up. But if I can ride around at 460hp on my street tune I'll be happy with that, thats all I ever wanted.... I know this setup with this motor won't set the world on fire.

I do have a lot of OLD parts, and a good mix of newer stuff on the car. That's what happens when you've been at it with this car since 2002. I just don't have the desire to spend the money anymore like I used to so I work with what I have.

I appreciate the input, I'll let you guys know what happens.

 

Old parts fall apart, kind of the way it goes.

You are however very lucky at the location at which it's chipping, which is probably the strongest part of the sleeve since it's right up against the adjacent sleeve. Your biggest problem will be keeping the seal on the head, but otherwise I'd just keep at it. Eventually it's going to give, funny thing is, my money is that when it does break it doesn't break where that chipping is.

 

Yeah, but I'd like to get a decent use out of them until that happens. The block was used but in another car. My h23 lost the #3 cylinder and it was easier to buy my buddies old motor out of his car after he reverted to stock to turn the car back into a commuter.

Hopefully we're right and it holds up a while, I just don't think I'll be able to push it to 30lbs like I orginally planned and have nothing fail.

I ordered a new gasket and new studs, probably get it back together over my xmas vacation time from work.

I had my old h23 rebored and its ready for a rebuild. Those sleeves are old as **** too, but they look a hell of a lot better, probably because that motor only ever lasted a couple hundred miles before it took a **** haha. If you guys don't know I've been to hell and back more than a few times with this car.