about a year ago I got my block sleeved and bored to 81.5mm and was told that an OEM headgasket would be sufficient enough to run on it. about a year later now, I been having coolant problems that can't seem to be worked out. I took the head off and had it resurfaced, installed it and the radiator was spewing water out everywhere. Nothing wrong there? I took it back off and sent it back to the machine shop to have it pressure tested. nothing wrong there. the machine shop went as far as to tell me they checked it @ 60PSi of air for over and hour and couldn't get it to leak. that had me left with the block. didn't have a straight edge to check it so I dissasembled it and sent it over to Golden eagle where I'm awaiting the results. I hope everything is OK, but one thing I have to ask was for a 81.5mm block using a OEM 81mm headgasket, would this cause an overheating situation? I'm down on ideas if they say everything is OK, so just looking elsewhere.
*summary*
-radiator spewing water everywhere
-Head pressure tested good
-block @ golden eagle to pressure check and deck possibly
-would a OEm headgasket on a 81.5mm bore cause it to not seal or work right?
-first head gasket was new OEM, the second where water was spewing was new Felpro.


Modified by smoovy at 11:34 AM 8/1/2008

 

please help me. I just want to know if a OEM head gasket on a 81.5mm bore would cause my problems and should I be using a 81.5mm bore headgasket? B18a1 running 15Psi and more possibly

 

I ran an OEM HG on my 81.5MM setup with no issues at all.

 

oem hg is more than fine, your problem lies elsewhere.

do you have afterrmarket headstuds? if so have they been used a bunch of times? might need new headstuds...

has your head ever been resurfaced? not a bad time for a mill

 

I'm using an OEM HG on my 81.5mm. No issues, Make sure you didn't put it on upside down (not trying to insult), and use copper spray this time.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by blackeg &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">oem hg is more than fine, your problem lies elsewhere.

do you have afterrmarket headstuds? if so have they been used a bunch of times? might need new headstuds...

has your head ever been resurfaced? not a bad time for a mill
</TD></TR></TABLE>
X2
OEM gasket is open to 81.75mm. Do ^^^^^^ .

 

thanks for the replies. the head was resurfaced and new felpro headgasket. I also took the advise of many on here and used the permatex copper spray. that's when I was getting the pressurized coolant problem. I'm using ARP headstuds. there fairly new. this is the second motor they've been on. first one was stock and bent a rod. there was no mixing of coolant and oil at all, just a pressurized coolant passage. if my block is fine, I'm going to take my head somewhere else to have it checked for straightness. when I took it to the machine shop, they said it had a .004" of a twist or something simiar to that but they took care of it..... I don't know right now. I'm just pulling at things that could have caused this. now I know my head gasket is fine......geez

 

are you using copper o rings ? if not, i recomend getting the sleeves cut for the o ring. we never had a headgasket problem since we started using o rings.

 

is that possible to have that done when the sleeves are already installed? I was told that I didn't need them with a forced induction setup? I dunno, I will need to call GE or hit them up on here to see if that is possible.

 

yes, Golden Eagle cuts the o-ring grooves into the sleeves, i belive they do it after all 4 sleeves are installed.

like i said, we have been using GE blocks for about 8 years or so now. when we went with a high hp setup (800-950HP) we still use the same block that we would on a low hp setup. ill never run another sleeved block with no o-rings.

back in the day, i had a block with no o rings, it blew headgaskets like every time i got on it (granted the tune up could have been way off, but that was back when FMU + 310 + afc was big ) but needless to say...i went through probably 12 headgaskets before i got sick of fixing them

 

oem HG is actually 81.25mm anyhow i digress, OP have you checked to see if your rad cap is holding pressure? This can cause major problems like what your experiencing and is often overlooked, i had a friend build 2 motors for his evo when it was a bad rad cap the whole time!

 

I've looked into the Rad cap. I have 3 new ones to choose from. I thought I had a problem with one but no, my problem lies with the coolant passage somehow being pressurized by one of the combustion chambers. the small air bubbles just never seemed to go away and every couple seconds water would shoot out of the radiator like 12"-24" high. I've never seen that before, but thanks for all the comments. I'm going to talk to GE tomorrow about the O-rings. don't want to keep having this problem.

 

running 81 OEM HG on 81.5mm bore... everything is going fine.

Did u resurface the block too? I run problems when resleeved mine.

Be sure to use 1.3bar radiator cap too.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by smoovy &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote"> I'm going to talk to GE tomorrow about the O-rings. don't want to keep having this problem.</TD></TR></TABLE>

talk to them about "step decking" instead, i personally like it a lot more...

 

I like it how he couldn't find a straight edge so he sent the block out. Come on man you give up way to easy. Yea 81.5mm here with oem headgasket no leaks. If you radiator is gushing water out, you either dropped the sleeve, warped the block, warped the head, or cracked something.

 

I didn't give up, this was after the fact they couldn't find anything wrong with my head, I thought to take advantage of my warranty with GE to have it looked over. it was a good move on my part to be 100% sure and for piece of mind that everything is perfect. what would I be looking at to have my block O-ringed? anyone ever run there's without the O-ring and then later had it O-ringed?

 

I go the word ealier today that my block is fine. no pinholes and no leaking when pressure tested. It was on the machine getting ready to be decked when I called and asked to add O-rings, so that's what they did. my block should be back before the weeks end. to Golden Eagle. Robs an easy guy to deal with.

 

good job on getting O rings

did Rob tell you about installing the copper wire ?

 

he didn't tell me how, but he said it comes with a spool of copper wire. what's the easiest way, so I'm not stuck trying to figure it out?

 

get a piece of the wire, do not kink it or put shap bends in it. start with the end of the wire, lightly tap it into the groove with a rubber mallet/ screw driver handle. trying not to mash the copper.. when you get to the point where you started, cut the end with wirecutters, getting the butt as tight as possible, not to overlap.

 

thanks man I appreciate it. I just got my tracking information......it's going to be here tomorrow.yay!!!!!!

 

Finally had the chance to put my engine together and back in the car. Vitals seem to be OK. I think the O-ringing the block was the best idea yet. No OVERHEATING!!! it has helped me thus far. I got to drive it around last night. a few vitals and issues I need help with:

1. Oil pressure at idle is about 10psi(fine)cruising 60psi(fine)Boosting shoots up to 90psi then back to about 75-80PSi( don't know????)

2. Oil temperature is around 220-230 doing a couple WOT runs (Don't know if this is OK)

3. smokewas coming from my engine bay when I came back from some risidual oil that was dripping from the Oil return onto my exhaust. there are 2 bolts that hold the plate to the turbo and the lower bolt looked like it was dripping onto my exhaust. If I tighten it up what other things can I check so that this may never happen again? no oil in exhaust or intake so seals are fine,

I'm still going to cut up my CF hood to add a vent to help with venting my heat because my CF hood is jacked anyway from flying up when I forget to put it down. any other ideas? I got a Fal fan and am using that instead of the perma-cool fan I was using...........

 

What thickness gasket are you running with the orings? Did you use copper spray. This is just a question for me. I just completed my engine build and started it up and had a coolant mixing with oil problem.

DaveF...Do you need to replace the oringing each time you remove the head?

 

if its a oem gasket they come 81.75mm stock so you will be fine. if your using any aftermarket gasket then you need to be sure that its at least 81.5 or you will have a problem

 

stock thickness gasket will work fine.