Recently had the car on the dyno getting a remote tune. After the initial pull my tuner noticed high IAT's and advised my IC Pump probably wasn't kicking on, shop checked and confirmed pump wasn't coming on. So I ordered a replacement and rescheduled the remainder of the session. Today I drove the car to the gym then to my kids school, leaving the gym I noticed my A/C was intermittent. Get to my kids school and I see smoke coming from under the hood, I immediately shut the car off and pop the hood. I see coolant all under the hood and on the ground that looks to have come from the main tank for the engine and not the IC tank. Car started and ran fine to get it up the street to Ford but temps got high if sitting @ a stop light. I've been reading and it sounds like it could be as simple as a faulty cap or a head gasket? What do you guys think? Car is a 2014 w/ a Gen II TVS w/ 2.5 pulley, FRPP Mono, JLT 127, ARH 1 7/8 LT's w/ catted H, car has 23,500 miles. Now if it is a head gasket wouldn't the car run like crap? Other than wanting to overheat @ a standstill the car runs fine.
Ford says blown headgasket
- Thread starter 07 Black Beauty
- Start date
My head gasket went on my Whipple 2.3, 2004 Cobra. The car ran fine and was only down about 20hp on the dyno when comparing to healthy runs. (I have my own dynojet, so I used it a lot) This was due to small amounts of coolant making its way to the cylinder and reducing burn. It would smoke pretty good under boost, as the head only seamed to allow leakage when in that situation. I drove it like that for about 500 miles until I took the time to park it and also the time to go ahead and build an aluminator with custom internals.
Iat being high is not related to overheating and finding coolant under the hood. If the coolant or oil looks like chocolate milk that’s a sign of a head gasket. You can also run a compression check and leakdown test to determine if it’s a head gasket problem. Could be a faulty thermostat, clogged heater core, or a number of other issues.
When it overheats while stopped, it sure sounds like the cooling fan isn't operating. You say the Ford says head gasket, but are they just throwing out scenarios, or did they actually perform diagnostics and run a compression test? I had blown head gasket and the car idled rough and was down on power, but I caught it fairly early. Never had an overheating issue. My gasket was blown between cylinders 7 & 8 and I was getting a misfire code.
When I spoke to the advisor it sounded like no real diagnostics were done and they were quick to put blame on the performance shop and tell me a price to tear apart the motor.
Sounds like your cooling fans are not operating correctly, or not at all.
Kinda what I'm leaning towards, I need to call when I get a break @ work
Would the car overheat regardless of whether it was sitting @ idle or being driven?
Dealership still hasn't called back with what diagnostics were performed. Sounds like my best option right now is to get the car towed to the performance shop
you can also buy a coolant tester for around $50. Itll detect combustion gasses in the coolant and turn a different color.
a blown head gasket can be difficult to chase based on certain symptoms. When I blew one on my lightning it was fine 99.9% of the time and then occasionally (even cruising down the road) temps would shoot up, then come back down. Then I saw coolant coming down the block between block and head. It never blew a radiator cap or anything.
a blown head gasket can be difficult to chase based on certain symptoms. When I blew one on my lightning it was fine 99.9% of the time and then occasionally (even cruising down the road) temps would shoot up, then come back down. Then I saw coolant coming down the block between block and head. It never blew a radiator cap or anything.
It's more likely to overheat because there is no air going through the fins of the radiator when the car isn't moving. The fan's electric. If you're driving there is some air flow through the fins, so there is a chance it will cool down, but not like the air flow the fan is capable of pulling.
Your a/c would exhibit similar issues. If there is no air going through the condenser coil, output is going to suck. I lost both fans in my F-150 a few years back and while it didn't overheat it was the hot air coming out of the a/c vents that prompted me to look at what was going on. Granted these were aftermarket fans, but I had to replace the controller.
Sounds like a radiator cooling fan problem to me too. Check the fan, fan electrical connection on the shroud, and the relays in the fuse box. While mine is a 2008, some troubleshooting steps in the first parts of this thread can help you diagnose your issue:
https://www.svtperformance.com/forums/threads/radiator-fan-troubles-and-the-fix.1037333/
I would try some basic radiator fan troubleshooting to rule it out before going down the path of a blown head gasket.
https://www.svtperformance.com/forums/threads/radiator-fan-troubles-and-the-fix.1037333/
I would try some basic radiator fan troubleshooting to rule it out before going down the path of a blown head gasket.
Looks like Catmonkey was dead on, cooling fans were fried. Leak down and compression tests were good I believe he said 185 across all cylinders.
Hopefully you didn’t pay the incompetent dealer anything
Whats really disturbing is how many people probably would be paid the $6200 I was quoted by the dealership to tear apart a perfectly good motor. And I'm 100% sure if the dealership had tore my motor down and found the head gasket was fine they never would've admitted it.
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Chase all the easy/cheap items first... fans operating, IC pump operating, expansion tank cap, etc.
It that all checks out , it could very well be a HG. I had a turbo eclispe in the late 90s that drove absolutely perfect and hauled ass MOST of the time. If i took it on a 1+ hour drive (parents were 1.5 hours away when i was off to college) it would literally overheat and blow coolant out of the overflow almost exactly 50 minutes into the drive--every time. Weirdest thing ever.
Pulled the head and found a 1/2 inch hairline crack in the composite gasket. Resurfaced head, bought $150 gasket kit and it ran like new for years afterwards.
It that all checks out , it could very well be a HG. I had a turbo eclispe in the late 90s that drove absolutely perfect and hauled ass MOST of the time. If i took it on a 1+ hour drive (parents were 1.5 hours away when i was off to college) it would literally overheat and blow coolant out of the overflow almost exactly 50 minutes into the drive--every time. Weirdest thing ever.
Pulled the head and found a 1/2 inch hairline crack in the composite gasket. Resurfaced head, bought $150 gasket kit and it ran like new for years afterwards.
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