Huge Problem

08-29-2005, 04:18 PM

OK, so the car has been leakng antifreeze, and my mechanic said it would be about $1500 to fix the head gasket, when the problem may lay not even be there. It could be the bottom half if the engne, and they wont know until they fix the top half. Then theres a lost $1500. My mechanic says I should get rid of it, but who is gunna buy it if it all jacked up.

Has anyone had this problem before, and do you know what specifically could be wrong with it? What do you guys think I should do. Im just starting college tomorrow and cant afford a new car.

natedawg9640 · 08-29-2005, 04:24 PM

well if you have a cracked head gasket the engine oil turns into poop that looks like cream of mushroom soup after a little bit.... and the coolant is discolored... obviously if that is the case i would say do the head gasket... it you have the time and a couple friends of family members that know stuff about it i'd say do it yourself... i've done one (on a saturn) and it wasn't difficult. the hardest thing was timing it.... but that's usually not an issue if you mark the timing chain and don't screw it up when you put it back on... where to you see the coolant dripping off? does it run out of somewhere or drip down something? and does the car run like ass? usually a blown gasket makes it feel like you are trying to pull a boat out of the water with a bicycle.

08-29-2005, 04:28 PM

The car runs fine. Nothing is going to be done ourselves. I dont want to spend the money fixing the headgasket if thats not even the problem.

jamcllw · 08-29-2005, 04:41 PM

If you've got the v6 check the LIM gasket. If your mechanic doesn't know about the infamous LIM gaskets on GM 60 degree v6s you need to go somewhere else.

08-31-2005, 10:37 AM

The LIM is not difficult to replace. If I'm not mistaken, someone on here posted pictures of the repair process (it was a while back, though).

08-31-2005, 11:11 AM

I'd definately check the LIM gasket (if it's a V6) before you get into heads, etc. As much as dealers blow, they've seen a million of them and might even be willing to diagnose it for free/cheap. If you have less than 60,000 miles you can maybe get GM to pay for half of the repair if you get it done at a dealer, too.