Driving w/ blown head gasket

[Seawolf]

The timing belt and water pump have been done by the previous owner. Or so he says.

Righty ho, is this the same owner who cleaned up the engine (and missed everything else) to hide the oil leak ?

That oil leak might just be the cam cover and camshaft seal, but I'd want to get that timing belt changed out before I drove another mile.

Call me an old windbag if you will :)

[TobyB]

Timing belt!

hee,
but,
I would.

t

[Bimmerboy91]

Yeah I'd pull off the camshaft sprocket and see if your camshaft seal is leaking. There is two. On mine, oil was leaking from the o-ring which I suspect someone tired replacing at one point because when I pulled off the camshaft sprocket, I saw a piece of the o-ring smashed up against the cylinder head. Once I pulled off the bracket the o-ring had a piece missing. This made me think my head gasket was leaking because of the way the leak wrapped around the side of the head, but I replaced it and let the car idle for about an hour and drove it pretty good for about 20 minutes no more leak.

[e30_vt]

Yeah I'd pull off the camshaft sprocket and see if your camshaft seal is leaking. There is two. On mine, oil was leaking from the o-ring which I suspect someone tired replacing at one point because when I pulled off the camshaft sprocket, I saw a piece of the o-ring smashed up against the cylinder head. Once I pulled off the bracket the o-ring had a piece missing. This made me think my head gasket was leaking because of the way the leak wrapped around the side of the head, but I replaced it and let the car idle for about an hour and drove it pretty good for about 20 minutes no more leak.

That is good to know. I will have to check it out.

I found a few more "surprises" today. The heat barely works. This means that either the water pump was installed incorrectly or the heater core is toast. I think it's the water pump. Other surprises include:
1. Bad Coolant sensor
2. Bad window switch
3. Previous owner deleted AC
4. Control arms need to be replaced
5. Rear shocks shot
6. One bad fog light
7. Possibly bad rocker arm

[e30_vt]

My maintenance parts still haven't come so I decided to putter around. The previous owner deleted the AC system but did a poor job, so I decided to clean it up a bit. While I was there I decided to delete the windshield washer fluid reservoir. Also, it looks like the valve cover gasket needs to be replaced due to the fact that oil is on the spark plugs.