High pressure air sound on drivers side of motor

[CRCinAU]

Good tips from all. I'll give them a try in the daylight and see what it rurns up... I'm really puzzled by this - as you can see, the engine runs fine - so I'm not sure where the issue is. I really would have thought a head gasket (if in fact this motor has one) would have more symptoms..

I'm also trying to aquire a compression tester to run through the three cylinders on the drivers side to see if I can see anything abnormal there too....

 

[VPRob]

you can isolate the source of the noise more effectively by using a 1 metre (approx) length of garden hose like a stethoscpe. One end in your ear and the other pointed towards the motor. You'll be surprised how it will isolate and localise a noise source. It may help you diagnose the problem. To me it sounds like very noisey tappets and maybe a valve not seating properly giving it a chugging quality when revved..... but I have enough trouble with diagnosis when the engine is right in front of me so I won't be hurt if you laugh that off. Good luck with it and keep us posted.
Oh, by the way, I am not surprised at the price your mechanic gave for replacing the engine. A lot of that is his time plus probably making a bit on the motor itself. If you can source a motor yourself and do the change-over yourself you'll save most of that cost but it depends on your level of know-how, what value you put on your time, and then you will spend extra on plugs, oil and a host of other "little things" you might decide to spend time and money on before you put the replacement into your engine bay.

 

[CRCinAU]

Interestingly, I used a bit of heater hose I had today and seemed to isolate the area the noise is coming from. I got it to the point that I could feel the air pressure coming down the hose - but I can't see exactly where it is coming from.

With the help of the good old gregory's, I believe its coming from around the circled area (somewhere).


I grabbed the good old smart phone and jammed it down any gap I could get it - and found this...




Sticking my hand down there with the engine running and there is certainly bursts of air coming out of this thing...

Looking at the diagrams in The Book, is this the head gasket? Something else?

 

[tavrin]

That bit is indeed the head gasket...

 

[CRCinAU]

In a word. Poo.

So, this makes me wonder... What is the best way forward for this? eBay shows second hand motors for ~$400-$500 - plus some places that are almost local will do fitting etc... I just talked to the guy advertising it on eBay.... ~$450 for the motor and $550 for fitting, then $50 for oil, filters, coolant etc - ie total $1050...

At 445000km, is it worth repairing this by replacing the head gasket - and probably the inlet manifold gaskets etc at the same time? Is it better off getting a lower km motor and getting that fitted?

Either way, financially I'm screwed at the moment - so looking at the best value fix I can get....

 

[tavrin]

Woah 445,000km!!! im extremely impressed.
My Ecotec is already blowing smoke on startup at 182,000.


You can replace the gaskets, but you're looking at roughly:
+ $100 for LIM gaskets (Get Mace's metal ones)
+ $250ish for headgaskets
+ $30 bucks in coolant

However, with those sort of km's and with 2nd hand low km engines going for ~$500 bucks for the lot (Ecu, bcm, gearbox, loom, and engine); would it really be worth it?
You could easily sell your old motor for $150 and all the bits and pieces from the new 2nd hand engine and only be out of pocket for a few hundred.

 

[CRCinAU]

Yeah - its a changeover service - so he takes the old motor... but its $1050 fitted with coolant / oil etc. He says the engines have between 150,000-180,000km on them and come with a 3 month warranty...

I also agree that 445,000km is a good run... A lot of that has been hard work too - towing a horse + horse float... sometimes as far as SA...

The deal is motor only - ie no gearbox / ecu etc etc... but from what I understand that isn't needed?

 

[tavrin]

Yeah you can just buy and swap the engine; but there are usually some really cheap bargains on ebay where people sell the lot for $500 just because they want to do a v8 conversion instead.
These bargains give you the option to resell some of the parts on ebay for a bit of $ to make up the cost of the engine replacement.

 

[CRCinAU]

Yeah - I hear you on that one.... Sadly though I don't have enough know-how to do this job myself... I can do basic stuff - water pumps, oil, radiator, plugs, etc etc - but things like this are getting beyond what I can do in both tools, knowledge and experience...

 

[tavrin]

Yeah if you want to save yourself the hassle of having to stuff around with transporting a 2nd hand engine and an engine swap then thats definitely the better choice.
2nd hand motors are a bit of hit and miss really; so if your mechanic is going to give you a 3 months warranty on it, then for 1050 that isn't a bad price at all.