Think I blew a gasket. help please

Finally found my 76 Free Spirit. 106k on clock. Drove it 1400 miles home. Two days later the dreaded fog machine out of both tailpipes. The temp gauge stayed right below the middle the whole trip. Milk oil now and even oil/water blowby up in the air breather. Lots of water out the pipes too.

Attached is pic of where i saw bubbles come from and think since it has rust there this was something that was building up to blow. No noticeable sound of an exhaust leak. Ran perfectly all the way home.

Going to pull the top half off tomorrow to see if it was the head gasket.

1. If it is not then is there any other thing that could cause this on a buick motor besides a cracked head or block?
2. Any preferred brand of head gasket to get that I should pick up?
3. What about the intake/valley gasket? I see mixed things online about reusing it.
4. Anything else I should check while that deep in it?

 

b4 tearing apart I would leak down each cylinder to determine where the culprit might be. water in the oil can come from bad intake gaskets too......especially if not over heating.

normally head gaskets cause alot of pressure in the cooling system

 

If you ran it back with coolant in the oil, you would have some knocking by now. Probably happened after cooldown. Pull the spark plugs, probably find some very clean ones. Examine gaskets well when you remove them. So you know for sure .
You may want to have heads checked for cracks. Drain oil and change filter.
Nows a good time for some bowl porting and a front cam bearing.
Maybe mill heads some too.
Do not reuse intake valley pan unless you know its fairly new.
Fel pro head gasket. Carb may have been lean , or old gas. Change gas filter.
If this thing sat along time, I would get new hoses, and thermostat. Flush radiator.

 

Looks like normal condensation out the tailpipes to me.
When its bellowing steam out the pipes, what does it smell like?

 

The oil was a nice amber color when I picked it up. I checked the oil at every stop for gas on the way home and didn't have to add any. The heater didn't blow as warm as it should and temp gauge (if accurate) never passed the half mark. I limped it home after I saw the smoke in mirror. It started to raise over the halfway mark but not to 3/4 when I got in my driveway. The previous owner drove it around his neighborhood often to keep it running. Real nice guy who shared all the details of work done and life of the car. There were no signs of overheating as in smell or knocking until I got it home.

 

Along with the water was a white cloud that completely hid my neighbors home and oil/water twin stripes down my street. They are still on the road and know my neighbors aren't too happy about that.

 

I made the whole trip checking the oil at every gas stop. It was clean when I got home, 1400 miles, and didn't use any.

 

You just got car, so you only know what your told about it. Could have been some thing done before you got it, and covered up with a stop leak. Might as well start pulling apart. Have heads check for cracks if you cant confirm gasket problem.

 

I can borrow a compression tester. Would I hook it up, bump it over till it max's out then watch for it to bleed off? To test the rad pressure would I need to remove the thermostat and then say try to hold hand over rad filler to see how much back pressure there is? or will the pressure come thru backside while thermo is still cold and closed?

 

You want to pump air into cylinders to see where leaking is happening. To test radiator pressure you need a radiator pressure tester and you would test cap pressure. But thats not where your problem is at.
Pump air into cylinder, and look in radiator for bubbles, listen for air leaking from carb or into valve cover. Even check exhaust and the matching side cylinder.

 

not a compression tester.....you need to use a cylinder leak down tester. if its leaking through a head gasket of crack you should see bubble in the cooling system with the cap just being off.


coolant getting into a cylinder of a running makes everything in that cylinder super clean, it steam cleans it, so if / you tear it apart it will be easy to see which one it's getting into

 

if you pressure test the cooking system you will see it not hold pressure but that's not telling where going.

sometimes it's as easy as pull all the plugs and kill the ignition and just crank it over, if water is in a cylinder it will come out and you will be able to see it very easy.

if you leak down test all the cylinders and no leak found, no bubbles in cooling system I would suspect an intake gasket.

 

Often when the coolant is low enough, you get low temp if any heat and low temp on the gauge because there is insufficient coolant to heat the sender, or provide heat exchange to the air in the heater box.

So, do not take the low temp/heater as a "good sign" that you did not overheat the engine.

Was there any oil in the wet spots behind the exhaust pipes?

 

Yes, enough to leave two oil stripes down my street also.

 

Trans modulator. Check trans fluid level. Your car will produce a James Bond cloud of white smoke when it goes bad.

 

Could be as simple as an intake gasket.

 

I would not run the car. From your description, you have coolant in the oil, drain all the coolant into a clean container and let it se a few minutes and see if it has oil film.

Once drained, drain the oil, you already know it has water, leave the drain plug out as some of the oil/coolant is likely thicker and slow to drain.

Then pull the intake as carefully as you can and inspect the gasketing and see if you can determine a leaking gasket.

Then consider pulling the heads.

At this point, I am going to say you really need to tear the engine down. But it is not my time and money, so I don't want to "spend them for you".

 

Two oil stripes? Both head gaskets blew at the same exact time, kinda doubt it.
You could have bad modulator plus another (head gasket) issue. Pull vacuum hose off modulator and see if it is dry or has been sucking trans fluid into your engine. Bond, James Bond
Trans fluid sucking in and being burnt will look like your car is on fire while driving down the road.

 

Diagnose the problem before you take anything apart! That is unless you're planning a total rebuild. It would suck to tear apart or rebuild the engine if it's only a minor problem, especially if it's modulator.

 

X2 Do some diagnoses, from your first post it sounds like your mind is set it head gaskets, and your ready to tear down.