(G) Head Gasket Change - Help needed

Hey guys as m sure many of you are aware my poor little cinq has died... and it is worth £50 scrap... as i was going to do before someone offered to buy it off me and never turned up. So i have now decied i have a car to learn on...
After all its already broke so whats the worse that can happen ?

Basically the point of this thread is to see if anyone would be willing to come help me change my hed gasket. I have no knowledge at all and would appreciate the support

I cannot pay to much but parents own a pub so would be willing to compensate and can accomodate if needed.

Many Thanks in advance.

Andre

Ps im in Great Yarmouth Norfolk

Hey guys im not sure if it actually is the head now i tihnk about it....

i am just going on the word of a portuguese mechanic who has been doing work on my car and a mechanic for a a guy who was going to buy it back off me...

The symptoms:
Idles eratically and stalls.

The things i expect and haven't
No mayo visibible anywhere in the bits i can see into without taking things off

The car runs... just and cuts out with little/no revs but if the revs are kept high enough then the car runs fine.
Im not sure fi the car is using water as im not sure how much it should use lo. i got the car in november and have topped up 3 times.

Do you lose water?? ? Check for mayo in the dip stick also.

No mayo anywhere visible... also not sure if i lose water... it does not leak if thats what is meant

If your headgasket is gone, u will suffer from water lost.

From what u describe, it doesn't seem to me your HG is gone.

Last time my HG gone, i had mayo everywhere, and had to top my car up before every journey.

Am sure someone with more expereiece will give u a more accurate answer.

But defo keep the cinq, don't scrap it or sell it

a failed head gasket doesnt mean loss of coolant. That only happens if the gasket goes between a coolant line and a cylinder or coolant line and an oil line. The latter resulting in mayo. The former resulting in loads of white smoke out of the exhaust.

You could have the head gasket go between 2 cylinders only which wouldnt affect the oil or coolant atall but would make the engine run like crap.

Going from what you have said, I dont think its the HG. If it was, you would have symptoms of either loss of coolant, overheating, white crap in the oil, oil in the coolant and/or crap running. You only have crap running but the symptoms dont sound like those of a gasket failure between cylinders.

In my humble opinion it could be the HG gone between two cylinders.

At low gas speeds, ie idle, the two cylinders don't have compression as it all goes into the next cylinder rather than compress in it own wee hole.

However at higher gas speeds it can't cross quickly enough so the car seems to run fine.

A compression test will tell.

Cheers

D

if its idling badly and cutting out at low revs, it could be an ICV fault.

Icv?

Idle Control Valve

Cheers

D

lol
hmm
so a compression test is recommended ?

No matter how good, or bad, we are on here we cannot pinpoint accurately every fault from a distance.

It doesn't matter how fancy the electronics are on a car, if the mechanicals are playing up, then it ain't going to run well.

Before doing a compression test, get the car idling as best you can. Tickle the throttle to hold it, but not rev the car.

Using insulated pliers, remove one spark plug lead at a time. If the engine dies, then its not that plug. Put the lead back on and restart the engine until you find the one, or two, cylinders that, when you remove the lead, the engine noise doesn't change.

If its one, take a plug and lead from a different cylinder and swap them. If the problem is with the original cylinder, then you know for a fact that its not the plug or lead. If the problem is with the cylinder that you took the good plug and lead from, then you know its the plug or lead, assuming you took them from the same coil.

etc etc etc.

Process of elimination of faults.

Cheers

D

sorry, my bad for the wrong info !

okis so the tasks for 2morra are to swap plugs and see if the engine dies? as in dies completely ? and what does "tickle" the throttle mean ?

Thanks again