Hi everyone,

Apologies for the length of this (my first) post, but I need some advice from the more experience mechanics among you.

I've just done a quick head gasket and sump gasket swap on my son's '06 Panda that was leaking oil from the top and bottom of the engine. As far as I can gather, it's an EV02 1.1 litre engine. Everything went pretty smoothly and I didn't have any big bits left over at the end of the job.

I filled the engine with oil and the coolant system with water (just in case I had to drain it again) and the engine started first time. It ran smoothly at fast idle for a while and then the revs dropped to normal idle. I tried bleeding the coolant system, using the heater hose bleed screw, and a weak coolant mixture (but no air) came out of the bleed fitting. The heater had started to warm up at this point, so things seemed to be working as planned.

I stopped the engine, refitted the bleed screw and removed the coolant filler cap to see whether I needed to top it up. I was surprised to see the water level had risen well past the top marker on the header tank. I re-started the engine without replacing the filler cap, to check whether I'd not tightened the (new) cylinder head bolts properly.

Sure enough, the fluid level rose and started overflowing the filler as the engine sat idling. Strangely, when I blipped the throttle the level dropped, which is the opposite of what I'd expect to see if the head gasket was leaking. I repeated the test three or four times and every time the revs increased the water level dropped, starting to rise again as the engine idled.

Has anyone else experienced this behaviour? I don't want to push ahead with trying to clear a coolant airlock if that runs the risk of damaging the engine. On the other hand, I don't want to replace a perfectly good head gasket and bolt set if it's just a tricky airlock.

Any help or opinions would be gratefully received

Hi

AIR is a bit of a pain to shift

My 2004 1.1 got 2 HG's in 6 weeks

Have a read about the bleeding techniques


But as the water warms it will expand.. so what you are seeing doesnt sound 'wrong'

If the level moves more than a cm or so something is wrong

if the level rises as you undo the cap there's trapped air, needs sorting

I have had 3 Pandas 2 almost self bleed. One is a pain.

After undoing the two bleed screws and filling up tighten the radiator bleed screw back up. Coolant should be flowing out of it.


over fill the expansion bottle coolant and it should flow out of the heater bleed screw. If it doesn't start the engine, raise the revs and it should squirt out of the heater bleed. Tighten the bleed screw back up.

dont leave it above max. syphon a bit out. Otherwise it will blow the heater matrix joint.

I concur that the Panda is a pain in the backside re air bleeding. There is a post on here somewhere showing how to make a tool to give the car a head of water if the header is inbuilt into the rad its essentiaal.. I resorted to filling it and blowing into the radiator which eventually allowed a lot more water to be added. Its not a healthy practice but it worked after a few days of repeat pressure bleeding the air noises stopped and the level has stayed constant since. Hateful !!

Just a quick note.

When you rev the car and the water level goes down, this is because the water pump is sucking the water on its feed side.

Tim

while your working on the car please do check to see the condition of the bottom of the radiator(look through the bumper). If you have lost some of the fine fin blades it might be wise to change the radiator as you may not get enough cooling and you may re blow the head gasket.

Tim

Thanks for the responses, folks, they've been most helpful.

As no-one seemed to think I was risking imminent engine damage I thought I'd try to dislodge the suspected airlock.

We live off a very steep drive so, with the engine still cold, I drove up the hill and straight back down, thinking that shifting the mass of water around the engine block might dislodge trapped air. When I removed the filler cap with the engine idling there was a burp and several large air bubbles emerged. The water level now remains fairly constant, so I think my original question is answered.

I replaced the coolant filler cap and, out of curiosity, removed the oil filler cap. The only way I can describe the sound coming from the rocker box is that it sounded like a drain emptying! I'm a natural pessimist, so I assumed there was either a head gasket leak between a cylinder and an oilway or a broken piston ring. I tried a quick dry compression test, which showed all four cylinders were between 175 and 185 psi (12 - 12.7 bar). With 55000 miles on the clock that seemed acceptable.

There's enough oil in the system and the sound disappears with the filler cap screwed in place. Is a gurgling sound coming from the open oil filler reasonable, or do you think I should be investigating further?

SmallBluePanda said:

Is a gurgling sound coming from the open oil filler reasonable, or do you think I should be investigating further?

Click to expand...

Quite normal I think. You are getting a combination of oil pressure and crankcase pressure release and it will blow quite a lot while its gurging.

I took the cap off my TA recently and it actually blew a blob of gunge out the size of a tennis ball. It nearly got me! This is a new car! Possibly even noisier noises that the 1.2.

I wouldn't run the car with the oil cap off but knowing the camshaft is running in a pool of oil and the excess has to drain down the oil returns then I would expect a gurgling type sound.

The compression test figures show the head gasket is ok.