Found a crack in my head just below the intake where the thermostat mounts. I have never over heated the engine and I think that the crack may have been there since I bought the truck ~65k miles ago, but I might have just knocked some stop-leak loose or something. Its a small crack and it was peeing out coolant one day when I caught it. The truck does not run hot or anything and it does not seem to leak when the truck is running. The coolant level leaks down to the level of the crack and then stops. There still is coolant in the resevior so I think I am ok. I'm goin to get some JB weld or the like to repair it since I do not think this warrants a top end. Has anyone else had this problem or a recomended fix?

 

JB weld will not handle that. of course the best method for repair would be to have it welded up, but Barr's also makes an excellent product that will not damage any internals.

 

I would prefer an external cold repair. A guy at caterpiller said they use belzona for cold block repair, and since I am in the petrochem industry I have seen belzona used on pressurized cases like bondo on car sheet metal. Problem is the proper belzona is hard to come by for me right now and I was hoping to find another cold repair epoxy that might be better than JB weld. I have been running the truck the past couple of days without issue so I am just not that worried about welding it up or anything.

 

FYI for future hole in head repair specialist.
I have used JB weld to repair the hole in the head. I used a pick to rod out the hole until I got some hard metal which made the hole about 6mm big. I then used the JB weld epoxy putty stick like Quicksteel that's the high temp stuff rated to 600 degrees F. Couple about 150 miles on the repair now no issues. If it begins to leak again I believe that I can remove the intake and sleeve that portion of the water jacket since i believe that the area is too thin to weld.

 

Just curious why the Belzona products are so difficult to obtain for you?

This is a great follow up since your hands-on experience shows there is more than one way to skin the kat or plug a leak!

Thanks for posting your results.

 

The belzona compound that is recomended is not the same used here at the plant. And the belzona we have comes in large quantities and are not small enough too fit in the lunch pale. For now the JB weld is holding so I am considering it fixed until it leaks.