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Blown Head Gasket? New Engine or Replace Head Gasket?
Hello Everyone,
My 05 Excursion 6.8L V10 (love it) always smoked on start up, but went away after a few minutes.. This past weekend, while driving I heard a weird thump from the engine. The temp started to go up instantly and the engine sounded "off".. I pulled over to check the coolant and it was completely gone, but no leaks anywhere. I pulled off the oil cap and the backside completely coated with the milky residue. Definitely coolant and oil mixing. I'm assuming a blown head gasket.
I do all my own work... I check the book time to perform the job and it is 22+ hrs.. possibly much longer. My engine has 210K miles, but ran very well.
Curious, from the experts on this engine. Is it better to do this job or finding a lower mileage junk yard engine? I'm curious if anyone has had the similar problem and what they did.... If I'm doing the head gasket I'm considering changing out a bunch of parts(water pump, timing chain, pullies, etc) since I have the top end apart.. Parts alone is getting close to 800.. I've seen junk yard engines for 1000-1500..
I love my baby and want it back on the road soon.. Thanks Everyone !
I'm trying to spend thousands on an engine rebuild... I'm trying to keep to a budget of 800-1500 doing everything myself.... I'd love a rebuilt engine. though...
What other Ford model/year had the exact same 6.8L engine was in my 05 Excursion?
The devil you know is often better than the devil you don't. I say rebuild the engine you have (the devil you know) instead of taking the risk on a 20 year old junkyard engine that promises greatness (the devil you don't know).
The one exception might be if you can find an excursion/ truck that has been wrecked in the rear, so you can see/ hear the engine run and perform a leak-down check and a compression check on it BEFORE buying it (I guess that'd be the devil you're sorta familiar with, and at least passed some tests).
...
It could just be the oil cooler that has failed, would be much cheaper than pulling the heads off.
Update. Just drained the oil to see if there was water in it. It came out mostly oil. It is slightly thicker and when it drains from the funnel it kind of coats the funnels as opposed to dripping complete into the container. This was the same as the previous oil change about three weeks ago (first time I notice this). Also, I notice sludge (milky substance under the oil cap). This was the first time I have seen this.
Plan. Changed the oil > fill the truck with water > pressure test to find leak > repair leak > refill system and then do a combustion test with the blue fluid to see if I am getting combustion gasses in the coolant reservoir, I am guessing there is some coolant mixing in the oil. I am also getting a misfire on 7, but that can be broken connector on the coil which is held down by a wire tie.
The problem I have it is a Northeast truck and unfortunately has rust on the rockers (has rot) and frame (not rot). If it was a clean truck, rebuild the engine could be a better option but the rust makes it hesitant to start sinking tons of money into this truck.
if you have not put oil in it yet, leave the drain plug out,
put water in, and add 16 psi air pressure,
let it sit over noght and see if any water comes out of the oil drain plug?
this will be a good test for a leak also, if the 16 psi falls off, you got a problem
Thanks! I have not. Only problem is it is very cold here in the northeast. I may be able to do it later in the week if the overnight lows hover above 32F.
Don't know anything about the V10, BUT the 5.4 has a known problem with water leaking by intake manifold gasket. Usually at front or rear corners. I'm sure there are videos on YouTube.
Got a deal on mine when I bought it, as the guy thought it was head gasket. Want to say intake manifold was like $200, and I did the work myself.
Plan on filling up the truck with water. Find the leak and repair. Then I will do a combustion test. Hopefully the liquid stays blue not yellow. Most likely yellow but fingers crossed. If it stayed blue I was going to do exactly what you said the intake.
As Tom said, check your oil cooler, right above the oil filter, you can easily bypass it by removing the coolant hoses and connecting them together. Also, the oil cooler can leak oil internally and externally, I replaced mine and what I thought may be a rear main leak turned out to be the oil cooler.
In cool/cold Temps you can get condensate to mix with oil and leave a chocolate pudding under the filler cap. I have it on my '04 5.4l and at first I was freaking out cause the truck had always used coolant in the 18 years I've owned it. Test the cooling system under pressure first. I finally found my leaks. First one was weird-the lower coolant hose where it connects to the oil cooler the spring clamp had cracked on the block side and the clamp had enough bite that it pierced through the hose. It only leaked after shut off after running at temp. The second was the front right corner of the intake. It was the most recent revelation but it has been 8 months now with ZERO coolant loss. I just turned over 245k miles and only thing done inside engine was replaced the chain tensioners with the cast iron ones at 101k miles. Here is a picture of what I had to do w/ intake. This was a problem for jb weld epoxy putty.
Thanks everyone for all the responses and suggestions. I really appreciate...
UPDATE: I finally had the chance to pressure test the coolant system and check for exhaust gases in the coolant reservoir tank.
Pressure tested at 15 PSI:: Check everywhere and did not find a leak anywhere in 10 min.
Checked for exhaust gas: Used the test kit from Habor Freight.. After warming up the engine I checked and the blue fluid turned Yellow! Tried multiple times and always yellow.
Looks like it is a head gasket (at a minimum) and probably a leak at the intake manifold.
I'm leaning on ewplacing the head gaskets plus any other fail points while I'm in there doing the repair. I saw an excellent youtube video of someone doing the job on a F250. Excellent. This person removed the entire front clip of the truck... I'm curious.. Has anyone done this job and did you remove the front clip?
Its a lot of work but definitely doable with the front clip on. When I did mine a few years ago I did it with the clip on. The worst is the passenger side, very difficult to get some of the head bolts in/out where all the AC crap is. You also need to replace the head bolts as they are torque to yield bolts, meaning they stretch as part of their retention process and are not considered reusable. You also will need to get a cam retainer tool, to hold the camshaft in position while you remove it. Also be prepared to have to replace injector/ignition coil clips as they will be brittle after this long. There are replacement pigtails available.
Before pulling the head I would verify where the leak is coming from, use a borescope in the cylinder heads through the spark plug holes, see if you have a washed out cylinder, if coolant is being burned the piston will be clean.
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