uh oh..... set back. water in oil

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swing69

fightin' socialism
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finally got the timing sorted on the rebuilt 318. One issue, was a poorly rebuilt carb. I sprung for a new one...it ran much better. still, initial timing wanted to be at 15 degrees, but it was hard to start.

after some running and playing, the exhaust started to smoke. I shut it down.....looked around and man, I had a bad feeling. Heres the oil I drained:

20190628_171454_resized.jpg
 
pulled off the heads as well. no sign of a gasket failure. I would rather have seen one!
Intake gasket also looked fine. Not sure where the leak occurred.

I top flush everything I could with fresh oil.....and continuously flush the pan. I going to manual rotate the oil pump with fresh oil to get things cleaned.......

I'm not really happy, first one like this ever! Oh well.
 
swing69 said:
pulled off the heads as well. no sign of a gasket failure. I would rather have seen one!
Intake gasket also looked fine. Not sure where the leak occurred.

I top flush everything I could with fresh oil.....and continuously flush the pan. I going to manual rotate the oil pump with fresh oil to get things cleaned.......

I'm not really happy, first one like this ever! Oh well.
Click to expand...
Bummer for sure, lot of work staring at ya.
 
A couple questions.
How'd those 340 exhaust manifolds seal at the bottom of the ports?
Do you think it's a intake coolant crossover leak, a head gasket, crack, timing cover leak or pinhole behind water pump ?

All trick questions.
 
Wow. That just sucks. Not to mention the sick feeling you get. So what course of action?
I would have made some block off plates and pressure tested with heads still on. And check the fit of intake to heads. From the volume of water i suspect the intake has a fitment issue.
 
Timing cover leak never crossed my mind, but that is still on engine and problem may have not been discovered yet.
 
Stock rebuild? Antifreeze in it? Is so at this point don’t go crazy cleaning it, you don’t know where its coming from and the antifreeze will stop corrosion. Did you see it run before being rebuilt? Its tough now its apart, you can’t run compression test or pressure test cooling system to try and locate leak. Really if you are sure the head gasket was good and the intake seal was good you are left with a cracked part or timing cover leak.
 
A bit slow I am, you could make block off plates for the decks and water pump. Put 10 lbs of air in it and listen. I have seen cavitation pits in front covers go through the cover.
 
It also appears as if there is some serious rust pits on one of the valve springs. I would hate for it to break.
 
There was no smoking or oil / coolant loss during the cam break in. The engine has maybe 20 min. run time after cam break in. It was in the process of finalizing timing and carb setup issues. At least the carb issue is fixed.

The smoking started soon after playing with timing. That may or may not be related.

Intake is a Edelbrock Performer. Used, but looked good.
Exhaust manifolds are stock 65 273 manifolds from the car (65 Barracuda)

Engine was a runner, it was .020 over. We replaced all the bearings, pistons (after a kid dropped 1 and busted off a skirt), rings, oil pump, cam....everything.

Heads look good too.

I'm leaning, ok - guessing, intake manifold gasket. I don't know for sure......

I'm going to go back to the engine and continue flushing everything I can with clean oil. I'm still don't know what to do...... short of looking for another engine.
 
just a weird light trick. springs are good. I can see no tears in the head gaskets. intake gasket destroyed in removal....not much to tell. I certainly don't want to fire up the parts cannon!

This is our HS project car. It finally got running on the last day or classes for the cam break in.
Kids are gone, I was just trying to get the carb / timing set properly so I could move on its own under power. That didn't work out too well....

The goal was to have the headliner installed, exhaust on, and front/rear glass IN for the beginning of Sept. when the kids come back. I'd hate to the car to be in a worse condition that when the left.

I'll probably just reinstall everything carefully and keep my fingers crossed. If I get lucky, all will be good.
If its still leaking, at least I could rule out head gaskets.

But the leak could be: cracked internal passage in block, intake gasket OR cracked intake, timing cover leak.

If it pukes again.....just push it to the back lift and get ready to pull the engine completely out. :(
and start over........
 
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At this point, I would say get the heads pressure tested first, being they’re already off. If it were me, I would go ahead and pull the engine out and tear everything back down to clean everything. The cover is my strongest suspicion, but if it’s the block, then at least you’ll have everything ready to go into another block after machine work.
 
I should add that if the rest of your car looks as good as your paint does under hood, that is going to be one sharp ride. Hoping for a quick and easy solution to your leak to help make up for all the extra work. Internal coolant leaks and wiped camshafts are my worst nightmare on a fresh build.
 
Isn't there something about using a a longer than required bolt on the timing cover and punching it through a water jacket? Just a shot in the dark, but who knows.
 
swing69 said:
just a weird light trick. springs are good. I can see no tears in the head gaskets. intake gasket destroyed in removal....not much to tell. I certainly don't want to fire up the parts cannon!

This is our HS project car. It finally got running on the last day or classes for the cam break in.
Kids are gone, I was just trying to get the carb / timing set properly so I could move on its own under power. That didn't work out too well....

The goal was to have the headliner installed, exhaust on, and front/rear glass IN for the beginning of Sept. when the kids come back. I'd hate to the car to be in a worse condition that when the left.

I'll probably just reinstall everything carefully and keep my fingers crossed. If I get lucky, all will be good.
If its still leaking, at least I could rule out head gaskets.

But the leak could be: cracked internal passage in block, intake gasket OR cracked intake, timing cover leak.

If it pukes again.....just push it to the back lift and get ready to pull the engine completely out. :(
and start over........
Click to expand...



I agree with Garrett. Don't put it back together until you do some more research. Mag and or pressure test the heads. Usually a mag on cast iron is good enough unless you have been porting on them.

If you don't pressure test them, you could miss something. Like a pin hole in a paste line, or even a pin hole in the bowl area. I've seen both and this stuff is old.

I don't know who mentioned it above, but when you see oil in the water like that, it's almost always a leak at the intake water crossover or a bad timing cover.


Had a buddy with a Chevy work truck. Had over 200k on it, but he took care of it. He loved the truck and had all his work crap in it. Started getting water in the oil. Went to a shop and they tell him the engine is garbage and quoted him some retarded price to do a swap with a used engine.

He and I wound up together at my brothers house and he tells me the story. I say pull the intake and see if it's leaking. He did. And it was. Has 320k on it now and he's thinking about retiring it.

The point is find the issue before moving forward. Sometimes the simple answer is the correct answer.

And as a FWIW, I've never seen a perfectly flat, straight intake manifold out of the box. I surface every intake anymore. It just isn't worth it.
 
Chevy, vortec especially are notorious for intake leaks. I must have done 50. I always use the fel-pro replacements and never refill with dex-cool.
 
Curiosity, What was the thing that told you to drain the oil?
Your post # 4 states intake gasket looked fine then in your post # 13 you state the intake gasket got destroyed.
How did the intake gaskets get destroyed? Was it a blue fel pro or the thin metal one that comes in some gasket sets? What type of sealer did you use if any?
 
Engine was a runner, it was .020 over. We replaced all the bearings, pistons (after a kid dropped 1 and busted off a skirt), rings, oil pump, cam....everything.
. . . . . possibly something jacked in the bore of one cylinder ??
 
on the timing chain cover...did you use just a gasket or rtv or gasket with rtv.....had a 360 recently where i used only a gasket and the cover leaked....the cover was pitted and the gasket only would not seal it....RTV did....no leakie now
 
After I saw the smoke - I looked in the radiator, and the level was low. got the sinking feeling in the gut. I checked the oil, and the level was 1" above the mark and frothy. typical indicator of coolant in the engine oil. No oil went into the coolant. That was all pristine "green". I then drained the oil, as you see in post 1.

Head Gaskets: I pulled the intake and valve covers - and took a pict of what I saw. Next, I pulled the cylinder heads, with the engine still in the car. One head gasket came off perfectly clean, attached to the cylinder head. One bank, the head gasket got mangled in the removal process. But after inspecting both closely.....I didn't see and gaps/tears/breaks in the head gaskets. ( I did not seal the gaskets with any type of spray on sealer - copper or paint)
The gaskets were the blue Fel-pro that came in an engine set.

Intake Gasket: The intake gaskets were the thin "tin" ones. A buddy of mine suggested to use the Felpro 340 composite gaskets. He said the metal were leak prone. The metal intake gaskets got hi-tak around the intake ports and RTV around the crossovers.

Pistons: the engine was rebuilt, and had +.020 pistons. Kids were cleaning them and dropped 1 on the floor, breaking off the skirt. I couldn't find a matching piston, so we bought a set of 8 with rings. We honed the cylinders, and its all looked pretty good.

Timing Cover: The original 273 timing cover was used with RTV and a gasket. If I recall, the bottom corner bolts for the cover need to be short. If its long, it will punch though the water jacket into the cylinder bore.

ROYAL FLUSH! Manual flushing today. removed the oil filter and added 10 qts of oil(walmarts best! $11 for 5 qts) ! I wanted the crankshaft swimming in oil. I rotated the crank by hand, maybe 10 complete revolutions. Next I pulled the oil pump drive and installed my priming tool. I rotated the oil pump and pushed a bunch of milkshakes out the oil filter head. Next, I installed a filter and turned the oil pump again, and I saw the oil pushing up through the lifters. I then rotated the crank a few more times and them primed it again. The goal was to splash as much oil as possible around and push fresh oil into all the bearings. I then pour another qt or two over the valley, and left it to drain down to the pan. I left it to sit for 30 min or so.......then drained the oil pan. It looked much better, not perfect, but alot better. I just didn't want the antifreeze to sit against the bearing or in the passages.

Now I'm ok with letting the engine sit until I figure out how to proceed. The intake I used was a "used" performer.
I'm thinking about getting another intake, to eliminate that source.
 
swing69 said:
After I saw the smoke - I looked in the radiator, and the level was low. got the sinking feeling in the gut. I checked the oil, and the level was 1" above the mark and frothy. typical indicator of coolant in the engine oil. No oil went into the coolant. That was all pristine "green". I then drained the oil, as you see in post 1.

Head Gaskets: I pulled the intake and valve covers - and took a pict of what I saw. Next, I pulled the cylinder heads, with the engine still in the car. One head gasket came off perfectly clean, attached to the cylinder head. One bank, the head gasket got mangled in the removal process. But after inspecting both closely.....I didn't see and gaps/tears/breaks in the head gaskets. ( I did not seal the gaskets with any type of spray on sealer - copper or paint)
The gaskets were the blue Fel-pro that came in an engine set.

Intake Gasket: The intake gaskets were the thin "tin" ones. A buddy of mine suggested to use the Felpro 340 composite gaskets. He said the metal were leak prone. The metal intake gaskets got hi-tak around the intake ports and RTV around the crossovers.

Pistons: the engine was rebuilt, and had +.020 pistons. Kids were cleaning them and dropped 1 on the floor, breaking off the skirt. I couldn't find a matching piston, so we bought a set of 8 with rings. We honed the cylinders, and its all looked pretty good.

Timing Cover: The original 273 timing cover was used with RTV and a gasket. If I recall, the bottom corner bolts for the cover need to be short. If its long, it will punch though the water jacket into the cylinder bore.

ROYAL FLUSH! Manual flushing today. removed the oil filter and added 10 qts of oil(walmarts best! $11 for 5 qts) ! I wanted the crankshaft swimming in oil. I rotated the crank by hand, maybe 10 complete revolutions. Next I pulled the oil pump drive and installed my priming tool. I rotated the oil pump and pushed a bunch of milkshakes out the oil filter head. Next, I installed a filter and turned the oil pump again, and I saw the oil pushing up through the lifters. I then rotated the crank a few more times and them primed it again. The goal was to splash as much oil as possible around and push fresh oil into all the bearings. I then pour another qt or two over the valley, and left it to drain down to the pan. I left it to sit for 30 min or so.......then drained the oil pan. It looked much better, not perfect, but alot better. I just didn't want the antifreeze to sit against the bearing or in the passages.

Now I'm ok with letting the engine sit until I figure out how to proceed. The intake I used was a "used" performer.
I'm thinking about getting another intake, to eliminate that source.
Click to expand...

There's your problem, aluminum intakes don't work with stamped sheetmetal gaskets, they must be fiber. Metal gaskets are for iron intakes on iron heads only. The intake gaskets need to be designed to handle the different heat expansion rates of iron vs aluminum.
 
MopaR&D said:
There's your problem, aluminum intakes don't work with stamped sheetmetal gaskets, they must be fiber. Metal gaskets are for iron intakes on iron heads only. The intake gaskets need to be designed to handle the different heat expansion rates of iron vs aluminum.
Click to expand...


This ^^^^^^^^^^^^

You can get LUCKY using a tin gasket on an aluminum intake and have it seal, but the intake face and head face better be damn clean, perfectly straight, flat and the manifold has to fit correctly.

Otherwise, they don't deal well.
 
^^^I agree with the above. 1213 s Fel-Pro. It needs a thicker gasket because the two different kinds of metals expand at different rates.
I personally use the "right stuff" in black on everything....
So I didn't hear where you re tightened the intake manifold down after that 20-minute break in?
 
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