head gasket gone?

[avinator]

Hi,


My 98 e39 overheated the other day. The gauge was on red for no more than about 1 minute before I shut the engine off. ( Does the audio alert goes on when the car overheats? Because I could not hear it. I know it alerted me when the windshield wiper liquid was low....) I opened the hood and checked both radiator hoses for circulation. The one on the passengers side was cold. I bled my cooling system and now the car operates just fine.

Any chance I blew my head gasket ? Should I do a coolant pressure test or a compression check? Which one is more accurate? I think I noticed a little bit coolant on the garage floor from the back of the engine. It might of been from when I bled the system so I wiped it down and I will check again tomorrow to see if any fluid appears again. Any help is appreciated.

Thanks

[xisco44]

maybe your thermostat is going bad.
so i would replace that.

and most likely your head gasket is ok

[fijimon05]

Damn I don't know about you guys, but I always check my temp gauge every 20-30 seconds.

[avinator]

Damn I don't know about you guys, but I always check my temp gauge every 20-30 seconds.

We should not have to do that... With all that German know how, they should have an audible when the temperature goes up beyond a certain point. :D

[fijimon05]

We should not have to do that... With all that German know how, they should have an audible when the temperature goes up beyond a certain point. :D

It's like a tick i have. If it had an audible warning sound when the temp got to hot, then it would all be sweet and dandy, but it's not like that so now I have to live with looking down at the gauge every 30 seconds. :shifty

[xisco44]

i do that bmw cooling system paranoia.
i also put the digital coolant temperature on the dash. to be extra sure

[TBar]

I saw " head gasket gone" and instantly thought, did someone steal it?

[tsouzee]

Damn I don't know about you guys, but I always check my temp gauge every 20-30 seconds.

Me too! I thought I was the only one. LOL Sometimes I look at it and it looks like its past 12 o'clock because of the way I'm sitting, and then I freak out but I get a good angle and breathe easy.
Freakin paranoia sucks man.

[avinator]

It sucks.... I would think with all the german engineering they would add an audible which rings when the needle is between normal and hot... so it should ding before you get the critical point when most of the times is too late to do anything about it....what's even more sad is that the darn head and the gaskets are over $1500 ( no labor added yet ) - a "used" engine is about 2k but it's silly to spend that much money on a used engine since the darn thing could have it's own problems which no one knows about...

Anyone know how much a "create" engine is and where we can get one ?

I am glad we have comedians on the forum....

[Cyrix2k]

We should not have to do that... With all that German know how, they should have an audible when the temperature goes up beyond a certain point. :D
it wouldn't work when you need it, like the airbags in e36s :rofl