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Thread: Head Gasket - womp womp. Looking for advice

  1. #1
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    Head Gasket - womp womp. Looking for advice

    Hey team,

    Because I’m an anxiety ridden man child I decided to purchase a block tester kit to see if I get any results. I ran it last weekend and it seemed ok. The bulb wasn’t filling and I couldn’t get the liquid to go yellow so I figured all good. Well today I was warming the car up again just as a weekly thing and decided to give it another go. This time I waited for the car to really get warmed up and noticed I had steam coming from the reservoir so I thought I’d try to suck some of that up and to my dismay, the fluid started to change color. (Insert Darth Vader “noooooo” gif here).

    I do have ample experience in electronics repair but a cylinder head would be a new beast for me. In my experience the tools are the most important part so I’d expect to spend some good money on tools that I would need, but those aren’t just a one and done so that doesn’t bother me. Also the car is not my daily driver at all, it’s a garage queen, so time isn’t much of an issue.

    First, how often do these heads crack? I would hate to get the head off and not be prepared with a new head. I don’t have much info about the history of the car other than it was driven by an older lady for the majority of its life and then I purchased it from a BMW CCA member after he had it two years. I did, however, notice that all the cooling components I replaced (thermostat, water pump, etc) were all original.

    Secondly, if valves need to be reseated or any additional work past just popping the head off and replacing the gasket, is that all something a good machine shop could do? Watching videos on lapping valves and cleaning a head makes me think it’s best to leave that to someone with ample years of experience.

    I guess in short the question is: is a head with 152k on it best left to a professional for a first-timer?

    Thanks everybody! Sorry for the word vomit

  2. #2
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    There isn't much special tool needed for head gasket job. You'll need cam tool, vano tool and maybe head stud torx socket. You should tackle it, 156k is nothing on an s52 motor. Head cracked if severed over heat, but you will see that problem right away.

    Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk

  3. #3
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    Tools aren’t much. There are copies of the vanos timing tools available. Lots of DIY also. You can pull it and take it to a machine shop for pressure testing and resurfacing and checking of valves and guides or you could just buy a refurbished head from a place like Autohead or VAC and there may be others. Then return yours to the shop to get your core charge back. Buy a top end gasket kit. People say not to use victor reins headgasket and to source elring instead. I have done the job at least 6 times. If you are patient and careful, you can do it. If you have never done one and can get a friend who has, that is ideal.

  4. #4
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    Quote Originally Posted by UsernaM3 View Post
    Hey team,

    Because I’m an anxiety ridden man child I decided to purchase a block tester kit to see if I get any results. I ran it last weekend and it seemed ok. The bulb wasn’t filling and I couldn’t get the liquid to go yellow so I figured all good. Well today I was warming the car up again just as a weekly thing and decided to give it another go. This time I waited for the car to really get warmed up and noticed I had steam coming from the reservoir so I thought I’d try to suck some of that up and to my dismay, the fluid started to change color. (Insert Darth Vader “noooooo” gif here).

    I do have ample experience in electronics repair but a cylinder head would be a new beast for me. In my experience the tools are the most important part so I’d expect to spend some good money on tools that I would need, but those aren’t just a one and done so that doesn’t bother me. Also the car is not my daily driver at all, it’s a garage queen, so time isn’t much of an issue.

    First, how often do these heads crack? I would hate to get the head off and not be prepared with a new head. I don’t have much info about the history of the car other than it was driven by an older lady for the majority of its life and then I purchased it from a BMW CCA member after he had it two years. I did, however, notice that all the cooling components I replaced (thermostat, water pump, etc) were all original.

    Secondly, if valves need to be reseated or any additional work past just popping the head off and replacing the gasket, is that all something a good machine shop could do? Watching videos on lapping valves and cleaning a head makes me think it’s best to leave that to someone with ample years of experience.

    I guess in short the question is: is a head with 152k on it best left to a professional for a first-timer?

    Thanks everybody! Sorry for the word vomit
    That's just about the mileage my car had on it when my head gasket went (of course, that was ten years ago). I had only ever really done brakes and oil changes when my head gasket failed (burned out between 5 and 6, so no coolant leak, but it barely ran). It's been going for 100k miles since I did it, so I must have done something right.

    So yes, you can do this. Do the homework, read every writeup you can find. People add different details, so read them all. Bentley, Pelican, stuff here on the forums, etc. Read it all. There are youtube videos on it now, so watch some of those too.

    Second, don't mess with the head. Take it off, take it to a machine shop. That's money well spent. They'll clean it up, make sure it's straight, replace the valve guides for you, pressure test it, etc. This is a great time to have them install cams if you're so inclined.

    Heads do crack, but mostly the gaskets fail. I wouldn't automatically buy a head. You can locate one to buy just in case, and you can even go ahead and buy it if you really want, but you're not in a hurry, so that doesn't seem urgent. It'll take a week to have your head done at the machine shop anyway, so what's another week or two?

    The only special tools you need are the cam and flywheel locks, and then you'll need to find a dial gauge or make one yourself. Pretty simple from a tools perspective (assuming you already have a normal tool and socket set).

    But no, I don't think this is best left to a professional. But then again, I won't let anyone touch my car anymore.

    More specifically, you care about your own car, but the people you'd hand it over to don't care about your car at all. They're trying to get it done as quickly as possible, whereas you'll take as much time as it needs to get it done right. Call me crazy, but I'd rather not hand my car over to people like that.

    This is fairly straight forward. You can do it. Take your time, do your homework, double check everything if you're nervous, and you can pull it off.

    Also - get a box of small ziploc bags and a sharpie and label all the hardware you remove, and take lots of pictures as you do it to refer back to.

    You can do this!

    -Josh: 1998 S54 E36 M3/4/6 with most of the easy stuff and most of the hard stuff. At least twice. 271k miles. 1994 E32 740il with nothing but some MPars. 93k miles.

  5. #5
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    Quote Originally Posted by pbonsalb View Post
    Tools aren’t much. There are copies of the vanos timing tools available. Lots of DIY also. You can pull it and take it to a machine shop for pressure testing and resurfacing and checking of valves and guides or you could just buy a refurbished head from a place like Autohead or VAC and there may be others. Then return yours to the shop to get your core charge back. Buy a top end gasket kit. People say not to use victor reins headgasket and to source elring instead. I have done the job at least 6 times. If you are patient and careful, you can do it. If you have never done one and can get a friend who has, that is ideal.
    Lucky me I have the vanos timing tools as I did plan to do that so I may tackle both at the same time. Thank you so much for the advice. I do have a friend that is a tech at Mercedes, maybe I could coax him for a couple hundred bucks to come lend a hand.

    Quote Originally Posted by asianvenom View Post
    There isn't much special tool needed for head gasket job. You'll need cam tool, vano tool and maybe head stud torx socket. You should tackle it, 156k is nothing on an s52 motor. Head cracked if severed over heat, but you will see that problem right away.

    Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk
    Good to hear. Definitely this leak wasn’t super apparent since I don’t have any other real symptoms. I did notice some coolant missing but not much at all, i figured it was just the weather turning cold; aside from that the car runs great.



    Quote Originally Posted by blckstrm View Post
    That's just about the mileage my car had on it when my head gasket went (of course, that was ten years ago). I had only ever really done brakes and oil changes when my head gasket failed (burned out between 5 and 6, so no coolant leak, but it barely ran). It's been going for 100k miles since I did it, so I must have done something right.

    So yes, you can do this. Do the homework, read every writeup you can find. People add different details, so read them all. Bentley, Pelican, stuff here on the forums, etc. Read it all. There are youtube videos on it now, so watch some of those too.

    Second, don't mess with the head. Take it off, take it to a machine shop. That's money well spent. They'll clean it up, make sure it's straight, replace the valve guides for you, pressure test it, etc. This is a great time to have them install cams if you're so inclined.

    Heads do crack, but mostly the gaskets fail. I wouldn't automatically buy a head. You can locate one to buy just in case, and you can even go ahead and buy it if you really want, but you're not in a hurry, so that doesn't seem urgent. It'll take a week to have your head done at the machine shop anyway, so what's another week or two?

    The only special tools you need are the cam and flywheel locks, and then you'll need to find a dial gauge or make one yourself. Pretty simple from a tools perspective (assuming you already have a normal tool and socket set).

    But no, I don't think this is best left to a professional. But then again, I won't let anyone touch my car anymore.

    More specifically, you care about your own car, but the people you'd hand it over to don't care about your car at all. They're trying to get it done as quickly as possible, whereas you'll take as much time as it needs to get it done right. Call me crazy, but I'd rather not hand my car over to people like that.

    This is fairly straight forward. You can do it. Take your time, do your homework, double check everything if you're nervous, and you can pull it off.

    Also - get a box of small ziploc bags and a sharpie and label all the hardware you remove, and take lots of pictures as you do it to refer back to.

    You can do this!
    Thank you so much man, this fills me with a lot of confidence. I think I’ll tackle this in the spring since Utah gets a bit chilly in my garage during the winter so that gives me a lot of time to study and read. These days our phones make it so much easier to take progress pictures so I’m grateful for that lol.

    You’re 100% correct though. My biggest worry when I drop my car off for even the smallest thing like emissions is, are they going to treat my car well? I believe you make a great point that I’ll be far more inclined to do it right and I’ll probably end up with a more properly built head in the end.

    I believe the dial gauge might be the only thing I’m missing so I’ll grab one of those in the near future.




    Thanks everyone, so far!


    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

  6. #6
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    Quote Originally Posted by UsernaM3 View Post
    Lucky me I have the vanos timing tools as I did plan to do that so I may tackle both at the same time.
    It’s not optional; you don’t have a choice when reinstalling a head since you are removing the vanos and disconnecting the crank to valvetrain timing chain.

    An angle torque wrench is expensive but convenient. I think HF offers one in the Icon line that is much less than snap on or others and still good. A dial indicator you fit to a conventional torque wrench is about $20. You can also buy ARP studs for about $175 that use a standard torque spec—no angle torque.

  7. #7
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    It's really not as bad as you may think when you actually start doing it. It's all disassembly and proper reassembly, just like anything else. I seriously considered having someone else do mine but I'm glad I did it in my home garage over the course of a couple weeks.

    Blkstrm nailed it though. Just take your time, label everything, and read/watch the walkthroughs a couple times and you'll be just fine. If anything pops up, the resources here should be able to help get you back on track.
    Past: '99 Hellrot/Dove M3 | '97 S14 1JZ | '06 Triumph Daytona 675 | '01 330I M-Tech I | '99 Silvia S15 | Current: '96 Estoril/Black M3

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  8. #8
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    Tools aren't that bad and years ago there was a great step by step walkthrough for this. I'm sure there are better ones now out there I did mine 8 years ago I think. Best advice is to just take your time and read up/watch some videos. It was actually a fun project.

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