Abbondanza
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- June 13, 2011
- Messages
- 181
- Reaction score
- 0
- City, State
- Long Island, NY
- Year, Model & Trim Level
- 1996 XLT 4.0 OHV 170k
My head gaskets failed on my 1996 OHV 4.0 (big white smoke cloud from the exhaust 2-3 miles from my driveway, and there was the obvious milkshake on the oil cap). I got her home, shut her down, and ordered a new water pump, t-stat and complete gasket set from Rock Auto.
I had been losing coolant gradually for months before that, so I suspected the head gasket(s) or intake gasket was failing.
Of course anyone who has gone through this job knows that the exhaust manifold bolts are the killer, on a 96 truck, they are severely rusted/seized. I got four of them off, but after I rounded of the next two, I decided to attack the manifold to Y-pipe bolts as suggested on other posts. These are also severely rusted, I decided to dremel-cut the passenger side bolts, the driver's side outer bolt snapped in half under extreme torque, but after a long fight, the hardest bolt to reach, the inner drivers side bolt actually came out with a bolt-extractor socket (9/16th) which I used a 1/2" 25 inch extension to reach. I hammered it on to the head and it slowly twisted out.
So after fighting through that, I have both heads out with exhaust manifolds attached. I see no cracks in my heads (cast-iron) so I was not planning on replacing them...unless someone thinks (based on my description and the linked pictures below) that I definitely should??
I figured I will get the 3 pieces of bolts left in the manifold to pipe out of there and get replacement bolts to re-attach after I change out the gaskets.
Is it a bad idea to think I can put these heads back on? ALso, should I clean and/or lubricate the cylinder/piston heads? Any advice based on the pictures would be greatly appreciated, thanks in advance for your time!
https://milla-bella.com/truck_images/passengerhead2.jpghttps://milla-bella.com/truck_images/passengerhead2.jpg
I had been losing coolant gradually for months before that, so I suspected the head gasket(s) or intake gasket was failing.
Of course anyone who has gone through this job knows that the exhaust manifold bolts are the killer, on a 96 truck, they are severely rusted/seized. I got four of them off, but after I rounded of the next two, I decided to attack the manifold to Y-pipe bolts as suggested on other posts. These are also severely rusted, I decided to dremel-cut the passenger side bolts, the driver's side outer bolt snapped in half under extreme torque, but after a long fight, the hardest bolt to reach, the inner drivers side bolt actually came out with a bolt-extractor socket (9/16th) which I used a 1/2" 25 inch extension to reach. I hammered it on to the head and it slowly twisted out.
So after fighting through that, I have both heads out with exhaust manifolds attached. I see no cracks in my heads (cast-iron) so I was not planning on replacing them...unless someone thinks (based on my description and the linked pictures below) that I definitely should??
I figured I will get the 3 pieces of bolts left in the manifold to pipe out of there and get replacement bolts to re-attach after I change out the gaskets.
Is it a bad idea to think I can put these heads back on? ALso, should I clean and/or lubricate the cylinder/piston heads? Any advice based on the pictures would be greatly appreciated, thanks in advance for your time!