07/12/2013Today, the Princess was being used to tootle over to Lubenham which is just off J20 of the M1 for a Triumph Club open day. All was well, no issues of note at all, but about 30 miles from our destination the temp gauge suddenly jumped up from the usual 1/2 to 3/4. I backed off and the temperature dropped a bit but the car didn't seem too bad. We pulled off at Leicester Forest East just for a loo break and I popped the bonnet just in case.
The thermostat housing had a bit of steam coming from it and had overflowed. At first I thought the bodge of chemical metal had failed and it had just dumped all the water out again.
But popping off the oil filler cap proved otherwise. I'd checked the water and oil a couple of days ago and there was no mayonnaise or warning that anything was amiss.
We filled the expansion tank and started the car to see what would happen. Lots of water and steam out the exhaust was about the result of that and the gauge rising steadily. That proved conclusively that it was a head gasket failure.
Thankfully, back in February I signed up for AA membership and today was the first time I've ever had to make use of it. The first AA thing to arrive was a van and I laughed when the driver suggested we might be able to put K-seal in, and then he laughed when he saw the contents of the oil filler. He didn't have the relevant A-frame* with him so we waited for a big lorry to take us home instead.
Tonight I spent my last bit of cash on 4ltrs of oil. I'll get the head off, check it for level and use the stuff I bought to do the HLS head on the HL instead now. The only thing I need to acquire is some engine flush to clean out the gunk and I can borrow the relevant stem seal tool so that can be done at the same time.
It's a frustrating set back, but it will allow me to get the engine in tip top health, something I was putting off until the Spring as I'll likely have to do this job in the street as I don't have enough driveway space to use.
10/12/2013Progress, of a sort. I've got what I hope is the correct valve spring compressor in the post to me, a suitable quantity of oil, a full gasket set, antifreeze, de-ionised water, torque wrench and all manner of other tools and stuff to sort the engine out. Thankfully, I don't need to use the car this week so I can wait for all my various things to get to me to do all the engine jobs at once.
Entirely by chance we found the source of my minor oil leak on the engine. As my brother came on the drive tonight his headlights swept the front of my car which now sits higher after the suspension pump up and is facing the opposite side to usual. This highlighted the fresh oil on the gearbox end plate and it looks like a couple of nuts are looser than they should be and that the gasket is leaking. What's annoying about that is that I've been under the car and cleaned bits to try and locate the oil leak and consistently failed to find anything conclusive before now.
We'll get the head off, change the valve stem seals and reseal the rocker cover thus eliminating the very minor weep from there. We'll then do the head gasket and after we've drained the first lot of oil we'll get the end plate resealed. Then we'll fix the inevitable exhaust blow at least twice and threaten to set fire to it before calling the job finished.
Oh, and my wheel nuts were posted today too.