well, where shell i start! build me engine up few weeks ago! with the followin!

 

88mm wiseco pistons

egal rods

new bearings

complete gasket kit!

new water and oil pump

and had my turbos refurbed!

 

anyways had a few teathing probs with it this past week (misfires) but all sorted! untill yesterday wen i pulled up in my drive and to see plumes of white smoke coming out the bk! so i checked my water temp and it was fine! left it running for abit and the smoke stoped!

 

all was well again untill abit later where it did it again! (bearin in mind that by this time ive done 1000miles steady of running in) anyways came to it this morning, fired it up and was ok! wen work, came bk later fired it up again and to my horror its buildin up preasure in the rad and the pipes were rock hard! this to me screams head gasket! but cannot for the life of me see how this could of happend! as ive had the heads skimmed! its been running lovely before all this!

 

could anybody else shead and light on my suituation!

 

just another thing! i did i comp and leak test just after the first time i saw smoke, and all was well!! :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry:

heads should really be re-torqued as over the first few thousand miles they will settle down.

 

Do a compression test to see if its just one side with the problem.

what do you use to accurately measure the water temperature with ? since the stock gauge is close to worthless.

Zeds are notorious for overheating (even with brand new or rebuild engines) and it doesn't take that much to warp one or both heads.

 

Also were the shorter head bolts put at the correct locations ? (there are 7 long and 1 short bolt per head) ...if you didn't then most certainly this is the cause of the leaking headgasket(s).

 

-Eric

bolts are all fine! its odd how one moment fine then the next all this! realy dont think re-torquin the heads will do much! or will it! if i fire the engin up and leave the rad cap off, i get a vslow and iregular stream of bubbles! and the smoke/steam swaps zorst as well!! realy odd! i also have been wonderin i only put antifreeze in the other day and aswe all know that its very "searching" is it brakes the surface tention of the water down. is it worth me re-torquin the heads? :s

could it be a case of a cracked head or block ??

mmmmmm hope not! :(

You should re-torque the heads bud. Standard practice after rebuild. Sometimes they can settle a fair bit.

dunno if its too late for that now, whats think?

seems a bit drastic to have to re-torque the heads bit of a backward thing to do especially when theres a fair bit of work involved plenum removal cam covers etc,not seen many people do this on a 300

 

when the heads got skimmed i hope they were skimmed with in tolerance as there isnt much room for error

 

im sure you followed the manual for torquing ie 37lbs then 90 undo then 37 then 90ish again in the correct order im sure you did but worth an ask

 

try a combustion gas tester see if theres any escaping in to the rad systym