its gotta be a blwon head gasket cuz the shop didnt install an overflow tank for the radiator i had to drive it home from westley chapel it over heated and now has a hard time starting and its blowing white thick smoke out of the exhaust is this a blown head gasket or what?

 

sound like it, if its over heating. GL puttin the new one in if thats the problem

 

i wouldnt drive on it at all when mine blew it was realy smoky then water was heavly coming out and before i could shut it off it made a (im broken and seesed never to spin again sound)so ya idont know thats just one of my senarioes if u can still replace the head gasket then get the heat and block resurfaced and put on a metal head gasket sence u have to replace it anyways

 

white smoke is coolant. Drop your oil and if its discolored or you can obviously see coolant than you blew your headgasket. sounds like its time for a cometic.

i would also investigate what casued the headgasket to blow. are you running a lot of boost? do you drive very aggresively? Was your car overheating before it started to blow white smoke? And if it was overheating was it overheating at idle or while driving. Perhaps your thermostat or waterpump are bad.

 

well before you start breaking into the engine make sure it is not your turbo seals going bad. alot of times if it is a headgasket the car will overheat and sometimes the radiator blows up or hoses blow off (from the compression of the cylinders leaking into the cooling channels). i would check the turbine first especially if it is the stock t25, those things are like 15 years old! you can also do a compression test which will tell you alot also.
-ken

 

a blown turbo would create light colored smoke but how would that be consistent with the car overheating? Plus removing the downpipe on a stock t25 is much more difficult that dropping oil to look for coolant.

 

^^^ya i was just saying that as a suggestion in case the old oil didn't reveal anything. but ya changing the oil is definately easy to do. also if it is the turbo seals then since the turbine is water cooled it will burn off water which results in lower coolant levels: hence overheat. when water is burned off it is always white no matter where it comes from (headgasket or turbo seals).

 

thanks for the info guys its actually a new imported engine and the guy didnt install the overflow tank its on its way back to the shop for a whole new motor under shippers warranty

 

gotcha. hadn't considered that.

missing an overflow tank wouldnt cause it to overheat. if you're coolant was low then ur burning it, or you're dripping it.

 

Having an overflow tank or not should not effect the headgasket blowing. The main purpose of having an overflow is for the simple fact that if the engine/coolant reaches a certain temperature, causing excessive pressure, the coolant then is forced into the overflow. Now, if you do not pay attention to the temp gauge, there's a possibility that you overheated the motor due to the high temperatures, or you might have lost enough coolant and ran the motor with insufficiant coolant, which also will damage the motor depending on the length of period you drove the car.

The white smoke can be caused from the oil seals being faulty on the turbo, but with the way he's making it sound, 'hard to start' etc, might just be associated with the head gasket. If it's turbo seal related, when you are at a stop, there should be a constant flow of white smoke and you should be able to smell burnt oil. Once the car's under load, the smoking then stops. With a blown head gasket, you should distinctively smell coolant amount the smoke. Either way, turbo motors run hotter then your naturally aspirated engines, hence why it's important to have a good set of gauges to monitor over the entire vehicle. A lot of problems such as blown head gaskets, etc can be easily avoided by watching what the vehicle is doing via some gauges.

I must say the shop whom installed the motor is doing a very good thing by helping you out with the warrenty, A+++ for them.