head gasket

[shanehandley]

just took my car in to garage for timeing and check over and they said that there was slight signs of co gases in the water, they said this was a sign of the head gasket going!is this right?

i then asked how much this would cost they said a few hundred!is this right?

are they easy to do yourself and what prices are you looking at for a garge to do them!

thanks shane

[Aragorn]

garages charge stupid money because it sounds a big job and folk are generally ignorant when it comes to cars - it all depends on what uve been quoted and what they are gonna change

its a case of unbolting the inlet and exhaust manifold, removing dizzy and cambelt, draining coolant, undoin head bolts as per haynes guide

swapping gaskets over (might be an idea to get the head skimmed as it might be the head causing the leak not the gasket if its warped - that starts getting expesive tho)

torqueing up the NEW head bolts to specified torque and refitting everything u removed

a head kit will cost u about ?20 which includes all the gaskets for the top end (rocker cover, head gasket, inlet and exhaust gasket, cam oil seal, dizzy oil seal, valve stem seals) the head bolts are about ?10

u will also need new oil and filter(?20) as the oil should really be changed and also you should look at replacing the water pump as they dont like being disturbed (?25) as well as a new timing belt if uve never changed it recently (?10)

a garage certainly wont do all that and if u do get em to it will be hefty steep your talking ?70-80 or so in parts if u do it yourself but thats replacing everything that could possibly give u any issues in the future

maybe another ?30 if u wanna get the head skimmed and replace the valve stem seals since u get em anyway and will stop any possibility of any other head issues

the way i see it is when its all off u may as well do as much as u can

if your not confident im sure someone on here who lives local would give u a hand for some beer money or whatever

[epo]

i did mine recently and it was fairly easy
i was lucky as i didnt warp the head
it took me a couple of hours 2 strip down and a gud few hours 2 put it back 2gether i personaly wudnt pay a garage fuck all especially when i did mine 4 ?40
but at the end of the day it depends how confident you are i was lucky as me dad was on hand 2 help he's a mechanic + ive got a lot of mate who'll help out with different bits