W108 head gasket me thinks

[white280SE]

Goodwood Breakfast club meeting I was driving along this morning 7am and my mate following me in his 73 RS woundefull drive nice and steady down the freeway and then abit of smoke out the back on the over run, thought best pull in, by the time I stopped the steam/smoke was like a bomb had gone off, much to the non amusement of the garage owners who thought a smoldering car was heading for the Petrol station eg their Petrol station.. ops.
Oh well back home me thinks the head gasket has gone which is strange as the PO mentioned $3000 worth of head work had been done to the car by a Mercedes Specialist.. not very well by the looks of it..RAC Man thought the same head Gasket..

ANYWay Lets hope it's a head gasket and a skim to fix it all might as well do abit more while she's off the road..

bank holiday here and I have no classics , as the burgandy one I forgot to get an Anunal MOT done last week so I have to wait till Tue for inspection.. oh well best do some home work on taking this all apart..

So if any one has any tips to help please do!!! post up

Smoke/steam coming out the back big time.. opened the rad cap and it was like a coke bottle opening froth shot up 4-5 inches for 2 seconds or so, loads of coolant in there, oil level has dropped a TINY amount, inside the rocker cover the oil in there is perfect and no coolant on the oil dip stick oil either ( blue paper towel trick to see if oil and water are mixed it looks very much to be good oil
from starting to smoke/steam to shut down was 45 seconds at best. 70mph to 0
I am thinking to wip the plugs out as I think only one of the cylinders must have water in there..rather than all 6

it's a 2.8 straight 6 motor.. 1970

any tips please or guides to taking the heads off I am going to have to ask MAD to help out on this one or any one else local to me..

[white280SE]

What I am looking for the most is any tips of how to take it all apart..

I have some good info to look though when I do take it apart from checking the gasket for damage to corrosion of the head to valve stem oil seal.

I am looking to get a whole head kit gasket set



As it seems best to do it all I have not manual to go by I will have to look out for one but I have got a space in a workshop I can use but I need to be doing this very quickly as I don't want to take the pee with their kind offer and end up with the car taking up space for weeks on end. I would like to think I could turn this round in a week. If the head needs work and 3-4 days if just a case of putting back togeather with new parts and a tidy up..

any photos or advice would be great also I am not sure what my engine is called it seams different engines have different codes like M103 and the like so what do I have

it's a 1970 2.8ltr straight 6 Auto

[Tomguy]

The motor is a 130.980 2.8L I6. Best educated guess is yes, it is the head gasket. I would agree, and say that it sounds like the "Mechanic" who did the work previously may have been better suited as a shoe cobbler than an auto mechanic. Your symptoms of high pressure in the coolant system would make sense if combustion pressure is adding to the coolant pressure - I've heard of radiators splitting and hoses bursting from too much pressure that the cap can't expel fast enough. Has the engine ever been run hot? It could lead to additional warping of the head, which can crack the head at a coolant path showing similar symptoms.

[white280SE]

Ok I am going to say No from me as when I have had the car it's been a nice steady ship to sail, both oil pressure and temp unit have been steady and never in any danger zone.

I can't say this is the case for the PO of the car. As I have not had much to deal with them other than buying the car.

What I can say is the coolant was this green stuff and it was always at the max and never needed to be topped up..

as I say the work was carried out on the head 3 years ago to the tune of $3000 for all the works on it.. I am just thinking or being lead to be leave that the head would have needed to be tightened up after a few miles to make sure it was all bedded in correctly.

ok I have some questions looking at the book Chiltons

cylinder head strip and install for 4 and 6 cylinder heads except 280 -280C engines?? well mine is a 280 ?? just when I look at the 280 section it shows a twin cam engine and mine is NOT a twin cam it's much more like what is being said about the 4-6 cylinder engine?

any one clear this up for me.. some one might have the book I am looking in page 93
this book Chiltons Mercedes Benz 1968-73 part no 5907


Looking at the car I need to take all the pipes and fuel lines and air intake manifold off and the exhaust , break the chain and mark up the postion of the cam and chain..I might as well change the water pump while it's this far down and all the belts as well

do I need to take all the valve gear off as I would have thought that would stay in place as I am not stripping the head right down am I . I hope to get the head off and see that it's the gasket only

any pointers please I had some thing sorted where Iwas able to use a workshop and then get the head checked before handing it over to the pro's once I knew where I was but this has fallen apart now so I am down to on my drive way and dodging the rain??

[white280SE]

Originally Posted by Tomguy

The motor is a 130.980 2.8L I6. Best educated guess is yes, it is the head gasket. I would agree, and say that it sounds like the "Mechanic" who did the work previously may have been better suited as a shoe cobbler than an auto mechanic. Your symptoms of high pressure in the coolant system would make sense if combustion pressure is adding to the coolant pressure - I've heard of radiators splitting and hoses bursting from too much pressure that the cap can't expel fast enough. Has the engine ever been run hot? It could lead to additional warping of the head, which can crack the head at a coolant path showing similar symptoms.

Lucky I think I caught it very early on big time I think at best I must have traveled 1/4 of a mile from when it started and at one point I banged it in to Neutral to just let her roll for the last 500 yards before I came to a stop..engine off. I know a small amount of oil or coolant does go along way eg smoke wise !!! so it looked worse than it really was..

[mak]

Suggest drain the oil ,now heavily contaminated with water .same for the radiator and side drain on block . Not forgetting the filter and fresh oil . The cam and the tappets will rust in no time !!

Head will require a pressure test and a skim if all is well.
mak

[white280SE]

hold your horses there. There is no contamination in the oil and none in the rad fluid all is steady as I caught it right as it happened and even then there would have to be the 3rd eliment Oxygen to make rust, none of all of the above is in danger..

Ok back to topic

woundered if there was any good drawings about to help with the strip down, with my Porsches we have PET http://www.porsche.com/all/media/pdf/originalparts/en/E_911-1_KATALOG.pdf

it's all on line and free Porsche's freedom of inforamtion and all that.. Very usefull and very helpfull Mercedes got anything like that about I can use for ref?? I have had a look about and not found a lot

[230/8]

As a practical matter, I'd suggest a copy of the Haynes manual for you model. It will have all that you need for this job and photos of them working on an actual car like yours. Basic tools will do it if you also have a torque wrench in your basic kit. There are two sizes for the socket head cap screws used for head bolts, and the smaller of the two is a very long one to reach way down into the front of the chain area to remove two smaller hidden bolts in there. While you are in there I'd suggest a new chain and hydraulic chain tensioning unit if the bill for the earlier work does not show them having been replaced. Check the chain guides as well and replace if worn. Other than that it is a simple, but somewhat tedious, R&R of various bits in the order needed to get the head lifted. After checking it out and carrying out any replacements or head surfacing that is needed, install is the reverse, as they say. The gaskets, both intake as well as the head, will probably need a re-torqueing to ensure they are tight; which may be the reason for your problem.

[white280SE]

Yeah I got all the tools so tha'ts not an issue but I may have to buy the long hex key one for the torque wrench..

I agree it looks alot of fildly bits here and there to get to the head but thats the same for my Porsches as well which includes taking the engine out!! in some ways that is easy as you can get to every thing..

my issue is that what do I do about the timing side.. Do I make sure all is marked up and make sure it does not move so it all goes back ok ??

I will check all the other parts but It's only done 63,000 from new. But you right while I am in there lets get stuff done..

[Pooka]

Are you sure it is the head gasket? A frozen thermostat could do much of the same things as what you describe.

Do a compression test first and see if a cylinder is low. This would also give you some indication of what part of the head or gasket is bad before you pull it off. Of course, if water squirts out of a cylinder then you have found the problem, but don't tear into it until you have checked the compression.

Before you pull the head make sure to drain the radiator. You don't want coolent spilling into the cylinders.

[white280SE]

The more I look at these things I may just run her up , I may drain out some fluid take out the thermostat and then top it up and then run it..

I will see if I can get a compression tester from some where to check..the system..

if that was the case would I have done some damage ?? some where else...

[white280SE]

just thought if a cylinder has flooded then it wouldn't run well... I just wounder if she will just run right up as normal, until hot.

[Tomguy]

Depends... especially if the intake or exhaust valve was open on the leaking cylinder. If the intake or exhaust valve was open, it may have evaporated out (and you may have a fine coating of rust on the seat and valve, hopefully not). If they were closed, the water probably stayed in the cylinder (but, since you opened the cap, not too much). It also depends on how bad the leak is. Leave the cap loose while you're running it & getting to operating temp. If you see a lot of bubbles in the coolant, or if the coolant starts to spill out, that's a telltale symptom of a head gasket or head issue.

[white280SE]

Ok we live in the land of picture and Video here is my first attempt



first video from starting it up and pulling out the garage and turning the video on



once it was switched off after 4 mins or so it was still hanging about the garage this stuff





Blimey it worked

Ok so you can see and hear abit now..

Right what I did

first off i checked the levels coolant and the Rad and both where spot on infact the oil is back to where I remember it.. the coolant is where I remember it before all this..

The car started first time on the key no worries there, Took up tick over perfectly no worries there

I even drove it out the garage. Stopped and took the rad cap off and alowed to tick over with it off.. It didn't take long 2 mins to start to smoke big time. I looked in the rad and water was down a TINY TINY amount where it's going round the system I guess I reved it and the water was moving about in there and was starting to show some signs of bubbles but not loads!! what I would expect to be honest of a normal car on tick over ( It may get worse but I turned it off after say 4 mins of tick over that was enough to be honest )

ok the smoke..

it smelt rich fuel at first but then that is start up for you..( cold )
it didn't really smell of oil may be a tiny bit on the first start up but when warm I didn't smell oil, Could I smell coolant ... no again not really coolant has that ackrid smell and at best hardly anything

to be honest it didn't smell of anything once it was warm ,that I can come running back and say it was this !!! it just was white looking rich fuel smelling..

So I am going to leave it now to settle and then take the plugs out but to be honest it runs sweet as a nut!!

I am confused...

[white280SE]

I am starting to think is this Fuel pump related or may be a piston ring broken? mind you either one of these would smell like there was some thing..

Even thought of what if some one put some diesel in the fuel tank but it's been run about perfectly fine for a while with the same fuel and it's been parked up in a locked garage with the back touching the wall so you can't get to it..

HELP!!!