Overheated Big Time - stage 2 SE Heads

I pulled a big bone head move Friday night. Coming home from a cruise night, I forgot to turn on my electrics cooling fans. While trying to move the car back and forth to get in the garage, I noticed smoke coming out of the hood. Unfortunately I noticied the water temp about 250 -260f and shut the car off and turned the cooling fans on. Water was spoutting out of the overflow and you could hear water boiling in the radiator. God I can't believe I did that! Anyway I left the fans on and let it cool off.

I wonder what damage I may have done. I filled the radiator the next day and ran a pressure test on the cooling system and it lost about 1 psi in about 20-25 mins from 16psi. Is this pretty normal? If there was a ruptured head gasket or worse cracked head, wouldn't the pressure fall off alot faster or am I being too optimistic? Any thoughts on any damage? Any other checks I can do? I am kind of afraid to start it.

 

Carl
I doubt seriously a cracked head. I'd do a cold and a hot compression test, check the oil and run it for awhile without the cap(til warm) then do another radiator pressure test.

 

I dont think the head would crack but aluminum tends to warp if it overheats,check it out,make sure theres no water in ur oil or any antifreeze leaking anywhere,i dont think you`ve damaged anything but just keep an eye on it next time.

 

You possibly could have warped the heads, but since you did a pressure check and it only dropped 1 pound in 25 mins (thats good) I doubt you did any damage. I would try warming the car up and doing another pressure check. I would change the oil first since it breaks down pretty badly when its burned. If you don't have any leaks with a warm pressure test, I'd say your OK.

 

Retorque your heads before starting it again!

Bruce

 

Thanks for the replies. Retightening these heads are a pain in the rear. You have to pull the headers off to get at the lower bolts. But it is better to be safe than sorry I guess. I have been reluctent to put in a termostatic switch in the past. Maybe this has given me more incentive to do that.

 

Yeah, Carl....tell me about it. I pulled a head in the car earlier this year with out removing the header (just unbolting). I had to torque the heads 3 times (orange crush). To get to the lower header bolts I loosened the one motor mount and used a bottle jack to push the motor over to gain clearance from the header flange for the lower head bolts.

At least you had the water pump running. I was showing off for a Pontiac car show and forgot to turn my water pump on. A half mile down the road I was on the side of the road spewing water.ou:

Bruce

 

Carl,
I was wondering why you did not use a thermostatic switch. I use a Painless switch and works great. Are there some issues I do not know about?

 

Doug,

At the time we wired it up, I took the easy way out and thought I would make it thermostatically controlled later. I guess later was too late!

 

I got mine real hot at the races one time when I lost a fan belt and did not notice until to late. The car ran fine but would push the dipstick up about 2" and push oil out the tube all over the place. I ended up reringing it to fix it. Tom

 

Tom,

I don't understand, what did you rering?

 

New piston rings, the heat killed the old rings.

 

Tom,

How did you find that out? Did you do a compression test?

 

my electric fans are hooked to the ignition, so when the car starts so do the fans, I do have an on and off switch if I choose to not run them when driving but usually keep the switch on, and they turn off when the car isnt running, Just an ideao No:

 

the engine had so much blowby it blew out the dipstick and blew oil all over.

 

Adam: thanks for the suggestion!

Tom: I understand now.