Head Clean

[Winger]

I Have had a water leak for a little while but unfortunatly had to move house and had no time to replace the o-ring seal at the back of the water pump so kept topping up with water every trip until i had time to fix it but unfortunatly when i was half way through i seen a crack in my oil cap and when i opened it all i could see was white cream Bugger.
after pulling the heads off and cleaning the face surfaces found that there is no warpage so decided not to get machined but i am still left with water laced oil all over the head so i was wonering what solvent to use to clean up inside the heads that wont cause any damage.

[clm434]

Mild acid. Like what they use to clean alloy semi tankers. Can't think of a brand off the top of my head though.

[date]

A followup to the problem of water in oil. I had a TM magna, and at about 150000 km, noted milky mush in the rocker cover. Damn (or words to that effect) - must be a head gasket. Whilst I was at it, a valve grind and new rings & bearings to top the job off.

When I was putting the camshaft back, I noted a scratch in one of the camshaft bearing posts, on the bearing surface. Put it all back together, start it up, drive 100 km to Canberra and check the water - add 1 litre. Come home, another litre.OOps. Must be the head gasket not sealing.

Mention it to my tame Mitsu wrecker and he says "Cracked head". No way says me. I ground the valves and didn't see any cracks. He says "No - they crack here" and showed me a head with a crack in the camshaft bearing journal - right where I saw the scratch....

To make a long story short, I had it welded up by a mob in Mitcham (Vic). Cost me about $120 including re-lapping of the valves and pressure test. They reckoned that they did 1 magna head per week and about 20 VL commodore heads per week. They welded the crack and then line bored the journals to allow proper fitting of the camshaft. A really good cheap job. I cannot remember their name, but if you want, I can dig deep and find it - it was back about 14 years ago.

End result was that whilst waiting for the head, I went next door and then spent another $1100 to get the magna fitted with LPG and never looked back.

[t_e_z_a]

That is cheap as

i just got a 4cyl suzuki alloy head tunnel bored and it cost me $120+gst. And that is with welding it, closing the mating faces and tensioning it all myself.