Oil looks diluted

[gavinl]

Guys, my Merkur XR4 recently had the engine temp shoot to just shy of the red mark. I may have a blow head gasket or a cracked head and here's the situation that led to the thought:

1) clouds of white smoke at idle, lesser but very visible at cruise or accelerations (although it's 30 degrees here right now)

2) coolant level dropped slightly, from max to middle

3) Excessive blowby

4) dark brown oil on dipstick looks really diluted (i.e. light when I wiped it off), but does not show milky color or water droplets on the dipstick.

I'll have the oil drained and do a compression test once the weather picks up.

Right now I'm just wondering, will coolant mixed oil look cloudy right away?

 

[Bob Woods]

White smoke means your burning water, you could have a blown head gasket. Have you tried Barrs stop leak or something like it? It not a fix but a temperary leak stop. Even "course ground pepper" will plug a small coolant leak. When oil mixes with water it looks milky.

 

[TheLoneRanger]

Is this a turbo 2.3L? If so, chances are it's a blown headgasket rather than a cracked head. Turbos create more cylinder pressure and are harder on headgaskets.

You may not be able to tell much with a compression test, if the leak is small. Try pulling the sparkplugs and see if one or two look different from the others. If two adjacent cylinder plugs look white, then figure the gasket has blown between the cylinders, leaking coolant into both cylinders. This is usually where they fail. Hope it's only the gasket and not a cracked head....

 

[gavinl]

Thanks guys, I'll pull the plugs to check first, then perform the compression test.