Driving with blown head gasket

[kerry-w]

Hi,

Need a bit of help here.

Mate of mine had a coolant leak, we couldnt find where it as all leaking from so she just left it run dry as it leaked everywhere again in the end.

Now I told her not to drive the car like this asit would indeed overheat, die and kill the head. Oddly enough the next day this exact thing happened and I had to go and pick her up.

Cars been left where it broke down since Friday now and last night someone reported it to the police as being dumped so it needs to be moved.

Heres the question: Can it still be driven with the head gone, Its a 1.1 saxo, my other mate with a Furio had the head go and he drove it like that with it overheating etc and it would manage about 10minutes before dieing.

Heared people say taking the oil cap off helps somehow? :S will top it up with a load of coolant and ill try to gaffer tape up as much of the coolant pipe as possible to try prevent the leak and ill have to follow the car back (only about 10mile trip)

Will it cause much more damage? Not that their bothered as they just want it moved and dont want to pay to have it towed back.

Any help appreciated

 

[Gt rob]

you can drive it until it overheats, wouldnt advise it, now chance of towing it?

 

[kerry-w]

you can drive it until it overheats, wouldnt advise it, now chance of towing it?

Yeah I thought this myself, thanks for clearing it up.

What possible damage could it cause? Its only a short drive anyway and we will make a stop half way to make sure it doesnt go too bad.

No chance of towing it no, no chance of using my car to tow it either as a last resort as my clutch is going as it is.

 

[Dunn]

you will warp the head if you keep driving it

 

[DavidBlaine]

Yeah, dry the pipe off, tape it up, fill with coolant and go until it starts heating up past the center point. If it heats up really fast, just park it and get it towed. No sense blowing up the engine over a rad hose.

Nadeem

 

[kerry-w]

you will warp the head if you keep driving it

Id have thought with it only being a short trip that the chances of this would be low?

If anyone knows a rough price for the head gasket repair etc that would be great too.

 

[MartinR]

your friend must be a pikey. just get it fixed you skinflint

 

[Sash]

Fill it with coolant... drive it sensibly put the heater on hot and full fan if it starts to boil up and the heaters go cold, stop, top up with coolant/let cool a bit and carry on... chances are the heads fubar'd already... saxo blocks are made of cheese.

 

[kerry-w]

your friend must be a pikey. just get it fixed you skinflint

Its hard to do that really as their in college full time and have to pay rent each week and have just lost their job. Its simply getting the car back from where it is now until they have the money to sort it out.

Fill it with coolant... drive it sensibly put the heater on hot and full fan if it starts to boil up and the heaters go cold, stop, top up with coolant/let cool a bit and carry on... chances are the heads fubar'd already... saxo blocks are made of cheese.

Thanks for that tip, odd about the heaters as they havent been going hot for ages apparently. So I assume its been driven with low/no cooland regularly without them knowing as it has cut out before but we thought that was the battery and altenator as the engine wouldnt start again because the battery was drained completely.

 

[MartinR]

i guarantee the engine is fucked because of running it dry,

 

[Sash]

My old punto didnt have a temp guage, so i relied soley on the heater method! It wasnt paticularly fun in the middle of summer driving about with the heaters on max!

 

[kerry-w]

i guarantee the engine is fucked because of running it dry,

Engine was fucked before, it would start, rev up to 3k, drop down and then die. This would happen everytime too unless you kept the revs at 3k by acelerating, it would also die if you dipped the clutch and applied the brakes.

My old punto didnt have a temp guage, so i relied soley on the heater method! It wasnt paticularly fun in the middle of summer driving about with the heaters on max!

Ha ha, luckily ill be following behind slowly so I wont have to put up with the heaters :rasp:

 

[MartinR]

scrap yard job. get a bus pass or push bike

 

[kerry-w]

scrap yard job. get a bus pass or push bike

I assume this will be the case as the MOT is up next week on there and hopefully they will come to sense and stop throwing money at it as 90% of the time for the past 3 months it wont start or dies.

 

[MartinR]

will come to sense and stop throwing money at it.

are you sure its not your car

 

[kerry-w]

are you sure its not your car

Ha ha, cross fingers mines working fine. Found out the fuel problem was infact the gague showing a full tank as half a tank and then when it was flashing as empty it did actually have half a tank left, was pretty annoying really.

Clutch will be done soon enough too and all will be dandy for a few days :rasp: had the brakes fail yesterday though the first time I pressed them which was scary to say the least.