So the other day my engine sudden felt like it was only running on 3 cylinders. Lumpy idle, loss of power, etc. Was driving it to my parents place to have a garage to work on it when it started bogging down. There was a pop and a big cloud of smoke went out the tailpipe.

Made it to a auto parts store, found lots of oil in the airfilter (down 3/4 since a few days before). Replaced pcv because that was clogged, replaced plugs because they were black. Issue was still there. No coolant in oil. Oil pressure normal.

Went to look at it later. Turned it back on to warm it up, went past 190(my norm) to 215 before I turned it off. Smoke out the exhaust. Then I took compression: 150, 135, 150 and 30!! Put some oil that last one and got a little bit more at 40.

Anyways, where do I go from here? Time to look for a 22r replacement? Or could it possibly be a headgasket?

Sounds like a ring to me.

I have other transportation for now but this is my DD. Any and all input is appreciated.

 

could be both, you wont know till you pull it apart, any 22r/re is worth rebuilding because there cheap and easy to doo

 

Cool, tearing it apart right now. I'm pretty strapped for cash right now and don't have money for a rebuild so I'm going with the cheapest fix, whether that is just a head gasket or finding a used engine.

 

Probably best to find a new engine. Sounds like the rings are nonexistant in that cylinder. either that, or a valve is stuck open and the seal is gonezo.

 

Is it possble that combustion gasses are going into the oil passages through the headgasket? I have the valve cover off now, do I just turn the engine and watch the valves to check for a valve being stuck open?

 

Well, if you pull a valve cover off, and the rocker is up, and the valve is down, it'll be pretty obvious. Usually oil coming out the VC in copious amounts is a sign of blowby

 

Valves were fine. Got down to the head gasket and this is what I found.

Closeup of the offending cylinder

Any of those holes in the in the headgasket possibly cause my issues or is it looking like rings still? I wanted to check the cylinder walls of that cylinder. Can I turn the engine if I put it back to tdc or will that screw up the timing chain? Thanks again for the help, this is my first time this deep in an engine.