I just blew the left side head gasket on my 1997 T100 with 245K miles. Motor was rebuilt about 30K miles ago (just confirmed that the engine rebuild was actually about 80K miles ago) (before I owned it). How difficult is it to replace the head gaskets? I'm not a gear head, but I've swapped motors and tranny's on Dodge trucks and done some work on my T100.
Thanks for any help.

 

30k miles and blew a gasket? Must of been a real cheap rebuild. I have not done the toy motor but have removed the heads on many a GM motor and its relatively easy. I would take the head into a machine shop to have them check that its not warped, if it is have it resurfaced or you will blow another gasket.

 

The only real difficult part of the whole operation IMO, is adjusting the valves. I've never done it on a 5VZ, but I helped the master tech I apprenticed under do a 4.7 2UZ V8 head. That was a PITA job, based soely on the valve adjustment, and that was working at a dealer!Other than that, it's pretty straight forward. Standard head pulling procedure lol.

 

why would you have to adjust the valves? I would leave those alone and just check the head surface where it sits on the block for warpage.

 

Kind of a late answer, but it's not too bad-you can just pull the bad one without even removing the exhaust if the studs come out easy. Just hope that it's the gasket and not a cracked head. I had to pull one head again after I did mine. Both my tucks heads were cracked when I bought it-but that's why it was so cheap.

 

I'm here to ask the same question so I don't have a good reply. I have done head work on many different kinds of cars (all European) and read through the procedure for the 3.4 and it is a bit daunting (and I consider myself to be a pretty competent tech), but certainly doable.

If the HG failed after only 30k miles you might have warping on the head or even the block might need to be decked (not as likely).

 

Here may be one of the best 5vz-fe HG rebuild threads around - it clearly shows what you need to be prepared for:
http://www.ultimateyota.com/index.ph...6&topic=2241.0
or:
http://www.ultimateyota.com/index.ph...6&topic=7462.0