Hi, I have a few questions before I try and tackle this again. 93 22re with 185k. I replaced the head about 6,000 miles ago. I put on a used head that looked in good shape with new valve seals and replaced timing chain, guides, tensioner etc. too. Did not resurface head. I did retorque head bolts. Ran good for a while. Started to get hot on highway and a few times went up to about 3/4. I would pull over at that point and let it cool down as necessary. This happened 3 or 4 times until I was able to replace radiator. Replaced radiator, and new radiator came with higher psi rad cap which i used. Ran nice and cool for a while. Couple weeks later, after getting off highway, temp started to creep up a bit, then truck stalled coming off after a light. Wouldn't start up, left it parked on the street and walked home nearby. Came back a few hours later started right up but temp started to shoot up very fast, pulled over in front of my house. Saw that my radiator was low on fluid and grabbed some water. surprisingly i emptied the gallon jug. pulled dipstick and saw that coolant was getting into the crankcase. drained oil and parked.

Now before I dig into this again, this is definitely a head gasket issue, right? i just put new timing chain guides on and when I had the valve cover off pretty recently for a valve adj. and retorque, the guide was find and the chain and tensioner are new so I don't think its the timing cover. The only other possibility is head gasket, right? Also, the head gasket would have to fail either in the front or rear--are these the only two places where oil passes through the head? how can i diagnose the sources of the failure after removing the head? Could the wrong pressure rad cap have caused this?

This time i will take the head to a machine shop to be checked. Can the block surface warp. Does that need to be checked? I don't want to pull the engine.

Planning on using a factory head gasket this time. Any other recommendations? Will there be any damage from running it briefly with the water in the crankcase? bearings etc?

Any feedback would be much appreciated. Thanks!

 

Blocks can warp but its rare. Take the head to get resurfaced. Check block with a straight edge. Clean the block really really well and use Only OEM headgasket.

 

A machine shop should check over a head. Vie dye penetrant they can find unseen cracks.

 

All depends were you using straight water it is the antifreeze that takes out the bearings.

It is also possible you forgot to seal the oil pump bolt that goes into the water jacket that could be leaking coolant into the oil.

When you replaced the timing belt had the guides broke yet so the chain was rubbing the cover??

Did you not keep a eye on things it looks like this happened over a period of time.

you really want to find the problem before putting it all together.

 

Have your machine shop check the head. The shop I use charges $35 just for that service to tell you if it has any problems. Depending on what machine work he may need to do to get in usable shape again, there can be a few minor repairs to where it is just cheaper to replace the head. A new head can be had for about $250.

Once a head gets into the $170ish amount of repair, I just replace them. There are several things besides warping that can happen to a head. Make sure you remove the plate on the back of the head as they can not surface it with it on there and that they do not lose it or you forget to pick it up when you get the head.

 

Make sure you get your cooling system in good shape while your doing all this work. New fan clutch and OEM hoses and thermostat.

Again, only use OEM head gasket...

 

I used a 16 PSI rad cap on my 22RE and it caused all sorts of funky temp problems. I switched back to 13 psi (factory spec) and it solved all of my issues.

 

when there is water in the oil, it can be hard on the main/rod bearings.

 

Finally had some time to dig into this. Ordered OEM head gasket, new thermostat and waterpump. Pulled the valve cover and this is what it looked like. I not going to bother fixing this the way it looks. time for a new engine or to get rid of the truck unfortunately. also, the driver's side guide looks like its gone so I'm not even sure if it was the headgasket.