Symptoms of blown head gasket?

[V8 Killer]

I hope this is not bad.What are the symptoms of a blown head gasket besdies massive coolant loss?

[HBHRacing]

overheating, collant loss, white smoke out teh tail pipes, missfire, runs rough, coolant being forced out of the radiator under extream pressure, hoses getting hard from pressure...

[V8 Killer]

Well..I popped my hood today just to check oil and stuff..I noticed my coolant level was incredibly low,almost nothing there.I never noticed any leak mark where I park and I let the car sit and felt around for wet spots and never found anything.It runs fine,no white smoke,sometimes idles a bit rough (jumps from 700-900 rpms).The temperature while going is fine (about 190).

[ThatsMeGC]

My brothers car has a blown head gasket... the biggest tell aside from coolent loss is the smell of burning coolant... it smells like someone filled a rubber hose with rotten eggs and set it on fire.

[HBHRacing]

Check your oil. does it look like a milkshake? I doubt that it's not your head gsaket. you might consider taking it in to get the system pressure tested.

[V8 Killer]

Originally posted by HBHRacing:
Check your oil. does it look like a milkshake? I doubt that it's not your head gsaket. you might consider taking it in to get the system pressure tested.

actully I changed the oil that same day..It looked fine.

[LwnGy83]

I'd say do a coolant system flush, and refilling it and see if it doesn't go down again. If I does, you have a leak some where. on my 94 3.4L my timing chain cover was leaking coolant and I couldn't find the problem for months. So... try flushing and refilling and hope that fixes it ;)

[V8 Killer]

I made a tiny mark with a sharpie,marking the coolant level when its was cold and after when it was hot.Drove about 100 miles just experimenting.Everything seemed fine afterwards...

[Jerome_Smith]

the only signs i had was sudden taping, loss of pawer and the SMELL of burning coolant, and a time frame of five min. no over-heating at all. no oil water mix. [img]graemlins/omg.gif[/img]

[V8 Killer]

I dont really know what burning coolant smells like..Ill try to set some on fire :D

[HBHRacing]

It smells very sweet.. I hate it

[V8 Killer]

No dont have any of those smells..I dont think..

[97rs4life]

coolant loss could be a waterpump going out

[V8 Killer]

Where would coolant actully be leaking from if it was the water pump?

I dont know maybe your right but like I said I never see any wet spots on the driveway or anything.Maybe only while im driving it leaks?
How can I check it out? Would temps be high if the WP was bad?

[jbfirebird22]

another thing you can do to check for bad head gaskets is take it to a mech. they should have a water test kit. i dont know the technical term for it, but if you just ask them nicely, i need to know if i got bad seals, could you test that.
what they do is place this tube like thing onto the open readiator as the car is running, if the liquad that is in the test pump turns green, then you have exhaust fumes coming into the radiator which means you need new seals or have the heads redone. however, like everyone else has said, if you see milky looking oil, white smoke, etc, then the seals should be ok