--
BBA

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"Al Kondo" > wrote in message
...
> I have a 96 Nissan Sentra with a 1.6 liter engine and has 120k miles.
> It recently began overheating and I had to turn on the interior heater
> to drop the temperature down. Since I do most of my own work on the
> car, I have done done a number of things to resolve the problem...
> but, with no luck so far. I need some suggestions on what else I can
> do.
>
> Here is what I have done so far:
>
> 1. Brought the radiator to the radiator repair guy in town. He did
> an informal flow test (put a hose in one opening and watched the
> outflow out of the other). He said that in his opinion the radiator
> had sufficient flow.... surely enough flow so that it shouldn't have
> caused the problem I experienced.
>
> 2. Changed out the water pump and thermostat. I decided with 120 k
> miles on the car, I wanted to do this anyway.
>
> 3. I checked the fluid in the radiator as the engine was warming up
> and thought I saw bubbling. Additionally, I saw signs of vapor
> coming out of the tail pipe as I was starting up. Lastly, it seemed
> that my antifreeze levels had been coming down in recent weeks without
> signs of obvious leakage. All this convinced me that I must have a
> blown head gasket.
>
> I brought the head to a automotive machinist in town and his
> estimation was that the head did not show signs of antifreeze leakage
> in the head combustion area. He indicated that the valve area of
> the leakage would show obvious signs if such leakage occurred.
>
>
> After all of this I am not sure what I should check out next. I need
> suggestions. My first thought is that maybe I should change out the
> radiator anyway just to eliminate that as a problem. What do you
> think??
>

cracked block! I would have performed a block leak test before removing radiator
or head -- you could remove the block - have it boiled and inspected for
cracks - or you could put the engine back together including radiator, etc, etc,
etc. then perform a engine block leak test!

BBA