I need some advice or the bike is a goner.

I originally posted the thread but it got off track

https://vfrworld.com/threads/help-c...f-the-valve-cover-breather.60370/#post-636398

The problem is…about 8oz of coolant came out of the breather in about 10 seconds after the bike warmed up. How did it get there? I’m assuming if the block/head(s) aren’t cracked it’s a bad head gasket. Am I correct in that assumption?

If it’s a crack I’m SOL. If it’s a gasket I was going to run smoke through the water passages to try and figure which head it was. Let’s say that doesn’t work and I replace both head gaskets, I have a few questions about removing the heads.

• Do I really have to remove the cams before I remove the head?
• Can I reuse the copper exhaust gaskets?
• I’m assuming the valve cover gasket can be reused as long as it doesn’t tear or look bad.

Any other advice would be much appreciated

The heads were not removed since I got the bike in 1998.

Thanks

 

Have you got the rear valve cover off yet?

If it’s #3 there’s a hose on the outside of the carb going to the thermostat, that’s where I’d start looking, it might have corroded enough to break through the head under pressure, you might be able to tap it put an insert in

I assume you’ve spun it over with the plugs out to see where the fluid comes out

 

After taking the cover off I guess I answered my question if the cams had to be removed to get the head off. It’s so clean, almost like it was steam cleaned. I dabbed a Q-tip on where the “liquid” collected and it’s definitely a coolant and oil mix. Let’s see if 10psi of smoke will help me find the coolant access point(s).

 

coolant and oil make a mayonnaise type mess in engines. A well maintained engine should be clean inside. What breather was the coolant coming from?

 

Yeah... you should have a milkshake at best if you had that kind coolant entry into your oil. I've kept from commenting because it's all too fucking strange and I have no idea.

 

The job of the crankcase breather is to evacuate crankcase pressure from blowby and piston movement. It should separate oil mist and allow the air to be recycled through the airbox. The breather is located in the valve cover and has no access to coolant. Excessive crankcase pressure can push extra oil out the breather. Oil and coolant will not separate. Is your oil overfilled? What does the airbox look like inside? How does the bike run? Any smoke running?

 

The Crankcase breather on the rear valve cover. I started the motor with the air filter housing removed and noticed, after warming up the engine, liquid was spurting out of the breather hose and into the carbs. I stopped the engine cleaned out the carb base and directed a longer hose into a container. I started the engine and within a few seconds liquid came out the hose and into the container. Very hot liquid. It’s brown and the viscosity of water and when I smelt it, it was like sniffing ammonia. 8oz in about 10 seconds.

The oil and coolant levels were good. After I started the bike, it started up immediately, no missing or staling. When It warmed up a lot of white smoke started coming out the muffler. That’s when I took off the air box and saw the liquid (coolant/oil mix) coming out the breather.

I’m getting a smoke cone tomorrow to put about 10psi of smoke through the coolant passages. Maybe it will point to the coolant leak. Since I never worked on a VFR engine before, after filling the bike with coolant, can I idle it with the rear valve cover off? I use to do it on an old Mini I had.

 

riding with valve cover removed=bad idea oil will get everywhere.

what is your history with this bike ?

 

I wasn’t going to ride it, just let it idle and see if the liquid was coming from the crankcase through the gear train opening or from maybe a crack in the head.

I never had any overheating or leaks. I’ve had only self-caused problems like gumming up the jets because of not draining the bowls before storage. It was running fine last year. The clutch lever wasn’t returning all the way when pulled. Maybe because I used a cheap master rebuild kit from China. After sitting for a year, no leaks, I rebuilt the clutch master and slave with Real Honda parts this time. Now this after starting it.

 

does your fan kick in when temp is high ? you stated that it never overheated, but if coolant quantity is too low and below the sensor, temp gauge readings can't be trusted.

 

Last year the fan would come on occasionally. This year after the first start with the white smoke I noticed the coolant was at the lower mark on the reserve tank when I took the gas tank off to get at the air cleaner. Possibly caused by the white smoke the day before. I also noticed that the part of the K^N air cleaner closest to the breather hose had no oil on it. Possibly caused by the liquid (coolant) that came out of the breather hose.

 

level in reserve tank does not always show coolant level in the system, why it's best to check under the rad cap, not the bottle.

 

Where are you located?

 

Jersey

 

I was just posting on your initial thread the following:

It may help us to know how long this bike sat without being run.

It is possible that a leak in the head gasket between oil and coolant passages could let coolant leak into an oil passage and that would find it's way into the crankcase and out through a crankcase breather. This would be a bit of a odd possibility, but still..... If that was the case, there should be coolant in the crankcase with the oil. You should be able to see it when you drain the oil.

If you do your smoke test, take the oil fill cap off of the clutch cover to see if the leak/ smoke ends up comming out of the crankcase. This test may be limited by cooant still trapped in passages within the engine.

 

All I can say is WTF. I ran about smoke from the coolant intake hose and it came out the hose connected to the thermostat housing, no where else. I plugged the thermostat to radiator hose and it doesn't stay pressurized. How quick is the pressure gone? Not a clue. Maybe if I take off the oil pan I'll see some smoke. No smoke coming out the oil filler opening. No smoke escaping anywhere that I can see or hear with 10psi.

I drained the oil and it was mixed with coolant. I measured what came out, 5.11 quarts of oil/coolant mix. Take a look at the below numbers.

Oil capacity 4.10 quarts
What I drained 4.86 quarts
Captured from breather 0.25 quarts
Total 5.11 quarts
Overage 1.01 quarts

Coolant capacity 2.78 quarts
What drained 1.75 quarts
Missing 1.01 quarts

So a quart of coolant got into the crankcase. How? What’s the next step, replace the head gaskets? Something tells me I’m going to be chasing this for a long time.

 

So you know that a head gasket has failed. Do a compression test on all cylinders, check the state of the plugs, then proceed from that info.

How many miles on the bike?

 

20,333 miles. The bike sat for about 13 months. Started it 2 weeks ago and white smoke. I thought I’d have clogged jets since I didn’t drain the bowls last year. Below are the results of the compression tests, cold engine.

Rear head
#1 180psi
#3 180psi

Front Head
#2 170psi
#4 180psi

 

inspecting the sparkplugs should reveal which head gasket is bad. expect to see traces of coolant and a perfectly clean plug.

 

Jersey rules oot me stopping by to help oot but your welcome to drop it off with me and I will fix it.