Early 944 - coolant in airbox?

[Arne2]

Hi, folks. I generally hang out on the 911 board, but just added an '84 944 to the garage. Price was right, was told it probably had a blown head gasket. And there is coolant in the cylinders.

But I also found that the airbox is full of coolant. Not just a little, but cups of coolant. Reservoir is bone dry. Any thoughts on what happened here?

[Arne2]

Oh yeah, pic of the car...

[Arizona_928]

Puked out of reservoir to air box.... Has the car been running hot, smoke, misses?

Use a pressure tester and look for leaks. Your reservoir might be kaputt

[sausagehacker]

I'd guess that someone cranked it while the cylinders were full of coolant it got pumped out of the intake valves, back to the airbox. Hope your bores are ok.

[dgcantrell]

If they did that, it could and should have hydraulic locked..... Pull the spark plugs and get that water out of there and don't let it sit in there.. Spray some WD-40 down in the spark plug holes to help protect the cylinders from rust until you get the head off.. Drain the rest of the coolant ASAP if you haven't already.

[Arne2]

Originally Posted by AZ_porschekid

Puked out of reservoir to air box.... Has the car been running hot, smoke, misses?

Use a pressure tester and look for leaks. Your reservoir might be kaputt

That's kinda what I'm thinking at this point.

Originally Posted by sausagehacker

I'd guess that someone cranked it while the cylinders were full of coolant it got pumped out of the intake valves, back to the airbox. Hope your bores are ok.

Didn't hydrolock, and the coolant in the airbox is so perfectly clean and fresh I have a hard time imagining that it came backwards through the intake system. And the inside of the AFM is also very dry.

[v2rocket_aka944]

if the airbox lid was on there, it'd be hard for the coolant to get in there (airbox lid has a lip that wraps around the "seal" of the air filter)...but i guess it's possible.

definitely weird though

[Arne2]

The rubber seal on the end of the snorkel was not in place. I'm wondering if the coolant leaked out of the reservoir, dripped onto the airbox snorkel, ran down to the end and got sucked in? Seems a bit far fetched, but nothing else seems to fit all the clues, especially the cleanliness of that coolant.

[Fast Freddy 944]

Pull your dipstick, if you see the level is high, and rad. fluid is present then you have a blown head gasket, fresh coolant in the airbox? that's odd. mabe the seller is playing a joke on you? dunno.

[Arne2]

Oil level is normal, oil is clean and nice, no milkiness, no signs of coolant in the oil.

[dp951]

Nice car ...nice blue .. worth fixing her up

[Fast Freddy 944]

Originally Posted by Arne2

Oil level is normal, oil is clean and nice, no milkiness, no signs of coolant in the oil.

BTW,nice car. If it all checks out, clean out the air box, get it bone-dry, fire it up, see if any white smoke is present. If so you may have coolant issues. If it runs ok, take it for a spin, make sure to fill up your coolant catch tank. When you return, pull apart your air box to check for rad fluid.

[Arne2]

Thanks. The color is not stock, it's a silver with a hint of blue, and then a lot of pearl in the clear. Not totally my cup of tea, but the car is very straight, and I wanted to find a project that was worth fixing up. It will never be a high-dollar, pristine car, but I'm hoping to make it a nice, fun driver.

It's sitting in the garage on the battery charger right now.

Frankly, the staggered Fuchs are probably worth the purchase price, so I don't think I can get hurt too badly on it regardless.

[Arne2]

Still not sure how the airbox got filled, but after sucking quite a bit of coolant out of #3, I started it and ran it for 15-20 seconds. Pulled the plugs, #3 was full of coolant again. Head coming off next week...

[CatsEyes]

Ah, bad luck. Previous owner should probably have mentioned the headgasket!

dgcantrell's advice above now comes into its own, I would have thought...

[Arne2]

Originally Posted by CatsEyes

Ah, bad luck. Previous owner should probably have mentioned the headgasket.

He did, that's why the car was cheap. I was just wondering if he might have been wrong. No worries, I expected that the head would need to come off when I bought it.

[dgcantrell]

Yep. Pull the plugs on all the cylinders and use a shop vac and a hose small enough to get ALL of the coolant out of the cylinders. Spray or pour some WD into all of them and rotate the engine over by hand to coat the cylinders to protect against rust. Be sure to drain the coolant too. There is a drain plug on the block down on the lower side near the Air/Oil Separator. This will get the coolant that is stuck behind the thermostat and keep coolant from seeping into the cylinder past the head gasket.

[Arne2]

Thanks for all the advice, folks. I'll keep you all posted on progress, maybe in a different thread now that the title of this one is misleading.

[sausagehacker]

I'm still lost about how the coolant could have ended up in the airbox via puking from the overflow... unless your coolant vent hose was stuck into the airbox or something.

Originally Posted by Arne2

Still not sure how the airbox got filled, but after sucking quite a bit of coolant out of #3, I started it and ran it for 15-20 seconds. Pulled the plugs, #3 was full of coolant again. Head coming off next week...

...and after reading this, still think it's most likely from the combustion chambers, being pumped/splashed back upstream. It's condition/color is irrelevant, if the gasket is blown that badly it's been steam-cleaned for quite some time.

[Arne2]

After today's work...