[DMCForum] Re: Continuing misadventures of a Volvo/B280F PRV

["therealdmcvegas" <dmcvegas@xxxxxxx>]

I've gone thru a simular thing. 2 years ago, I found I had nasty, 
chunky oil. Didn't look like a milkshake to me, and the car was 
running fine overall. A couple of months later, I noticed that I was 
losing cooling, and having to pour in about a pint or so every week. 
Under the manifold, I noticed pools of coolant, and discovered a 
leaking O-ring on the Y-pipe. Replaced that, and was fine for a 
little while, until I randomly overheated in traffic one day. I 
happened to have some spare coolant in the car, so I filled up, and 
drove home.

Now, I was noticing the same thing as you, with the goop filling up 
the mesh filter in the breather cap. As soon as it got clogged, I was 
spitting oil out from the Front Main Seal behing the Crankshaft 
Pulley. Cleaned it out, and it was fine for a week, until it would 
just clog up again. And then I started pouring steam out of the 
exhaust when it started up.

Drove it down last week for my emissions inspection, and to get the 
car tuned (I fixed a whole bunch of vacuum leaks), and my mechanic 
wouldn't touch it. He confirmed a blown headgasket. Probably only 
about 10 miles or so from my house, but the car drank a half-gallon 
of coolant each way!

So now, my motor has given up the ghost. It'll run, but it blows out 
coolant, and just keeps running warmer and warmer. And the reason 
that I bring this up, is because I started having the same tale-tell 
signs as you. The first thing that I would do, is clean out the oil 
breather cap. Martin is right, that if the motor sit for a long time, 
it's normal for condensation to cause that. BUT, if you drive 
normally, and still see that gunk collecting again in the breather 
cap, then you know that you've got a problem somewhere. FYI: My 
coolant also smelled like exhaust gas too.

So for me, it looks like it's time for a motor swap...

-Robert



--- In DMCForum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, "cartermartin" <cartermartin@xxxx> 
wrote:
> Sorry in advance for the long post.
> 
> Ok so I think I have gotten to the bottom of my Volvo 760GLE/B280F-
> PRV problems or at least nearly to the bottom of it. 
> 
> I have essentially rebuilt my  cooling system. Along the way I did 
> every possible test I could think of for a blown head gasket or 
> cracked head. These include:
> 
> - Compression test. I got 180-185# on all 6 cyl. The numbers might 
be 
> suspect but felt the fact they are so close together was more 
> important.
> - Cooling system pressure test. After all the cooling system work 
was 
> done. I pressure tested it at 22# (factory spec for this model) for 
> 15-20 minutes. I had very little, if any, leakage.
> - Tested the cooling system pressure under normal running 
conditions. 
> Pressure was built gradually up to 15-20# or so.
> - A block leak test. The gizmo that detects exhaust gasses in the 
> coolant by drawing air thru the coolant.
> 
> Anyway after all of this I still have coolant loss and evidence of 
> high pressure in the system. In this case coolant blown out of the 
> expansion bottle.
> 
> The only other clue was the chocolate milkshake on the filler cap. 
> When I changed the oil I found no evidence of coolant.  And after 2 
> negative 'block leak' tests (i.e. no combustion gasses) I finally 
got 
> a positive after a highway run (where btw it urped out a pint or so 
> of antifreeze).
> 
> It appears that under light load, idling or driving around the 
> neighborhood, there is not a problem. This manifests itself at 
> freeway speed when I hear a buzzing sound from time to time that I 
> believe is either the pressure being vented past the radiator cap 
or 
> perhaps even gasses blowing past the head gasket. The latter may be 
a 
> long shot but the sound is coming from the opposite side of the 
> engine from the coolant bottle.
> 
> At this point my suspicion is either:
> 
> - small head gasket leak
> - Cracked head
> - or maybe a seal for the cylinder liner?
> 
> I'm still a neophyte on these engines and since it's an old Volvo 
> sedan (as opposed to something more exotic) I should probably walk 
> away. But I feel I want to get to the bottom of all of this. It is 
> also difficult because it's running SOOOOO good.
> 
> Any thoughts, ideas, or suggestions would be appreciated? Any PRV 
> mechanics in the Atlanta area who can do a head/head gasket, please 
> step forward.
> 
> Oh and for what it's worth I did get the Y-Pipe o-rings sealed up. 
> 
> Carter

---

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