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Re: Blown Head Gasket
Posted by John Miller (more from John Miller) on Thu, 16 May 2002 00:39:02
In Reply to: , Kok Chen, Sat, 17 Dec 1988 12:00:00 

> 2.  Driving with temp gauge in the red for more than a minute or two.

I'd tend to believe that a fair number of 'head gasket' issues started out 
as fan thermoswitch issues, and turned into head gasket issues when the 
driver didn't notice the temp gauge.

> As far as cooling system issues go, 1. can be overcome by using Original
> SAAB coolant (or Original Mercedes-Benz coolant) and Original SAAB
> 82-degree  thermostats.

The different coolant formulations out there are getting to be confusing as 
all hell.  Each has its own set of tradeoffs in friendliness to plastics 
(radiator tanks) vs friendliness to aluminum (almost everything else now) 
vs compatibility with other coolants vs water pump seal and bearing wear vs 
longevity etc.

The Mercedes BASF Glysantin G-05 spec looks good for most applications, in 
fact Ashland (Valvoline/Zerex) is now making it for the US arm of said firm 
(e.g. Chrysler) and it *should* be available as Zerex Extreme G-05 at your 
local parts store except no one carries it yet, Ashland says NAPA should 
have it but their warehouses aren't stocking it either.

> radiator,  and specifying an excessively high switch-on temperature.  To
> add insult to  injury, the calibration of these (German) thermoswitches
> tends to creep over  time.  The creeping is usually upwards.

It's my experience that these German thermoswitches seem to have a 60K mile 
reliable life, newer ones may be somewhat better.

> 4.  Specifying 89-degree thermostats instead of 82-degree thermostats for
> certain new cars over the years.

Bear in mind that in some cars going much below that level (82degC/180degF) 
can result in cars remaining stuck in 'cold start' mode, resulting in 
poorer fuel mileage and in extreme cases cylinder wash-down and catalyst 
failure.

>>  In addition, I have owned primarly american cars ... with  an estimate
>>  of  close to 2M miles total with zero, zip,  nada head repairs.

My experience has been somewhat different.

If one looks at the 3.8-liter Ford V6s on the road, the ones that have not 
experienced head-gasket failure are rarer than the ones that have.

> So how about the time I picked up a brand new (less than 20 miles on the
> odometer) 1999 Mercury Sable from Budget.  The next day, 100 miles away
> from  the nearest Budget rental office, the car suffered a complete
> cooling system  failure, and within minutes became undriveable - in the
> middle of nowhere.

I had a brand-new, 20-miles-on-the-odometer Dodge minivan rental that 
turned out to have nothing but air in the cooling system.

>>  Comparing those numbers to the Saab, in my mind, would  reinforce my
>> opinion - yes, I believe dealing with blown  headgaskets is a fact of
>> life  with saabs.

Of the three Saabs we've owned, two turbocharged, for a total of 400K or so 
miles, I've never had a head-gasket failure.  A cracked head in the '81 
900T, yes, but no gasket failures.

John.
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