What now?

[Komet]

Are your head gaskets blown? If not, no need.

 

[TommyJ1980]

Are your head gaskets blown? If not, no need.

It went from having a slightly rough idle, to barely start in after sitting in a parking lot for about 10min, and the white smoke became very pronounced all of a sudden. Once it did start, I kept it above 1000rpm or so to keep it from dying on the 2 minute ride home.

 

[Canadian Rust Bucket]

It went from having a slightly rough idle, to barely start in after sitting in a parking lot for about 10min, and the white smoke became very pronounced all of a sudden. Once it did start, I kept it above 1000rpm or so to keep it from dying on the 2 minute ride home.

That would be from all the coolant your engine is trying to combust.

I have a little story that might help illustrate the problem. Bear with me here.

My father said to me, "Son, my truck sounds really funny when I'm turning." So I crawled under the truck, found a cracked power steering pressure hose spraying fluid, and replaced it. However, this didn't fix the issue entirely. The groaning noise when he was turning went away, but now we could hear something else. The wheel bearings were on their way out, and the symptoms were hidden behind the noise of the power steering issue. Fixed that, the truck now drives much smoother and the old man is happy.

A good rule of thumb is to fix the issues you know you have in a given system, before you try and figure out what else is wrong.

In your case, every symptom could be caused by a bad intake gasket letting coolant leak out of its internal passages into the rest of your engine. Until you eliminate the known bad gasket, you might as well throw darts at a board for diagnostics.
You won't know if something else is wrong, because the top end leak is causing enough problems on its own to mask anything else that might be going on.

 

[99Yak]

Leaking in? Quit driving it.

 

[bretcopsey]

We had a Chevy Venture with the 3.4 with notorious manifold gasket issues. I delayed replacing the gasket when ours started leaking because it wasn’t showing up in the oil. Until suddenly it was in the oil and then it was too late-wipes the cam bearings and destroyed the engine…. I’d suggest to stop driving it until you can get the gaskets replaced.

 

[TommyJ1980]

These were the notes from back in Dec:

You must be registered for see images attach

 

[Caman96]

Tommy you’ve been driving that for 4 months with an intake gasket leak?

 

[TommyJ1980]

Tommy you’ve been driving that for 4 months with an intake gasket leak?

When it wasn’t down for suspension work and steering box issues, yes.

 

[johnckhall]

As I stated in comment #4, I had an intake manifold gasket leak and had it fixed immediately. You were told in December there was a leak and chose not to have it addressed and now want to know what the problem is? Based on the comments, I think you should have a good idea where to start.

 

[jerry mize]

Hi all - 1998 K2500 5.7L 249,000miles. So this is where I'm at. I have mechanic notes stating that the intake manifold gasket needs to be replaced, and I am planning to do that very soon, and have the parts. In the meantime, I knew I was having some coolant leakage issues, so I replaced the radiator, hoses, water pump, thermostat, and coolant temp sensor. I was also having a bit of a rough idle immediately prior to that, so I replaced the plugs as well, see pic below for the worst looking ones when they came out. At this point, about the only thing left to do is the intake manifold gasket, but what I'm smelling is that I'm running rich somehow, I can smell gas. Would a bad intake manifold gasket cause this, and what would be the best way to look at the mixture settings or whatever would be causing me to run rich? Thanks, I have a code reader I got from a friend, and the auto parts store is close, and they will read them as well. Appreciate any thoughts you may have. The rough idle seems to have smoothed out, but it is still there subtly.oes the truck have any codes I would start there but yes intake gasket can cause the simptoms you are having if the gasket is sucking air the ecm is trying to adjust I have had the same issue in my at one point as well

ride

Hi all - 1998 K2500 5.7L 249,000miles. So this is where I'm at. I have mechanic notes stating that the intake manifold gasket needs to be replaced, and I am planning to do that very soon, and have the parts. In the meantime, I knew I was having some coolant leakage issues, so I replaced the radiator, hoses, water pump, thermostat, and coolant temp sensor. I was also having a bit of a rough idle immediately prior to that, so I replaced the plugs as well, see pic below for the worst looking ones when they came out. At this point, about the only thing left to do is the intake manifold gasket, but what I'm smelling is that I'm running rich somehow, I can smell gas. Would a bad intake manifold gasket cause this, and what would be the best way to look at the mixture settings or whatever would be causing me to run rich? Thanks, I have a code reader I got from a friend, and the auto parts store is close, and they will read them as well. Appreciate any thoughts you may have. The rough idle seems to have smoothed out, but it is still there subtly.

You must be registered for see images attach

Does the truck have any codes I would start there but yes intake gasket can cause the simptoms you are having if the gasket is sucking air the ecm is trying to adjust I have had the same issue in my at one point as well