Warning to anyone using those Miracles in a bottle. (Rad Stop Leak, Oil stop leak)

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C0RR0SIVE

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This post is only to warn people of the dangerous and small benefit out of the bottles of liquid that are supposed to cure your coolant leaks, and oil leaks.

Radiator/Coolant Leak Stoppers:
ALL BRANDS
Yes, they work great at stopping a leaky radiator, or heater core, but they are even better at gumming up every passage, these passages are rather large, so it isn't noticable that they are stopping things up quickly. I am currently working on a GM 3400 V6, otherwise known as the LA1, these engines all have ONE common failure, Lower Intake Manifold gasket failure, and this is the reason I am posting this thread.

The previous owner apparently noticed the failure, or noticed coolant leaking on the engine, so they shoved atleast half a gallons worth of the radiator stop leak into the system over the course of its life, the leak stopped, externally.

What he didn't see, nor know is that when a LIM gasket fails, it fails, and the LIM gasket is all that keeps coolant from dumping into the piston chambers, and lifter valley, guess what, most engines don't have a solid area for that valley, it's a straight shot down to a cam (OHV based engines) and the crank case, where your oil is all at, guess what happens when water and oil try to mix? IT BECOMES SLUDGE.

Now, we have an engine that is still leaking small amounts of coolant into the crank case, slowly, over 100,000 miles, and the engine is slowly sludging up, no one can tell this is happening, because the water and oil mixture is becoming sludge, and is sticking to the engine, so when you dump the oil, all you see is oil, not the milky brown substance that results from water.

After awhile, small, VERY small oil passages, about the size of the tip on a ball point pin are blocked, these passages are CRUCIAL as they oil the rod bearings that are on the crank it self, and the lifters at the top end of your engine, which pushs the valves open, even worse is, in the heads, where the lifters are, and where you typically poor your oil, you have slightly larger galleries that allow oil to go back down into the crank case, this is how your oil circulates, well, eventually, these also become plugged and one of two things happen.

1: The valve/cam area is flooded and then packed full of oil, there is now only one exit, out your PCV system, and back into the intake, destroying your catalytic converter.
2: The valve/cam area isn't flooded, but isn't draining nearly fast enough to keep oil flowing into the moving parts, resulting in the shredding of your cams/lifters/pushrods.

Now, I said this is the result of using a stop leak product, here is the really tricky part, the stuff is still flowing in the water, and it is meant to STOP things from leaking out pin holes, that you can not see easily, imagine it leaking through the gasket, into the crank case, this speeds up sluding, and makes the oil STICKY.


Eventually, your engine fails due to the shredding of valves, cams, crank, rod bearings, and even the tearing away at your piston sleeves due to the valves being shread.




Now, to the ONLY positive that stop leaks have.
THEY WORK, albeit, not as well as you would think for the intended purpose.

They are meant as a last resort, such as when your radiator or heater core is leaky, but hasn't fully busted, they aren't meant to stop anything for good, nor meant to stay in the oil/cooling system, you put it in, on the side of the road, run your car till you can stop at a shop safely the next day, not next week, next year, or 10 years later (if you went ten years with out a flush of the cooling system or doing a few oil changes, you shouldn't even drive.)

One last downside, if left long enough in the cooling system, it eats at your hoses, and causes the rubber to decay, in a way, that isn't normal, it makes it POROUS, and causes the rubber to leak all over, the hoses will feel slimey, and appear to have oil on them, or look like condensation has formed, that is the stop leak, leaking through the hoses after eating them up.

This previous owner instead of paying $300 for the LIM repair bought $20 worth of stop leak, and sold the car off, to someone not knowing what had happened, and this was an older male, 4 years later, and the engine is done for, because we never knew what was happening.

*Note, this isn't my car, it's my brothers car, if I have you as a friend on FB, you can easily view the pictures of the progress so far, chances are, he will either have to get a new car, or a junk yard engine, and perform a LIM job on that.


Facebook Album: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=43852&id=100000887370048&l=166e8a2f1b
 
How toast is the engine? You say it was originally a 300 dollar repair but he went for a 20 dollar bottle of stop leak instead. What would it cost now to fix it?
 
At this point, to actually fix the engine, over $1000 for all gaskets, new seals, solvents, bolts, valves, lifters, rocker arms and so on, pretty much everything is done for, and the major parts being Heads, Block, and manifolds actually need machined.

Valves - 12 - $20 EACH
Rocker Arms - 12 - $35 EACH
Push Rods - 12 - $4.00 each
Master Rebuild Kit - 1 - $600
(Master Rebuild kits generally contain nearly everything, pistons, rings for the pistons, main bearing, rod bearings, rear seals, all gaskets, oil pump, oil pump pickup, connecting rods, connecting rod caps, various bolts, valve seals, new valve springs.)

Block machining and honing - $350
Heads Machined, valves lapped, and pressure tested - $140 for each head
Manifold, both upper and lower $150
NEW injectors - $125 each, theres 6, sad they are sooo expensive, but they are screwed due to excess carbon and heat.
Head Bolts - $40 for the set
LIM Bolts - $35 for the set
CAM - $345 for a performance cam, though the current one seems ok, I don't see any bad scores on it, it can probably be machined.
Crank - I can't find a new cheap one, and using one from another engine is a very bad idea.

All the solvents, chemicals needed, and so on also adds up, cheap, but adds up, I measured the build up of sludge, in some areas it nears half an inch thick.

So far I have put 30 hours into this, now, figure at $60 an hour, yea, I would be in heaven. I am doing this free for my brother.
At this stage, most people opt for a junkyard engine, have it checked in thrown in, which usually costs $500-$1000 depending on the state/area.


I just did the math, if a customer really went ahead with a rebuild, it would be around $2500-$3000 for parts alone, then $1800 in labor for the current amount of labor, which is about right for a total rebuild at a dealer or very reputable shop.
 
Jesus, I could never understand why people can't just replace a simple gasket instead of letting it snowball into something that now requires a total overhaul. The way I see it, your brother is indebted to you forever for this.
 
It wasn't my brother that used it, was the previous owner, it actually held for awhile and made the leak slow enough we never caught it, I wouldn't have even noticed the LIM had failed in this manor
 
And that is all that it is meant for, it's not meant to seal large areas, nor areas in the engine that are subject to large amounts of stress and heat.
 
Ugh, I feel your pain. Gaskets aren't expensive... (well, compared to rebuilds)

I'm surprised you opted to rebuild it and not swap in a used one.
 
If we had thrown in a used one, we would have replaced the gaskets anyways.

Plus, this just ended up giving us the chance to get some more power out of it as we had all the major components.
 
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