Finding steam coming out the exhaust, along with a reducing quantity of fluid in the radiator or overflow bottle, might mean you have a leak between the cooling system and the combustion area of the engine. As this leak gets worse you will notice the engine running more and more rough, needing a tuneup, or not wanting to run at all. This kind of a leak can usually either be found as a cracked engine block, a cracked head, a warped head, a blown head gasket or a combination of the above. Many times these symptoms show up after the engine has overheated, since this overheating can cause warps, cracks and blown gaskets. To further investigate do a compression check next. A low compression on one or more cylinders will point to the problem areas. Also pull some spark plugs and compare the type of wear among them. If the coolant leak is near one or two of the spark plugs it will show signs of discoloration and point to the problem area. After confirmation of any of the above, it's probably time to disassemble the engine to some degree and make repairs. Hope This helps
Apr 30, 2008 at 4:03 AM
