Coolant Woes and rough idle

[newtron]

Hello All and thanks in advance for the help.

The other day after driving with no issues what so ever, I ruptured a coolant line. This caused the car to overheat and die on the side of the road. I got it home and put a new section of line in. I fired it up and then a small amount of coolant was leaking out of the water pump area. So I replaced the very worn out water pump and installed a new gasket.


This seemed to fix the problem for a moment. I was able to fire the car up and take it for a small 5mile drive, turn it off, and no leaks. I then drove it home, it idled roughly when I pulled into the drive, then another hose burst. At this point I chalked it up to the fact that the car just had 25+ year old radiator hoses. So I replaced all the hoses (minus 1, I'll get to that) and put in a new thermostat.

This also seemed to fix the proplem for round 2. I was able to drive it again this time about 3miles, turn it off no leaks, then drive home. Let it sit overnight and no leaks. Only thing was it was idleing a hotter than prior to the adjustments. I thought this was due to it needing a coolant top up after the drive.

Toped up the coolant, which was a bit low, then Fired it up again to go to town, drove just fine, started very easily. Then after about 5 miles we pulled to a stop sign and it started to idle very roughly. Arrived at destination and popped the hood, heard leaking/hissing from cap. So I walked to the auto shop and got a new cap. Drove with new cap maybe 2 miles and blew another radiator hose, not a new one, but one I missed. The one that leads to the oil cooler.

Now today I've replaced that oil cooler hose, and the car is doing very funny things. 1st it took less coolant than previosly, so I thought fire it up for a moment to get things flowing, and add more. But it still wouldnt take more. Let the car run for a few minutes with the heat on full blast. Puts out heat no problem and doesnt smell. Turned the car off and lots of hissing from under the new radiator cap and at the upper radiator hose, like its building up major pressure. Also its now idleing very roughly, and when I push on the gas you can feel it firing very roughly as you add more fuel. Also there seems to be much more exaust/white smoke coming from the tail pipe.

Could it bee that I need to put the radiator on a incline and see if somehow there is air trapped in the middle of the system from where I replaced the oil cooler hose?

Could I be getting coolant in the oil from the oil cooler area?

Do I need to replace a head gasket?

Did I mess something up with the water pump?

I'm not sure where to go from here? I just dont understand, how it ran smoothly, no rough idle. Then I replaced everything coolant related and now its running so poorly? Was it just not running poorly before because the radiator cap was so worn it just let off the excess pressure when driving?

Thanks

[plenzen]

Sounds to me like head gasket issues. The pressure build up is from cylinders/combustion/heat etc. Will just keep blowing lines and popping the cap.
Rough idle may be from steam in cylinders and must be careful not to damage injectors.

Good luck

Paul

[rlaggren]

Ditto the gasket.

It got pretty good and hot the first time I'd guess. You may have trouble finding a head gasket. They probably _do_ still exist, but you might have to tap every source you can imagine; maybe even ship it in from over seas. But don't skip the local guys first. I and some others found CarQuest had some.

If you don't take care of it right away, it would be a good idea to pull the glow plugs (easiest way into the cylinders) and squirt in some WD40 or some such and turn it over a few times to try to prevent the water that may be in the cylinders from rusting stuff and really totaling the engine. Maybe somebody else knows an easier way to protect the cylinders...

Rufus