When any head is cracked it all mixes.

 

what years are the safest ? for non-head gasket fail / non-head cracking

i have a 90 & 93 .. about to sell 90 with 160k, runnin good too .. still workin bugs out of 93

 

Yeah it gets mixed altogether. Sorry, I wasn't trying to be mean or put you down or anything like that. But I just hope you inspected that before you purchased the XJ and knew what you were getting into.

Did you notice coolant in the oil or vice versa?

Even if by some miracle the head wasn't cracked, I'd still pull the head apart, resurface and throw a new gasket on it. Cause that's worse than I've ever seen.

 

Hey captian obvious. do you read anything do you not realize that we said earlier

 

Yep, just reiterating though. And it doesn't hurt to see that there's agreement between people (at least that's what I'd want to see if I was having an issue). And wanted to throw in my apology.

Thanks for asking though

 

Oh c'mon you guys, look at the bright side. That XJ won't ever need stop-leak and the owner can go "muddin'" right in the driveway. Heck, let it harden and it's a safety feature, like adding a concrete brush guard/battering ram up front.

I suspect the suggestion the head may have issues is going to be correct, I can't imagine that didn't overheat- severely. It isn't unrepairable though, just gonna take some work.

 

Wow... yes I'd be very concerned that the rust has weakened the head between cyls 3 and 4. I'd try to rule out a cracked head really early. If the water pump still works I'd do a basic oil change and let the thing idle for a few minutes, drain the oil and coolant, and look for contamination. Before buggering around with any flushing. Actually if the cooling system is that bad just drop the pan as it's probably full of crap too. Has it ever had an oil change?

On the bright side Mr. OP, if the body is good that's what counts with these things. The 4.0 is a beast and millions of them are out there. Driveline can be replaced but once the unibody is toast then it's game over.

Funny you mention that - my first thought was "Hmm so this is what Martian cement will look like"!

 

So far I don't see any symptoms of cracked head or bad gasket, except white smoke, which almost disappeared (hopefully it is condensation in muffler).
No codes
no oil in antifreeze
no water in oil
compression was kind of OK.
I looked in oil fill hole in valve cover, nothing was wrong there.

 

Well at the very least, you want to rip out every component of the cooling system and replace them. And flush the hell out of the block when you have the thermostat and water pump off. And flush the hell out of the heater core cause that same rust is in that too. Once you do that, fill it with 50/50 coolant/water mix and then run it. Monitor it with an infrared temp gun on the thermostat housing, watch coolant level, and watch for white smoke

 

I drove it for about 15 miles.
It doesn't overheat, but I feel it needs one more flush.
I flushed by garden hose both ways:
radiator
heater
engine.
It doesn't smoke anymore. So far so good.
And it needs steering stabilizer.

 

Damn man! Glad to hear its all workin out for ya!

 

Go buy a lottery ticket. Hurry.

 

X2 lol

 

Hahahahaha

But seriously, watch coolant level. You will be the luckiest man alive.

What all did you replace??

 

thermostat
t. gasket
antifreeze
oil filter
oil
used 2 bottles of "flush"
next:
steering stabilizer
tires
hopefully not evaporator (didn't check where leak is yet)