QuestionQUESTION: I have a 1953 Farmall Super C that I bought 2 weeks ago, the person I bought it from said he recently rebuilt the engine. I got it home and noticed a couple days later that oil was seeping from the head gasket, I can't tell if it is leaking water but the oil is a little milky looking. The engine starts and runs very good so would it be safe to just change the head gasket and how hard is this job? Any help is appreciated.
ANSWER: If the oil is milky, then it has also leaked water into the crankcase and you should not run it until this problem is fixed or you can damage the crankshaft and bearings. Without knowing the details of this engine rebuild, it's impossible to say what exactly is wrong. If this was a do it yourself rebuild by the previous owner, he may have done it wrong or did an incomplete job. To do a complete job, the head should have been sent to an engine machine shop to be checked for warpage and resurfaced if necessary. If there are cracks, the head would have to be replaced. The gasket could have been installed incorrectly or damaged during assembly, or the head possibly was not torqued down properly. The head and block surfaces may not have been clean enough, or the head bolt holes may not have been cleaned out before assembly. The easiest and cheapest thing to try first is to retorque the head bolts and see if that helps, and if it doesn't, then the head will have to be removed and everything that I mentioned will have to be checked. This is a very simple basic engine so it's an easy job to change a head gasket.
---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------
QUESTION: I decided to remove the head after I removed the oil pan drain plug and first thing that came out was water. My first question is, do I need to completely disassemble the head in order to have it checked, second question is: would there be a torque setting for the intake and exhaust manifold, this is a one piece manifold.
Answer I'm sure there is a torque spec for the manifold, but I don't have it or know it offhand. If they are 3/8 bolts, it should be somewhere around 30 to 35 ft. lbs. 7/16 bolts would be about 40 ft. lbs. The torque isn't quite as critical on the manifolds as it is on the head. Whether or not you strip the head down completely is up to you. The shop that works on it will charge you more if they have to do more disassembly to do what needs to be done. To check for cracks, it should be completely stripped down, for resurfacing it might only have to be partially stripped down. It's been my experience that machine shops sometimes forget to send a head back with everything it had on it when you sent it there. Things get lost or forgotten, so the more parts you have removed already, the less chance there is for that to happen.
