Headgasket

[zrice88]

hey. i have a '91 festiva L. i bought it about 2-3 weeks ago with a blown headgasket. the engine is original and has 250,000+ miles on it. this car is my daily driver and i drive it about 15-20 miles every day. my question is this: Is my engine worth putting a headgasket on? should i be looking for a replacement engine? the oil leak has gotten progressively worse since i got it and i need a solution fast. thanx for your help.

[packrat427]

It just depends on what you want , do you want to do a swap to a B6 or B6T, or a 1.3 back in do you want to get by as cheap as possible ,
You should be able to R&R the head , have it checked and just maybe get by with doing a new gasket , Buy a repair manual to help if this is your first time .

[festivaWES]

a head gasket is not all t5hat hard to replace, be sure to get the head planed level before reinstall. At autozone you can get the head gasket, 2 intake manifold gaskets and the throttle body gasket for 30 some bucks.

as for the oil leak: replace oil pan gasket, and valve cover gasket. (which is included with head gasket i think)

Run some sea foam in it for 5 minutes, then do another oil change.

Good for basically the rest of the motors life providing not major breaks.

-Wes

[zrice88]

what other gaskets should i replace when replacing the headgasket? will tearing it down affect the timing at all? NAPA sells a headgasket kit for about $90-$100. do i really need the whole kit or are there just a few select gaskets that i should replace?

[festivaWES]

get all the gaskets i mentioned above, you'll want to replace them all

As for the timing issue, you have to take off the timing belt, no biggie though, piece of cake to line it up

[zrice88]

whats the best repair manual out there for festivas?

[packrat427]

All I have is the Haynes , there are several others .

[zoe60]

As long as you have it that far apart, replace the camshaft seal in the head. Mine was leaking bad.