My 'new' 1971 Spider has milky coolant.

[ScoopMan]

I just picked up a 1971 Spider that has a great body and interior, but is a mess mechanically. It starts and idles well, no smoke, but that is as good as it gets. There is nonexistent power, much of it I attribute to the carb as the vacuum operated secondary never opens, so I have a new 32/36 DFEV and 1800 intake ready to go in. Massive oil leaks around the cam boxes. Compression test had all 4 cylinders at 100 to 105 psi dry, maybe 115 psi wet. Not great but passable? God knows when the timing belt was last changed. Howling diff covered with oil. I just started to get into it this weekend. I figured I would begin by trying to get the engine leaks taken care of, by taking off the cam boxes, adjusting the valve clearances and put a new timing belt on while in the process.

I drained the coolant, which could have been from the Nixon administration as far as I know, and it was milky green. Must be contaminated. Head gasket? The bottom of the radiator cap had some sludgy stuff on it.

Drained the oil, and the crankcase was way overfilled. Must have been 5 or even 6 quarts in there. Previous owners pretty damn clueless. Oil looked pretty used up but no coolant in it as far as I can tell.

Considering I am taking the cam boxes off anyway, and will also be putting on a new intake and carb, wondering if it makes sense just to go ahead and yank the head off that thing while I am at it and take it to a machine shop to get checked out. A leak down test would be great but the car is undrivable and I do not have the equipment for it. Is there a relatively simple way to do this at home? Rental compressor and a spark plug hole fitting?

The ultimate solution is a total rebuild, but not sure if I want to go that far with it right now, when it seems that there might be some life left in it, as the compression test was so-so but not horrible, especially as all values were very close. I was thinking I could replace some gaskets, put in a new TB, adjust the valves, points and timing and see how it goes first. I was not counting on a head gasket though... Does it sound like I need one?

[So Cal Mark]

I'd pull the head. Since your planned work is most of the head tear-down, it's easier to pull the complete head and disassemble/assemble on the bench

[bradartigue]

You are doing a lot of work just to get it running, so pull the head and replace the gasket. Foamy/gunky crap on the cap is absolutely from the headgasket. Spend the extra 2-3 hours and do it all.

[vandor]

What he said. And get a machine shop to check the head for straightness. Migh consider a valve job a this point. Project creep...

[ScoopMan]

Thanks guys. Pretty much as I figured. If I pull the head I will definitely check flatness and do a valve job. I am guessing that is where I am losing compression since my wet test did not cause all that big a jump in my values, like a 10 psi increase. And speaking of project creep, I am tempted to see what happens if I pop in a pair of Mark's 285 cams

First things first, pull the head. I sure hope nothing is cracked in there. I figure a cast iron block should be pretty robust, but anything is possible with this car from what I have seen so far.

This car was pretty stupidly maintained. Vise grip scars on the drainplug... The crank nut is pretty gored and I need to grind off the burrs before I can get a socket on it. Those kinds of things. I worry about the dented oil pan, for all I know some twit tried to jack the car there. Sure hope my oil pump is OK...Now that I think about it I wonder if it was overfilled on purpose

[narfire]

If you get the cams (they make a difference) do spring (more $$$creep) for a set of adjustable cam wheels to really benefit from the cams and your new carb.

The dented oil pan could have broken the oil pick up. If over filled , I doubt if the oil pressure light would flicker if you went around a corner aggressively. If it was filled to proper level the oil might slosh enough to starve the now broken pick up of oil and you would get the pressure light to flicker/come on momentarily.

[ScoopMan]

Well.... With the head and intake manifold off, I can access the motor mounts a whole lot more easily, and the one on the intake side is pretty oil contaminated, so I will be jacking up the motor anyway to change it... Might as well drop the pan and look at the oil pump... More scope creep!

Then again, I should probably have a close look at the cross member for cracks, especially considering that I should replace the ancient looking ball joints and bushings anyway. I need to clean up the nasty oil better first so I can actually see something. Dropping the cross member and front suspension will make removing that oil pan a piece of cake.

I have a feeling I will be replacing everything in this car