swd9 update

1974vette

Member
I continue to get bubbles and foam in the radiator. there so far does not seem to be oil in the coolant or coolant in the oil. I pulled the plugs and none seem to be cleaner than the rest from water cleaning them. the exhaust gas test in the radiator is negative. compression in #1 is 115 #2 is 95 #3 is 98 and #4 is 120. it seems a bad head gasket between #2 and 3. I owned the tractor about 5 years it has not been worked or over heated. I tested the coolant which was new at that time and is good to negative 45. what next pull the head to do a visual inspection? looking for advice from you guys out there. thanks again. joel
 
Check tappet settings first no need to get in a hurry about tearing engine down just mite open up a big can of worms.
 
I will check them. I do not want to tear off the head. Thanks. The tappets could alter the compression readings but why the air/foaming in the radiator? Thanks for the help
 
Checking gas mode compression results may depend on starting valve openings, maybe some not open enough and air flow through the starting carburetor disc opening and small air passages. You probably have compression getting to the coolant system somewhere.
 
yes looks like a bad head gasket. but just because its burnt between the 2 cyl's dont mean that it will produce bubbles in rad. that is usually a cracked head. i have had a few with a burnt gasket and no rad bubbles. it will also only be running on 2 cyl's with a bad gasket like that. if its running on all 4 cyl's on diesel then the gasket is not burnt between cyl's, but that dont mean the gasket is good either. i presume its a cracked head, as those are famous for that. and if you have compression in rad its head pulling time, no getting out of that. not a big deal either 1.5 hrs and its off.
 
The tractor starts on gas well and flips over to diesel with no problem. The tractor does not miss at low or high rpm. I hope it's just a head gasket because it seems a good head is hard to come by. I guess I'm glad I didn't get new paint on it yet. Thanks again everyone for the help.
 
Didn't type that to good. If a starting valve is just getting off the seat it would take more cranks or loose some air to match another correct adjusted opening. Full air flow is not flowing like a gas with throttle wide open when cranking. You have small longer passages in gas mode on a diesel unless the butterfly valves in manifold are open. Probably not air flow though because of one cylinder of shared ports higher than other.
 

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