M60 pumping out rust fountain?

[632 Regal]

Definitely a red looking fountain shooting out of the expansion tank when revving it up. So I am guessing the only rust available on these engines would be water pump or head gaskets. What else would cause a rusty coolant? It's not a different color coolant it IS rust!

I also think the head gaskets could have rusted through or possibly a missing thermostat, OR the bleeder that was partially clogged is causing cavitation causing the fountain on rev ups?

Anyways I pulled the hacked up radiator and JB welded the leaks and will wait a bit to finish that part up to confirm if the engine is good or has a head gasket issue. Anything else I should be looking out for at this point? Not going to be dumping a ton into this thing until I have an idea if the engine is good. No oil in rad and and no water in the oil. No white on the oil filler cap either and no steam in exhaust.

Working on this 540 is a bit of a challenge since my main driveway spot is still taken up by the E46 that I wanted to sell last year... Another story for another time.

Any help appreciated as always.

[winfred]

my best guess is maybe someone polluted the system with dexcool, it doesn't play with others and makes nasty red clay ****, not enough iron or steel in the system to make much rust if any, my experience with roasted m60s is they are tough and tolerate it fairly well but when finally crunchy is the block and heads always seemed warp away from one another, block would taco about 4-5 thou and the heads would bow up 4-5 thou giving you around 9 thou total difference in the center between 3-4/6-7 and you would get air in the system usually at high speeds

[Frank87]

I don't understand how you Amerikanskys can always get head gasket trouble on M60 blocks. However, if the oil on the dipstick is totally ok in color and does not show the typical oil/coolant color, you are probably ok.

This rust could come from the radiator but it could also be a mix of different coolant types that have been in the engine for too long. The coolant that came out of my M60 3 years ago (240.000Km) seemed like dangerous radioactive ooze. Engine still running 100% since then and it has 393.000 now.

Define shooting out.. If I rev my engine with the expansion reservoir open, it will just "stream out slowly".

[632 Regal]

No, if the cap is off and you rev it up it shoots out a fountain. Same with the hole in the rad which I just sealed. I am hoping it's a coolant block causing this. I will pop the rad in again and have better ideas on what is going on.

[Bill R.]

i've got to agree with Winfred. Dexcool makes a really nasty corrosive colorado river looking mud when mixed with conventional coolant. It will eat pinholes in the radiator core and attacks everything. And you have to flush it and flush it repeatedly to get it all out

[632 Regal]

Well today installed the JB welded radiator and poured a gallon of anti freeze in with a gallon of water so the block wont freeze tonight. Started it up, slight miss and steam in the exhaust. Exhaust smelled like raw fuel until the steam stopped. At that point we had excessive pressure bleeding out the expansion cap, son said it smelled like the old Honda which I couldn't smell. Let it cool and started it again, more raw fuel smell in exhaust and slight miss. Could see air coming up into the expansion tank again plus the steam and slight miss. Opened the cap and smelled like raw fuel with continuous bubbles percolating up into the expansion tank until it fired on all 8 and then just smelled like exhaust in the expansion tank.... So my initial guess was correct. Head gasket/s are bad. Perhaps cracked head which I lean to not to be the issue.

So I have a 95 540 with bad trans and a bad engine... Trans 159.00 fix (probably) Engine head gaskets (probably) body is straight as a nail but needs paint, interior not so mint.

Lesson learned, never buy a car you can't drive home. If I had a flat yard I would just stick it in a pasture and part the thing out. Very disappointing day.