Possible head gasket replacement needed? help needed

Hey all,

Yesterday my expansion tank split at the seems and my brother told me to check the oil just to ensure that it hadn't gone 'milky' as it if was it is probable that the head gasket has gone. I chcked my oil filer cap and there is a little milky residue - not alot at all. I was wondering or rather probably hoping that this could be the condensation referred to in otehr posts - is there any checks I can perform to assertain whether its the head gasket or not as I do not want to have to strip the engine if its not fully needed

Any help would be greatly received

Many thanks!

Have you got any coolant loss? How is the cooling system in general?

If the expansion tank broke at the seal then either it was damaged/old or got over pressurised. This could be due to coolant issues or pressurisation of the system (possible head gasket).

You can check with a compression tester (only costs about £10 and easy to do) or a sniffer test (garage will do this, checks for exhaust gas in the coolant). You can do a leakdown test but that's overkill at this stage.

Any other symptons or issues?

A small amount of emulsification isn't necessarily an issue but you need to figure out why that tank blew, definitely worth doing the compression test first imo

Well I can tell you (being as though I initailly bought this car and sold it to daverave) that the radiator was blocked when I bought it so I did a full flush out, new rad and coolant replacement, the hose from the expansion tank and the radiator was slightly perished and steaming when hot so I replaced that also.

The fan kicks in and out with no problems and keeps a level engine temp but there has been some coolant loss - guessing that this was due to the split header, wasn't doing this when I sold it (I know how that sounds)

The oil emuls is pretty slight but the oil is really pretty fresh as was changed within 400 miles ago

This happened to my black cabby but it just went pop on the motorway and spilled all of it's coolant hence why I told him to check the oil, do you think that the pressure test is fully reliable for the H/G or do you think that a sniffer test would be better?

Any help on this matter would help me also as I feel a little guilty about this!

A compression test is very easy to do (and cheap too) so I usually recommend that first. If it is inconclusive then move to sniffer/leakdown tests to fault find further but you often find a compression test reveals all you need

i tested the compression today, all 4 was the same just over 10 and in the green, so now i'm hopeing it was just the  old bottle popping and nothing else. Thanks for the advice.

Sounds good, switch the expansion tank and hopefully you are sorted