My Car could be FUBAR'ed!
 

On top of everything that happened over Memorial Day Weekend (wife's car breaking, mom falling, ticket). Now there is a chance my head gasket is going out in my car.

On the way to work yesterday morning sitting in traffic I noticed a smell of antifreeze. Then steam started coming out from in front of the passenger side of the windshield and my car felt like it was running on 6 cylinders. So, I thought oh crap heater core. Well, I get to work, take a friends car to pep boys and get a bypass kit for the heater core. I get it bypassed and the overheating stops. BUT, my car still runs like a 4cyl. Well, last night I limp it to my dads house and we check some stuff. The upper radiator hose has no pressure like the thermostat isn't opening (which I just replaced 2 weeks ago). So, we start to think head gasket, we take off a coil pack next to the thermostat and see antifreeze on the plug wire....so a nice "oh ****" comes to mind.

But, on a good note, I got to thinking today that if it was my head gasket I would have been seeing smoke pouring out of my exhaust. So, I am going to leave work early today and go replace the thermostat again hoping that it's just a bad one that I put in. And that by chance the antifreeze that got in the plug hole was from when I replaced the thermostat and spilled some antifreeze. The sparkplug itself looked fine, that also keeps me from thinking head gasket....

So, this afternoon I am going to either be a very happy person that it's only going to cost me another $10 for a thermostat or I am going to be a very ill person about to pay $800 for a HG replacment (which will probably mean I will have to cancel my trip to Panama City in 2 weeks)

Here's my pros/cons list for what I expect:

Pros:
1. No smoke out exhust lean less towards HG
2. No pressure on upper rad hose, lean more towards Thermostat
3. Antifreeze was seeping around one of the bolts on the thermostat housing, lean more towards thermostat.
4. No more overheating now that heater core is bypassed, lean toward thermostat holding the water from getting to the rest of the engine.

Cons:
1. Antifreeze on plug wire, lean towards HG
2. Running like a 4 cyl (skipping, sputtering engine), leans towards HG

Right now the pros are winning...Keep your fingers crossed!!!!!!!!

Have you checked the oil? I thought milky oil meant headgasket. Also, spark plugs, coil packs, and fuel filter. BTW, your car SHOULDNT have plug wires...

Dude im in a similar boat only way worse

Not always, I had a leaky head gasket and the oil was fine. I had a couple places look at it and they couldnt figure out what it was. Then I took it to a ford dealer and they figured it out right away. REALLY expensive, but happy to be fixed.

Intake gasket?

Well, I got real lucky and unlucky at the same time yesterday. When me and my dad checked some things out, it turned out that the thermostat I just put in was bad (woudln't open in boiling water), so we replaced that and bingo half the problem was solved. But, at the same time, I unbypassed the heater core when we did this, and coolant started leaking on the test run. So, I don't have to spend $800 on a head gasket, but I do have to take my freaking car apart to change the heater core!

We found out that the coolant on the coil pack (don't know why I called it a plug wire), came from the thermostat housing leaking. We checked, rechecked, and triple checked this, because the antifreeze was just in the cylinder, not actually down in the plug itself. We checked the other plugs and all to be sure! So, good news Head Gasket ok, bad news needs a heater core!

well lucky you, 1994 and 95 v6 owners. Our headgaskets were notorious for rupturing, there was a recall on them eaven. Lucky me, mine looks to have had work done to it already, so either they got the recall message or were too late and had to fix it (carfax was fine)
but thats in the past anyhow, lol

do you have any idea why the thermostat housing was leaking? when my thermo housing was leaking it was due to the crappy plastic intake manifold Cracking ..i diddnt take note of what year your car is but im just sayin keep an i eye that.

Yea, I have to do a heater core in my car sometime before winter comes. :(