Pontiac Owners Club UK

I took off the rad cap on the 3rd gen and there's little white bits floating around in it, is that the start of a head gasket issue or could it be something else? It still runs fine and hasn't ever over heated.

I dont want both firebirds to have head gasket issues in 1 week!

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Probably just needs a flush - has it ever had any rad weld or similar in it?

When I've seen head gaskets start to go and contamination of coolant happens it's never looked like that.

I don't think it's had any rad weld in it. A couple of weeks ago I noticed a hole in a coolant hose, and the fuel hose next to where the hole was, was leaking as well so there's a potential contamination point there (which I fixed today). I was at a garage recently where they just topped up the rad, but it was just water from a bottle which didn't look very clean so it could have been that as well. And I'm pretty sure before that, the coolant looked alright, and I haven't really driven it in the last couple of weeks.

Let's hope a flush is all that's needed. Is it just a case of taking off the bottom hose and putting a hose pipe in the top and turning on the tap? Or do you need anything else to get it round the whole engine?

Use rad flush as well, available from halfords. Run for twenty minutes then flush as you suggested with bottom hose off and stick a hosepipe in the rad filler cap. R

probably just dirty water bottle they used, or if leaking hose is breaking down then that could be where its come from
headgaskets can cause oil contamination, but not bits