Hey guys and gals,
I'm glad to join this community! I love my mini but its broke!
The car had been running well but I was having some minor overheating.
Well long story short, my girlfriend borrowed it and it had a massive overheating.
Well thats the scoops. I'll be checking through this site to see how all this works. I can post more details later,
aloha,
joel

 

Sorry to hear that, hope everything works out, from one Joel to another Joel.
Cheers!

 

Ok heres some more information.
My girlfriend is NOT car savvy. She just kept driving as the red warning lights told her to stop. She probably drove for like 20-30 minutes after the light came on. When she got to Kona (west side of the big island) the car seemed to be quite overheated. THe coolant had leaked/boiled out, I don't know all the details. an hour or so later the shop where she works tried to put some more coolant into the car and it immediately boiled over.
Later these guys checked and feel pretty sure that it had blown the head gasket. This is at a tire and minor service shop.
I spoke with a fellow named Rocko at the Kona Mini repair and he said to do a compression test. We did that.
dry wet
cylinder 1 115 175
cylinder 2 128 193
cylinder 3 134 185
cylinder 4 139 180

This is a 2004 S.
I've got fairly low miles on the engine 48,000

Can someone tell me if this is conclusive evidence that the engine is blown?
It seems to me that if we fix the head gasket we are not really solving the problem.
Thanks for any advice.
joel

 

Hard to say, at least they aren't reading zero, think the head gasket is probably gone or leaking. Replace it and see where you are.

 

your compression looks great, try pressure testing the cooling system overnight with the spark plugs removed, then in the morning use a pen light to lookk down the spark plug tubes, if you see coolant on top of the pistons, you either have a cracked head, or a blown head gasket. otherwise i suggest making sure both fan speeds are working properly, change the thermostat, bleed all the air out of the sytem and check the coolant level every day until your satisfied the level is not moving, if it is moving keep looking for a leak.

 

Aloha,
I think I need to be more specific. The rumor is the engine is blown, but I don't know. The repair guy in Kona strongly suspects that it is, based on the compression readings. But, I don't want to go order a new engine if I don't have to. Can someone tell me how we can determine whether it is not worth messing with?
We have determined that the head gasket is leaking into the cylinders.
To repair the head gasket is about $1800 or so. But to get a new engine is in the neighborhood of $5,000. So you can see why I am hesitating.
Is it of the opinion of engine specialists that the compression readings i posted earlier strongly indicate a damaged engine?
can someone help me to figure this out? Or perhaps there is a better forum to ask this question.
Please help!
joel

 

Also,
If I am hopeful and fix the head gasket, that may be fine, but no sense in fixing the head gasket if perhaps the cylinders were damaged! But I don't know, just looking at the engine it looks cherry!
j

 

Its been my experience that when overheated the exhaust valves destroy their seats, which if bad enough will screw you compression reading, if I were you i would at least pay to have head removed and sent to a good machine shop to have valve seats inspected. It is possibly that the head warped blowing the head gasket. Simply milling the head getting a thicker head gasket , having the valves recut may be all you need and this should be half the price if not less than half of a new engine. I have seen alot of minis overheated, usually the topend of the motor is what needs the fixin. Should definetly definetly take head to machine shop tell them " pressure test, check for warpage, mill if necessary, recut valves" my local machine shop will do this all day long for about 275$