Severe Engine Help!

[blanchardkeith]

Well just before my wife and i were to take my little one to the hill country my new radiator decided to explode. I got a long neck cap thinking that was the problem. My radiator once it would get hot would send all the fluid to the resevoir and it would never return. I thought as did some on here that it was the short cap on the long stem. I thing once I put the long stem on it never would let the pressure out. this is an 1800. It built up on my first drive and burst just under the black cap lid. What was the problem? My mechanic thinks that the head was leaking pressure and sending all the water to the resevoir and not letting it return because of the back pressure.? Why would the water not return when the engine is cold though? Any way at this point I am going to try to get the radiator hammered and welded back into place. (hopefully) What do I do now? The engine ran fine. I did notice a little white smoke out of the tail pipe upon start up this morning. But other than that she drove fine. Could it be the head? Thanks for the help. On to the taho for the weekend trip.........ugh!

[rlux4]

Two idicators of a blown head gasket are either oil in the water, or water in the oil. When you get the radiator back in, fill it and leave the cap off when you start it. Watch to see if you get bursts of air coming up out of the radiator. This would indicate a bad gasket between a cylinder and a water jacket.
Do you have the long metal heater tube from the water pump back to the firewall? Last summer my car was displacing all the coolant into the overflow and boiling out of it, major overheating problem. It turned out to be the gasket at the end of the heater tube at the water pump. It's on the suction side of the pump, so it was sucking in air and displacing coolant.
Ron

[So Cal Mark]

for coolant to get sucked back into the radiator, you have to have a sealed system so that a vacuum is created. If you have any type of leak (including a leaking head gasket), no suction is created and the coolant stays in the bottle.
Once you get the radiator sealed, pressure test the system and see if it holds. You can start the engine with the pressure tester in place and warm the engine up. The pressure tester will read the pressure in the system. If you're getting compression into the cooling system the pressure will be high