antifreeze in oil…again!

Were you able to see which cylinder had the leak when you removed the head? What size tractor/which engine? 

Sounds like a cracked liner or block now. I know you said you had the head checked, but weren't specefic. Did you have the head dye checked (http://www.skygeek.com/ats-za70.html) or Magnaflux particle checked or pressure/vacuum checked for 12 hrs.? Eyeballs don't count.

Well it could be, knock on wood, that you still had residual coolant in the oil system, and that there was still air in the cooling system. I recommend doing a cooling system pressure check now.

You can get a cooling system pressure tester pretty cheap. I think I paid around $50.00 for mine years ago from Mac tools, if Harbor freight has one I would think 20-30.00? If any of your local parts houses rent tools that would be the way to go. It's just a pump with a gauge and assorted caps that connect to it.

If you have a tool rental store nearby they should have the complete test kit.

Otherwise: http://www.google.com/search?q…..1I7GGIC_en

Harbor Freights proud of thiers:http://www.harborfreight.com/c…..ure+tester

You're right, that looks like a basic Stant $50.00 kit!

The local Shucks store used to rent tools. Now that they have been bought out by O'Reileys who knows?

Before you order one check with your local stores to see if they rent one or if any employees or accounts have one to loan/rent.(or if they sell one at a reasonable price) The reason being you need an adapter to fit your tractors radiator. Buying one online and finding it does not come with that size adapter would be a bummer to say the least. If they think they can help you bring your cap with you to check it against the adapters they have.

Just a thought, does the place that checked your cylinder head have one ???

For my contribution I would like to say that I have learned to watch harbor freight as for products and prices.  Last fall my 3/8″ air ratchet gave up after many years of service.  I looked at this one from HF

http://www.harborfreight.com/3…..65161.html

Then I went to my local hardware store bought a name brand  one with a little more torque, double to warranty at half the price.   to HF.   I have found the above true in several cases. 

I've had trouble with HF air tools.They always replace em and they always fail again when I need them .  I gave up and only buy brand name air tools now.     BG

Tinbender wrote:

The local Shucks store used to rent tools. Now that they have been bought out by O'Reileys who knows?

At the two local Schuck's/O'Reilly's stores I go to, nothing has changed (so far) except the merchandising layout and more store branded stuff.

msshearin wrote:

I prey that it is the bolts not torqed enough or left over coolant and not block!!!!!!

Most likely cylinder liners, not the block.  If you are real lucky, just the liner O-ring seals.

The O'Reilly's around here, you basically deposit enough to buy the tool, and if you bring it back in a reasonable time you get a full refund. In other words, they loan it to you no charge. It also works this way at Advance Auto. I guess this is their way of selling parts, it works for me.

Msshearin wrote:

if it were the liners wouldn't that mean white smoke from stack?

Nope. White smoke is unburned fuel from incomplete combustion caused by a “cold” flame front (cold combustion chamber). Sometimes accompanied by condensation, and dependent on ambient temperatures and humidity. Will go away usually in under a minute at idle.

Mike,

We ran into the same problem when we purchased our tractor where the antifreeze would mix with the engine oil. We went through the steps of changing gasket, checking the engine head, liners and replacing the piston orings. What was causing our problem was the plate at the back of the cylinder head was not installed properly (missing gasket and plate was warped) and therefore causing the antifreeze to go down the engine oil port. To fix the problem we had the hole at the back of the engine head sealed and had a thicker plate made. We installed the plate with gasket and our problem was solved.

I'm adding more pictures. The plate in question, in our case, is the plate that is at one end of the the engine head facing the steering. Our plate includes a 90 degree pipe for which a hose is connected and goes to the heater in our cab. If you don't have a cab it should be just a flat plate attached to the engine head.

Where was the bolt for the horn situated on your plate? If you remove that plate you will see that the oil has mixed with your antifreeze as well. Check the antifreeze in your radiator to see if you have any oil floating on top.

Does that bolt go in the same hole as the one that we sealed in our engine head. See my first pictures that I've posted.

If you left the top right hand bolt off there is a good chance that the antifreeze is going into the hole on your engine head as I indicated in my post #24. That plate needs to bolted on tightly to seal that hole properly. Take that plate off to see if you have oil in that area.

Mike, that's great news. It took us weeks and a lot of hard work to take the engine apart and put it back together as we had to do this on 3 occassions to figure out what was causing the problem. Once we took that back plate off we noticed immediately that the oil was mixing with coolant in this area. The back plate was warped and there was no gasket and hence why the coolant was mixing with the engine oil. Here's a brief overview of what caused our issue.