Aluminum head issue. External coolant leak. Advice needed.

[furyus]

My concern is if the metal is thin enough to leak there, is there enough to weld without blow through, or is there enough to cut threads into. If not, maybe it can be machined out enough to put in a freeze plug.....

 

[sleepar]

You won't know till you get into it.... I would avoid welding at all possible could be because of core shift and the whole area is thin and could be an inclusion or pocket where a bubble is .... either way call the place you got them from and see if they will honor it fir an exchange of both heads and eat some shipping and down time for a fresh set... if that fails go into repairs

 

[Bigal75]

I would do like CDR said. Drill a hole to the water passage then tap and install a threaded pipe plug. That's as low budget as it gets and should work fine.

 

[Wookie316]

Well if I take P/S pump off I have fairly good access to the front of the head. I may try epoxy first to see if it will hold. I am on the fence with a weld or drill and tap. Both are good ideas just not sure what to do? I will see if I can contact Mopar next week but I bet they are going to brush me off. At least it was at the front facing forward and easy to find.
Also the shop that built the engine, the guy I need to speak to is on holidays for another week. May quiz him and see what he recommends?

 

[sleepar]

Try some radiator copper powder and let it circulate always works and it will seal the small pinholes and any future holes before you go epoxy and make a mess of the out side... I always put 'pepper' copper in a new build as an insurance policy usually about 2tablespoons... and some companies use it factory. And retork you're head bolts to spec anyways after 500 mile break in.... if it's just a small weaper... copper lubes the water pump... best stop leaker if that doesn't stop it and mopar ids useless then go the drill and tap for 1/4 " pipe plug you can go bigger if you need it... ponder it before you do any thing....

 

[miller]

If both heads came from the same batch...might want to take a look at the back end of the opposite head. Just make sure you don't have the same prob on both.

 

[nm9stheham]

I am personally skeptical about the drill and tap due to having no idea how thin the whole area might be. It could be good and thick and this is just a series or small voids and you're fine to proceed. Or it could be a large void and you end up with a much larger hole and not enough thread count in it to reliably bite. Or it could be really thin in that area due to core shift and no size of tap will bite in properly. Of course, any hole and tap CAN be augmented by JB....

If welding, I think I would drill a small exploratory hole first to get a general idea of the area's thickness. If thin, then the weld fix changes to a patch welded over the area rather than a weld bead in the area.

Interesting on the copper powder...I just avoid stop leaks of any type. I've seen too many clogged rads.....

 

[Wookie316]

Yeah the drill and tap worries me only in the fact that I believe 1/8" is the smallest I can go and that's pretty big considering the pin hole leak I have.

A properly placed tack weld probably would get it an hold for the life of the head. Have a few local connections who deal with this type of stuff more that I ever will. So gonna pick their brains on what to do.

 

[sleepar]

I am not a fan of stop leaks either only the fine pepper copper has proven to me to be successful the bars and others are junk that block a core to stop a leak true... It to me seems the lesser of the evils given the cooling system and block are fresh and it will circulate freely until it finds the leak and it has been around longer than the rest of the stuff.... it avoids tearing the engine down also it has no other binders than the fine particles it self and it doesn't take much of it to work.

 

[Wookie316]

Well as expected, a call into Direct Connection got me nowhere. Performance parts have no warranty and even explaining that this is obviously a manufacturing defect and not abuse there is still nothing I can do. Sure I could write letters and complain till I get someone higher up, but my time is valuable too and I'm not gonna waste my breath on the off chance they may come good for it. There are many other aftermarket options out there and I can promise I won't be purchasing anything from Direct Connection again.

 

[Wookie316]

Well decided to drill and tap it with a plug tap. Sealed threads with J B, so I'll let it sit overnight and see what happens? Turned out better than I thought. A good 1/4" of meat to tap into. Not even that noticeable behind the P/S pump. Fingers crossed.

 

[sleepar]

Hope that does it... mopar sucks and has for a while.... the only mopar stuff I have on my car is what it came with in '67 and some brake parts from the 80's.. but everything is junk today.... just so hit or mis and I am so frustrated with it I have taken a few months off from the car so I don't smash anything and/or take a ride somewhere and blow some Windows out.... I don't know...... but someone suggested count to 10 and take a deep breath in stead of taking a deep breath and counting down from 10.... but it is not right

 

[WileE]

If anybody notices, just tell 'em it's the new logo for the "O" in MOPAR.....

 

[Wookie316]

Didn't work. It must of been a crack. Checked this morning and it leaks as bad if not worse below the hole now. Must be a crack that keeps trailing. So I'm not a happy camper today.

 

[WileE]

Good grief... thought you had it. Back in our garage, we'd send parts out to the machine shop to get magnafluxed or zygloed. Depends on the outcome whether we'd fix or trash.

 

[sleepar]

That really sucks...

 

[Wookie316]

So now the big question. Do I drill to the next size pipe plug. Or do I drill big enough to hammer a frost plug in? Thoughts? To me a frost plug will be cheaper because I only have to buy a plug and appropriate drill bit. If I go with bigger pipe plug I have to spring for another tap as well.

 

[miller]

Real sorry to hear your problem.
This is just me, but if it was mine, considering you've already opened it up, I'd find a good tig man. Yeah, weld it.

 

[67Satty]

Hope that does it... mopar sucks and has for a while.... the only mopar stuff I have on my car is what it came with in '67 and some brake parts from the 80's.. but everything is junk today.... just so hit or mis and I am so frustrated with it I have taken a few months off from the car so I don't smash anything and/or take a ride somewhere and blow some Windows out.... I don't know...... but someone suggested count to 10 and take a deep breath in stead of taking a deep breath and counting down from 10.... but it is not right

Doesn't Edelbrock make these for Mopar Perfromance? If so, the blame for the defect in the head has to go to the Edelbrock and the blame for not backing a product they sell has to go to Mopar Performance. This doesn't speak well for the supposed higher quality of Edelbrock heads or is this kind of thing pretty common with all aluminum heads? I never seem to hear of any big quality problems with Indy cylinder heads castings themselves, just bad set up and customer service if you buy directly from them. But as far as the castings themselves, are the Indy heads the least likely to give trouble?

 

[sleepar]

Get a shop to check them for cracking and get them fixed or if there's too many problems eat them and get a set of edelbrock 6077 with the small chambers. Mopar is buying edelbrock seconds and have the eddys checked or delivered care of you to the shop... everything is junk remember...