head gasket replacmen

[96pathy]

I am looking at purchasing a 1998 Pathfinder SE that the owner is basically giving away for $500.00 because it needs a new head gasket. I am going to look at it and do a compression check to find out for sure but am wondering can this be done with the engine in the car or does it need to be pulled and is it worth doing for the price of the car? It is a manual transmission, interior and exterior appear to be in very good shape from the pics and has never been off-road. Thanks for any help and hopefully will be on here alot more.

[sewebster]

You can replace the head gaskets with the engine in the car. It's not a small job, but if you know what you are doing and have the tools, it isn't such a big deal either. If there was nothing else wrong, I would say it could be done in a day for basically the costs of the gaskets (heads, intake, plenum, exhaust pipes, at least). I guess thats about $100 in gaskets, maybe a bit less. I'd prepare yourself to spend at least a big more for stuff you find that you need to fix though.

 

But when you take the heads off, there is lots of stuff you could discover that is wrong that you might want to deal with, (or not, because the costs can add up fast). You probably want to change the timing belt while you have it off etc. It could also take way longer than a day if you have problems, lack tools or experience etc.

[Precise1]

^ he pretty much covered it, but how many miles on it? One thing to consider, why is the head gasket blown?? That is not a normal problem for the VG30 and VG33 motors, quite the opposite actually...

 

B

[skulptr]

minus the t belt, i just pulled the heads off a vg33 i have on a stand in less than 2 hours.

[sewebster]

Having the engine on a stand makes everything so much nicer