Vauxhall Corsa C - Head gasket shot or not?

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Wed 23 Mar 2011 12:54
Vauxhall Corsa C - Head gasket shot or not? - fuzzy

My son owns a 2002 Corsa C 1.2 SXi 16 valve. He has had it since Christmas.

He uses it daily for 3 mile each way journeys to and from work and for occasional 12 mile each way trips to his girlfriends.

It suffers from the usual mayo on the filler cap and has coffee coloured oil on the dipstick.

Since owning the car we have had to refil and empty header tank 2 or 3 times hich made me think the head gasket had gone as there was no sign of external fluid leaks.

We have not had to top up the water for the last couple of weeks however.

Could it be that their were airlocks in the cooling system or do I need to take the car for a good run to get it up to temperature and pressure to see if the gasket IS shot?

Thanks.

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Wed 23 Mar 2011 14:41
Vauxhall Corsa C - Head gasket shot or not? - Peter D

First thing to do is have a garage check for combustion gases in the header tank. If it is clean then an oil and filter change and clean the cap and take the car for a good run 50 plus miles. However loosing water form the header tank repeatedly does not sound good. Check the header cap seal is intact. Regards Peter

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Thu 24 Mar 2011 10:16
Vauxhall Corsa C - Head gasket shot or not? - fuzzy

Peter D.

Thanks. Spoke to the garage last night.

They actually suggested just doing the oil and filter bit and monitoring. Doing themselves out of work to ave me money? Bless them :-)

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Wed 6 Apr 2011 04:43
Vauxhall Corsa C - Head gasket shot or not? - 1litregolfeater

Sounds like the timing chain cover gasket has given up. Very common, most are diagnosed as head gaskets.

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