My father's QX4 overheated the other day and he had the car towed to a Goodyear dealer.

Goodyear dealer said the thermostat was bad and they replaced it.

That was 4 days ago.

Last night he was on the interstate at 70mph and he noticed the car decelerate to 60mph as if he tapped the brakes. He looked at the gauges and saw that the temp gauge was pointing to H but wasn't pegged. He pulled over immediately and had the car towed to Infiniti.

They called today and said that it might be a blown head gasket.

How major is this and how much could it cost? Car is no longer under warranty.

Also, is it possible that the Goodyear people from last week could have caused this in any fashion?

Please help!!!

 

Doubtful the Goodyear guys did anything wrong if all they did was replace the thermostat. Since it overheated previously, and on a relatively new car (2001), there is a good chance the cooling system has been neglected. That means corrosion. Corrosion = bad. Unfortunately, a blown head gasket is a best case scenario and is probably an 8-12 hour job since you will want to replace both sides. So expect at least $1500 parts/labor.

Worst case is if the corrosion was bad enough to eat away at the heads and they cant resurface them, or they are cracked. Then you have some tough decisions to make because you're looking at $3000-4000 for remanufactured heads and the labor to install. And that's if there was no other damage to anything else from one or more cylinders being hydrolocked. In any case, fix it as cheap as possible and sell the thing ASAP.

Moral of the story? Flush your cooling system every 2 years or 30K miles and you will avoid mucho problemos.

 

The car has 180,000 miles on it and has not missed a single service interval or had oil for more than 3500miles.

180,000 mile service, about $1250 was recently finished. So I am sure the cooling system has been flushed at proper intervals and checked upon.

I can't stress how meticulous and prompt my father is when it comes to taking care of any of his cars. Which is probably how he got 220,000 miles out of a mazda 626. Then 170,000 miles out of a G20(that was still going strong when it was sold) and 180,000 miles out of an I-30.

I really appreciate your detailed response. Can you think of anything else that might be going on? Would love to hear more of your thoughts

 

Didn't mean to sound like your dad had neglected the car. 180000 in 5 years is alot though. If whoever did the services didn't flush it, didnt use distilled water, didnt use the right coolant (DEXCOOL mixed with phosphate/silicate type etc.), then it could explain some of the problems.

Time to dig out the service records and see what they did or didn't do to the cooling system. If there is alot of scale and plugged passages in the radiator, you can be pretty sure somebody hasn't been doing their job. Plenty of undercover evidence of repair shops charging people for services they never performed. Kwik-lube places especially.

 

that sucks let us know

 

Oh, I didn't think you implied that at all! No worries! I mentioned it because I should have said so in the first place, thats all.
Good to know, I will have to see what I can find out. I doubt any hard copies of the records were kept by my father, but do you imagine that I can request the records from the dealership? Every service has been completed by the dealer the car was purchased from.

 

Mitchell Book time for a 4wd QX4 is 22 hours of labor for both head gaskets.

That should tell you alot about the price.

 

Aha, it WAS the fault of the people at Goodyear!!!

After replacing the thermostat they did not flush the system at all which caused some problems.

The fix? Only $190!

Close call. Way to go Goodyear, way to go.

 

It just seemed they didn't bleed the system correctly...You got lucky but keep you eye on the Temp.

 

Well, the car is BACK at Infiniti. It lasted a couple days being fine until it overheated AGAIN.

Awaiting diagnosis...

 

Back on December 31, 1999, I had my Taurus overheat headed over to my sister's house. Who knew that it had a year Y2K problem

Thinking it was the thermostat, I took it into one of the rare places open on New Years Day (Pep Boys?). So I spent $100-200 to have this work done.

Then, about a week later when I was home, the lights all went on again. Engine problems, and they replaced the upper block (turned out there were some issues with that engine for that year, so it only cost me $400 or so with assistance from Ford, involving mainly buying an extended service contract for $300 of it). That weekend, headed out of town, then as I was arriving back, the oil light went on. Ended up with a small block for another $100.

So, in my experience, it probably isn't going to be good. Though, my engine was still going strong 40K miles later when I got the itch for the G.

 

replace it yourself, save alot of money

 

IIRC the larger Ford V6 from the '90s was notorious for blowing head gaskets.

One Uncle had it in his Lincoln Continental, decided to take the Ford offer of mucho $$$ off if he traded it on a new car. Another Uncle had it in a Mercury Sable, he decided to have it fixed by Ford for a nominal fee under a customer goodwill program.

 

do disrespect my dood, but FORD SUCKS

Fixed
Or
Repaired
Daily

thats what ford stand for, so im not really suprised yer taurus overheated, id be suprised if u said, u put 200,000 miles on a 1990 taurus without overheating =O