everyone that has checked my car is saying the head gasket it blown and it cant seat some area cause the metal may be warped. Can someone point me in the right direction as to where the head gasket is so i can look at alll this stuff myself. I dont think these snakes opened the engine and just started making stuff up once they saw the smoke billow out my exhaust. the car was driven way past its normal use but still i want to see if i need a new engine or if i can rebuild salvage this one for cheaper. It was popping some codes before i started dismantling you can see this on my other forum post. But i just want to know where i should be looking to find this head gasket. I have taken the top off and am looking at 6 holes and a skinny piece of metal on top of it. Is this it. and if i have to buy a new vq point me in the right direction for cheap motors.
P0300 and p1614 were the codes from the other post. It was misfiring horribly and i wanna get this thing running.

 

From what it sounds like you shouldn't be the one doing the engine work. Just saying. The head gasket is what seals the connection of the head (where the valves, rockers, lifters, etc... are) to the block (where the cylinders are and the main part of the engine.)

 

you should be careful with what your doing. if you arent covering everything correctly when removing.. you could come across other problems besides the gaskets. but from what you have said so far i would do the following
A) go to yelp and search for a mechanic in your area with the highest ratings and go from there.
B) dont take it to the dealer LOL
C) and lastly, you will probably need your gasket resurfaced. on my old sentra my gaskets warped (thank god i still had warranty on the car) they were resurfaced and resealed. other problems did arise while doing this.. (i remember seeing the nissan rep going through pages of what had been done.. from what i saw in total damages from my part and theirs bill was over 5k)
faulty computer
they messed up a piston
other minor things

when this happend i also encountered other problems which were not within the warranty, such as needing new coolant piping. and other stuff which were not so expensive... all in all.. i learned my lesson about coolant going dry in my reserve... LAWL i was 18 and noob.. what can i say?

 

if they didn't pull the head/s off they will never know for sure if your head is warped, they are only assuming and telling you worst case. if they pull the head and decked and measured your block and found warppage, they need to send the head and/or the block out to get milled to level it.

if your headgasket is going there should be coolant in the oil and/or oil in the coolant. should see bubbles in the coolant. gaskets are cheap but labor is a pain to do.

in most cases a used motor is often considered because cost is pretty close.

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i assume you taken off the plenum. The round big thing in the center, there is 6 bolts in the center. Sounds like you got the lower plenum off too to expose the 6 ports in a up and down line. MAKE SURE YOU COVER THOSE and nothing gets in it.

you cant pull off the head, untill you remove/loosen the timing chain. Get a FSM to help you because you might be in over your head in the next couple of steps.