head gasket

The head bolts are inside the valve cover. You'll still need to take the timing belt off, and you'll need to unbolt the exhaust manifold from the head or the pipe.

What are your symptoms? On nearly every Hyundai I've seen that had a significant head gasket problem, the head was so badly warped that it was best used as a paperweight or bookend. You should definitely take things far enough apart to check head flatness.

Take it to a machine shop where they can use a straight edge or flat surface plate and an indicator. The use of fabric softeners tends to make the fluffy bath towels less accurate.

No offense, but you might want to consider having this work done by a shop. Your questions indicate a certain unfamiliarity with the task at hand and it's not a simply remove and replace job. You are going to get into such things as torquing the head back down, timing the valve train, etc. If you have to ask where the head bolts are and where the exhaust manifold is, you are probably not really ready for this job.

The symptoms you describe bother me some. A puddle of oil and a knocking when first started are somewhat contradictory symptoms. The knocking implies a rod problem. If so, you are in for a lot more work than replacing a head. Did the dealership hear the knocking? Is the word "knocking" perhaps a bad way of describing it?

messagenews: snipped-for-privacy@k70g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...

this work done by a shop.

I'm feeling a little bad about sounding discouraging, but I really want to tell you that a head job is not a good place to begin your DIY career. To be honest - your troubleshooting skills seem to require a bit of work - as would be expected when you are just starting out.

You would be doing yourself a big favor by taking the car to someone you trust and getting that person to allow you to hang around and learn from the work he performs. It's really not a matter of unbolting this and bolting on that with a few magic numbers thrown in for good measure. It's certainly not the kind of thing that you want to jump into as a beginner and finding yourself sitting at your computer screen asking every question in the world as you try to plow your way through the job. Things will go wrong for you this way.

If you're hell bent on taking this on yourself, then my best advice is for you to go to the local auto parts store and get yourself a Haynes or a Chilton's manual. You'll find all of the information you need in them. If you read them and find yourself asking people what the books mean by this and what they mean by that, then you'd better consider that a clue that someone else needs to do the repairs for you.

Best of luck.

messagenews: snipped-for-privacy@m73g2000cwd.googlegroups.com...

really want to

messagenews: snipped-for-privacy@m73g2000cwd.googlegroups.com...

really want to

Better yet, go to

and check out the factory repair manual. Print out the pertinent pages and you're good to go, more or less.

If watching someone else do the repairs doesn't work out, perhaps you can have a mentor with you who's done this sort of repair previously.

I think, like Brian and Mike, I generally encourage people to do as much of their own work as they can, but I'm concerned that if you try to do this on your own, you might end up with more trouble and expense than if you pay someone to do it. I still like the mentor idea, though. Everyone must start somewhere.

D'OH!!!! No kiddin'. You'd think I'd been around here long enough to make that suggestion, wouldn't you? Guess it gets to be habit recommending the other manuals in other newsgroups. Thanks for straightening me out on that one Brian.

wow, i bought a chilton manual they didnt have it for a 2000 so i got a

1998 figur> "Brian Nystrom" wrote in

messagenews:1e43h.983$sw6.114@trndny08...

less.D'OH!!!! No kiddin'. You'd think I'd been around here long enough to make

I don't know of any others that have free access online. You should be able to purchase paper copies from the dealer or order based on information in the owner's manual, but it'll cost you.