First, the vehicle we're dealing with. A 1995 Pontiac Grand Am, with the infamous 2.3L Quad Four. Anyone remotely familiar first remembers the head gasket problems associated with this engine.
I'm up to 129,000+ miles. So far aside from a couple sensors and spark plugs, things of that sort, I've only had to have the flexplate, and timing chain replaced. Oh, the alt too. Oops, waterpump also. List is getting longer. :)
As far as driveability, theres no odd symptoms of any sort. No coolant loss. (Twice it mysteriously disappeared, but I had a faulty cap which I just replaced) No oil consumption, and no contamination visible to the eye on the dipstick.
Here's the reasons for the my questioning though. Yesterday, I replaced one more vacuum hose I missed, just for upkeep, because it didn't look pretty. I had the oil/air separator box off. The tube that the oil drains back to the engine was coated with quite a lot of this thick, yellowish white crap. There was just VERY LITTLE detectable on the filler cap, but not the tube, and not the dipstick. One more, I took out the spark plugs that are fairly new, because it seemed to have a funny miss at idle. They were all gapped too far by the way. But #3 had a greenish appearance up and down one side. Peaking in the hole with a powerful flashlight revealed nothing.
So, I was just wondering if anyone knew. I've never had a head gasket go out on a car before, so I'm new at this if that's what's about to happen.
TIA,
Tony