Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums General Troubleshooting Head Gasket blown

My head gasket blew this morning. I opened up the oil filler cap and it was all foamy and there was antifreeze and steam everythere. I havent turned it on since and had the car towed home. Is my motor trashed? Is it a hard job to change? Is it worth fixing, or would it be more smarter to put an used engine/trans in it? The car itself is in mint condition and I love it. Im sad. Since i have no idea what to do I am just letting it sit im my driveway untill I find out and in the meantime i am driving a 88 Mercury Tracer to get around in. It gets me from point A to point B, just no where near as comfortable, luxurious, or as nice as my tour did

My Contour is a 96, 4cyl auto, 159,000mi

I did my head gasket! Rather easy if you got time, and tools

Ill break it down for you
-Remove Intake air cleaner
-Remove valve cover
-Remove side upper engine mount
-Remove serpentine belt
-Remove the timing belt covers (also will have to remove the water pump pulley)
-Remove Exaust manifold shield, and spray PB Blaster rust penetration stuff on all the exaust manifold studs and bolts.
-Remove exaust manifold when you get the nuts loosened
-Unbolt intake manifold
-Begin removing camshafts after you get timing belt off
-Remove Cylinder Head


I may have skipped some things, it is a big pain in the ass if you dont know what you are doing, and/or you dont organize.

Label everything! (Intake bolts, Cam bearingcap #, etc)

Also torque everything down

I suggest buy the $16 Haynes manual at autozone for the Contour/Mystique

I might have a repair manual i can get in PDF format on removing cylinder head

Dude.. that sounds like a lot of work.

Took me a week to get off (Was during weekday, I had school, and then work on fridays)

Got it reassembled in 2 days because i worked on the weekend on it straightfoward

did yours blow completely before you changed it? was there antifreeze in the engine? I opened the oil filler plug and it was full of foamy antifreeze/oil mixture as well as the antifreeze tank. I shut if off soon after i realized what happened, hopefully soon enough.... In talking with some people i know, im scared that the head may be warpred? how can I tell? Will my motor be ok after i change the gasket even though antifreeze leaked into it all over the place

thank you for the info above......

Contourkev- is your Contour Green? If so it is a twin of mine. I checked out your site. I have a front end cover too. Mine has the stock aluminum 15' rims though.

Dark purple