I'm paranoid after hearing all of these head gasket stories

[soccer_eldorado]

I have a red with magnolia interior 96 eldorado, runs and idles like a baby and drives like new (I've made a few repairs after reading instructions on this forum) but I read a post by cadillactech that said that 96 through 98 northstars are prone to blowing head gaskets. I LOVE my car, and try to keep the service up to par as much as possible, but after hearing these horror stories, I'm paranoid and contemplating selling the car on hearing this. Would you guys say that these cars blow head gaskets any more than any other car, or are they especially vulnerable. Ill get back to watching the Superbowl

[majax]

don't worry about it the odds are it will not happen to you. You say you maintain it well and thats all that matters. Just make sure you put the supplement tablets in your coolant system.

[BeelzeBob]

Keep in mind that there are millions of Northstar engines on the road and very very few of them have head gasket problems. You read about them on here because EVERYONE that has a problem looks up an internet forum to vent/complain/look for help and commiseration. Take what you read here with a LARGE LARGE grain of salt. The chances of having a problem are slim. If you read all the forum you know that even if you do have a problem the engine is repairable and easily fixed so what is to worry...??? Drive it and enjoy it and forget about the head gaskets.... Just maintain the cooling system. Your engine/cooling system has the long life DexCool in it so it has very long life corrosion protection. As long as you drain and refresh the system with fresh 50/50 DexCool/distilled water every 4 or 5 years it will be fine.

Look at the total membership numbers for this forum and compare to the millions of Northstars on the road...very very small percentage and highly biased toward those that have had problems due to the inherent nature of internet forums.

Hint.....don't read the medical forums, either, or you'll suddenly feel like you have every strange disease in the world....LOL LOL

[Ralph]

Originally Posted by bbob

Keep in mind that there are millions of Northstar engines on the road and very very few of them have head gasket problems. You read about them on here because EVERYONE that has a problem looks up an internet forum to vent/complain/look for help and commiseration. Take what you read here with a LARGE LARGE grain of salt. The chances of having a problem are slim. If you read all the forum you know that even if you do have a problem the engine is repairable and easily fixed so what is to worry...??? Drive it and enjoy it and forget about the head gaskets.... Just maintain the cooling system. Your engine/cooling system has the long life DexCool in it so it has very long life corrosion protection. As long as you drain and refresh the system with fresh 50/50 DexCool/distilled water every 4 or 5 years it will be fine.

Look at the total membership numbers for this forum and compare to the millions of Northstars on the road...very very small percentage and highly biased toward those that have had problems due to the inherent nature of internet forums.

Hint.....don't read the medical forums, either, or you'll suddenly feel like you have every strange disease in the world....LOL LOL

Tablets?? This is the first time I didn't see you recommend them Bob.

[soccer_eldorado]

Thanks, I feel better now. Even though Ive never had a problem with my 96 lincoln towncar in the past five years (other than airstruts, replace myself with springs for like eighty bucks) I still love driving the caddy a lot more. I know there are people that are diehard fans of either or, but I love lincolns AND cadillacs, after all, they're really the only cars of this kind on the market. My mom's 2005 Audi A8 I feel is no match for the Caddy in performance or sheer luxury. I can't wait to get out of law school, I want one of those new body style STS's.

[zonie77]

Replace the coolant and the headgaskets will probably live. Of course it should have been done several times by now!!!

[sprucegoose]

Originally Posted by zonie77

Replace the coolant and the headgaskets will probably live. Of course it should have been done several times by now!!!

You hit the nail on the head there! The root of the problem in most higher mileage vehicle's coolant systems failing is the original owner procrastinating on servicing the coolant. My daughter's 96 Grand Prix 3.1L just blew a head gasket last week, so I know this first hand now. We took a chance in buying it even though I noticed the coolant looked pretty bad. I changed it right away, but it went 3 weekes later. It had been sitting for 6 mo. in storage when we bought it, so that probably didn't help...

[91TexasSeville]

sprucegoose

It had been sitting for 6 mo. in storage when we bought it, so that probably didn't help...

Maybe yes, maybe no. Chances are the head gasket was going south anyway, or that is why the car was sitting for so long....started to overheat. You may have sealed up the small leak with conditioner for it to breath life another three weeks.

[sprucegoose]

The prev. owner told me the reason it was sitting for 6 mo. was it was his company car which he bought from them, and never used it afterwards... I found it kind of strange, but then figured he probably did it to turn a few bucks, but never got around to selling it. I know it must have sat for some time as the rotors were rusted so bad they had to be replaced!

It always ran normal, temperature-wise. I never added any sealer of any kind too it. Just new dexcool and distilled water when I replaced the fluids. It seemed as everything was great, I checked coolant level and oil 3 days before it went and all looked normal... them whammo, it hit me with the sledge hammer!

[Daniel Almestica]

I have a 94 etc it run really good. if you take good care to change the coolent then you sholud not have a problem. I change it once a year!

[an01sts]

You have to watch the tech's point of view because it isn't alway accurate: I was a caddytech too. What happens is that when you work on the same cars all the time, you can build a sterotype. I did lots of theft recovery repair in the mid 80's to early 90's. From that perspective, you would have thought that all Cadillacs were stolen from their owners; after all, they were lined up by the hundereds.

The thing is that everyone's Cadillac wasn't being stole. Rather, all the stolen cars ended up at the stealership to repair damages caused by theft. The more accurate fact would be that they were the same cars being stolen numerous times. No matter how well one does his job, there are telltale signs of previous repairs. The thing I noticed was that it seemed like 90% of the theft recovery cars had previous theft recovery repairs. The unmolested virgins in the theft circut were in a large minority.

Likewise, just because a tech hauls heads off Cadillacs all day long doesn't mean that all Cadillacs need to have the heads hauled off. (If he's a caddytech, wtf does he think that he'll be working on all day?) I have seen numbers that say 8 out of 10 new Cadillac owners continue to buy new Cadillacs. If you had to yank heads off most Cadillacs, you certainly wouldn't have 8 out of 10 owners buying new Cadillacs. Factor in the fact that some of those owners only wanted to buy a new Cadillac in thier lifetimes, meaning that they were satisfied, but they aren't going to swallow another horse pill. With that, it's more than a safe bet to say that in a worse case senerio, 8 out of 10 Cadillacs don't need their heads r & i.

[Grog]

" Sprucegoose wrote 96 Grand Prix 3.1L just blew a head gasket last week."

GM is having lots of problems with Intake gasket leaks and head gasket on all there 2.8, 3.1, 3.4 and 3.8 engines. The worst years where from the change to Dex Cool in 95 to about 2002 when GM released a redesigned gasket. The Dex Cool anti freeze is made from an acid compond and returns to this when it brakes down. Do not trust this stuff. If your FWD car is out of warrenty get the Dex Cool out of it. The engine and cooling system will need to be fushed before changing to the old green anti freeze. I had a 98 Trans sport with a 3.4 the engine was ruined by dex cool leaking from a intake gasket into the engine oil. Took a new engine to repair it 3,400.

[dwight.j.carter]

The northstar does not blow headgaskets any more than a regular car would.

[dwight.j.carter]

And another thing you do not need tablets if you are running dex cool it should have the additives already in it. I don't know for sure what years are running dex cool but I know my 99 does.

[EcSTSatic]

you do not need tablets if you are running dex cool

Uh oh, here we go again...