Hey everyone,

Today I planned on reinstalling the radiator on my 292 and then doing an oil change. Well, before I put the rad back in I flushed the block with the water hose and made sure I got all the crud I could. After I filled everything up, I ran the engine to get the oil hot and to get the air out of the system. That's where the problems started. My oil turned milky white, so I somehow now have water mixing with my oil and to top that off, I then noticed transmission fluid bubbling up to the top of my radiator. So...where to start diagnosing?

Sounds like you might have flushed part of a head gasket out of the motor along with the crud or could the timing chain cover gasket have let loose in the flushing.

Butchering up everything I can get my hands on in Dayton Ohio

Hmm, sounds plausible. Thanks. And let me add I Had my radiator checked out, but it was too far gone to rod out...it was branded as "weak" oh well

I would try a timing chain cover gasket first before yanking the heads.

Butchering up everything I can get my hands on in Dayton Ohio

Trans fluid bubbling in the rad sounds like the trans cooler rotted through in the rad. Time for a recore or new one.

Dan      Kingman Az.      86409

you will also fill your trans with water if its cracked inside.dont run it until you check it out.

Thanks guys, any steps I should take to clean the engine of water for now? Also, would an auxiliary trans cooler work in the meantime?

Unless I missed something here, this sounds like two problems; transmission fluid making its way into the engine coolant and water finding its way into the engine oil. While an external cooler can likely eliminate the ATF from making its way to the radiator, then doing away with the water in the engine oil will take a bunch more work. Hopefully it’s just an engine gasket issue. The timing cover gasket is a good place to start.

Lorena, Texas (South of Waco)

Update:

1) I drained my transmission today (I need to replace the pan gasket anyway) And all the fluid looked clean and unharmed. Whew. I will drain some more out tomorrow after she has time to settle, and I will drain out the torque converter as well. I am going to buy an external transmission cooler tonight. any recommendations? It's a two speed Mile-O-Matic / Ford-O-Matic / Cruise-O-Matic.



2) Should I drop the engine oil pan to help clean out some of that watery oil? And do I need to worry about the watery oil rusting anything?

So Far I have taken the oil pump apart and am letting that drain, I have poured some fresh oil down the rockers to help flush out some of the nasties, and have had the drain plug out since the incident to allow for everything to flow out.

3) I need to add as well, the rocker's did not have their gaskets when I did this flush, so there is a possibility that water got in through the gasketless valve covers. I thought I did my best to not allow any water in, but I am unsure of myself now. Is there any way to test if my gaskets are broken without taking everything apart? I was thinking of doing a flush one more time, but this time using low water pressure and seeing if any water pours out the oil drain plug. But my fear is that if it does start pouring water out the oil plug, then I definitely will start rusting stuff up. Thoughts?

I’ll suggest that while the oil is drained from the engine, refill the radiator with water and put 10-13 psi at the cap. I have a pump up cap tester that I use for this. Then with the oil pan drain plug still out, see if any water comes from the pan. I’d leave the pressure on at the cap for at least fifteen minutes. If there is indeed a significant internal water leak, it will be difficult to maintain the pressure and any water getting past an internal seal will start flowing reasonably quickly. If you do get water out of the drain pan, then the next thing to do is determine where it’s leaking from. Timing cover is still on my short list of places to look first.

Lorena, Texas (South of Waco)