518i Head gasket Update

[grave79]

So, after only 6 hours or so of work, I got the cylinder head of of my 96 518i, and I think I've found the problem (see attached photo - I hope.) The gasket was pretty bad in this area too, but luckily it doesn't look like there's any warping, and a little work with a scraper has gotten it pretty smooth. If everything goes smoothly back together, the next step will be buying a new exhaust. It was pretty badly rusted, and when I disconnected the pipe from the manifold it just fell apart. Any idea where I can get a complete new pipe for cheap? So far I've only been able to find cat back systems, and the cat is shot too, so that's not an option. Hopefully by tomorrow night it'll at least be running, although probably rather noisily

[DanH]

I dont see a photo.

[grave79]

Take 2 at posting a pic, here goes-

[DanH]

Now I see it...

My M30 headgasket failed at the opposite side of the coolant passage, the part between the front left passage and cylinder #6 (one of the two you're missing ). And it looked a bit worse than yours, probably due to the combustion pressures.

[grave79]

I had a feeling mine wasn't all that bad, I just hope it seals up nicely, otherwise it's off to the breakers, and I'd hate to see that happen.

[632 Regal]

that area looks pretty deep...is it as bad as it looks?

[grave79]

No, it's tough to tell from the picture, but that's actually built up gasket and whatever else. I've got it scraped fairly smooth now, but some of that stuff was caked on pretty good. The gasket was also eaten away and warped in that area.