My 2000 Dodge Neon has a slow head gasket leak (evidently an idiotsyncracy of some Dodges). I lost about a quart of oil in the first 5000 miles I drove it after I bought it. How crucial is it to have it fixed right away? Is there any danger of ruining the engine if I hold off a few months before having it fixed? I’ve driven another 400 miles since finding out about it and haven’t lost any appreciable amount of oil yet. The car has 45k miles on it. So far, there is no antifreeze or anything unusual looking about the oil. Thanks to any car experts who can help out…
pohjonen - I’m assuming it is not under any sort of extended warrantee. Otherwise, you should be able to drive it as is for a while. Where is the leak exactly? What side of the head is it on? Is it anywhere near the spark plug wires? If so it can melt them over time, but if that has not happened by now it probably won’t. If the leak is near the SP wires, you can temporarily make a sheild with a tin pie plate. I had to do that with my CJ-7 and it worked for a while.
Best plan would be to have it fixed, but I will tell you it is not a cheap Job. And if you knew someone who could do it for cost of the gasket and a 6-pack, that would be best…Try asking an independant garage instead of a dealer…where you’ll pay 78 to 88 bucks an hour…
They told me it was leaking at the rear driver side. And this was very common for the neon. I was told 600 dollars for the head gasket and that it might be a good idea to do the timing belt at the same time since they would already be in there.
Loosing a quart of oil in 5000 miles is not bad. How do you know it’s due to a head gasket leak? Do you have a foamy residue on the inside of your oil filler cap?
If you do have a small head gasket leak, you might try using one of the leak stop compounds that you can place in your radiator coolant (there are compounds that are specifically designed for small head gasket leaks). I did this with a Chevy Astro I used to have and it solved the problem for thousands of miles. Note, this is a temporary fix however and the head gasket, if leaking, will eventually need to be replaced and it’s not a cheap repair.
Just read you follow-up post. While they have the engine opened up, it would be a good time to replace the timing belt. It will save you lots of labor dollars in the long run.
Also, the danger of running the car with a head gasket leak is that you are getting antofreeze into your oil. Antifreeze will damage additional engine components - rod bearings, rings, etc.
True, but a head gasket only costs a matter of a few bucks…and the labor is $600. Add the Timing Belt and you are certainly in the 1700 range…No? That is why I said seek a non-dealer garage to do it. Heck I’d do it if he lived in CT.
Not all head gasket leaks are the same. The typical problem with this engine is external oil leakage from the head gasket. Head gasket sealing at the coolant passages and combustion chambers is generally not an issue in these instances. Thus, coolant loss, oil contamination with coolant, and overheating are not concerns here (not that they’re never a concern, just that they’re usually not involved with the type of leakage described). There’s no point in using a cooling system stop-leak if that’s the case.
My understanding is that there should be warranty coverage for this at the age and mileage described. I suggest you pursue that possibility vigorously.
Oil leaks that are not severe often don’t require immediate repair. One rule of thumb is if oil loss is less than one quart per thousand miles, it can usually be tolerated. You’re way below that threshhold. The primary concern is to not let the engine get low on oil, keep the oil level within the OK range by checking it often enough. The next concern is damage to rubber parts such as plug wires, coolant hoses, and motor mounts. If such parts are getting oil on them, delaying the repair can result in further expense.
When you get the repair done, make sure it’s at a competent facility. There are updated parts and revised procedures involved. You want someone who knows what he’s doing, not someone who thinks he know’s what he’s doing.
The recommended timing belt replacement interval is 105,000 miles. I don’t see any point in replacing it at this low mileage just because it would cost somewhat less than doing it later. In this case, later is 60,000 miles away.
No.
I’d expect a head gasket and head bolt set to run 100-125, if other gaskets and seals are needed it would be more. The labor portion of the repair is likely in the 400-450 range. Doing the timing belt in conjunction with that might add 200 or so.
according to this http://www.allpar.com/neon/repairs.html site, they have to remove the timing belt to change the head gasket anyway.
QUOTE:
The cam seal is a common spot for oil leaks on the Neon, so it wouldn’t hurt to replace it with the head gasket. But if they’re changing the head gasket it shouldn’t cost you more than the price of the seal to replace it, maybe $7 or $10, thats it. If they want to charge you labor for changing the cam seal while they are in the middle of a head gasket change, other than maybe a few dollars, they are trying to rip you off, they have to take the whole area apart anyway, they only have to spend an extra second to replace the cam seal. Dealers try the same trick with the cam timing belt during head gasket changes. Try to charge you full cost both, telling you that you should change the cam timing belt when you change the head gasket. Which is true, because you have to remove and replace the cam timing belt to change the head gasket, so since that is such a labor intensive job, you should grab a $50 new belt and replace the old one and put off the expensive labor intesive job of a cam timing belt change to much later. The dealer will try to charge you for full labor for the belt and the head gasket, basically double dip. END QUOTE
I do have remaining concerns, however. Other sites say that supposedly, after 1999 the head gasket problems were addressed and if this is true, my 2000 should not have this problem. Another site said that cam seal leakage was often mistaken for the head gasket leaking. I don’t especially want to take it to a dealer since they have a vested interest in saying it’s NOT the head gasket.
Whatever, my oil is clean and not foamy and the leak is to the OUTSIDE ending up on my garage floor. And it is very slow as I said, a quart in 5k miles.
So bottom line, is it safe for me to wait awhile to address it?
Gary - Sorry, I guess you did answer my question. As long as there’s not immediate danger of ruining my engine, I would like to wait awhile before I do this. I’ll check and see if the oil is getting on rubber stuff like you said would be a bad thing. Thanks.
If the leak is at the rear of the engine, it’s not a cam seal – that’s at the front of the engine. The engine might use a camshaft plug at the rear, but that’s fairly inexpensive to replace.
If the cam seal is leaking, the timing belt may be contaminated with oil, which shortens its life. My recommendation would be to replace the cam seal and the front crank seal, and replace the timing belt, which is fully removed if both of those seals are being replaced.
It may be that a revised head gasket was used on 2000 models, that’s a detail I’m not familiar with. I’d still inquire about warranty coverage for a head gasket failure on a car with that little mileage. If there’s any question about what is indeed leaking, a second opinion would be advisable.
Use circumspection in taking the advice from the site you linked. It’s clear to me that the author doesn’t fully understand the repair procedure. Saying “they only have to spend an extra second to replace the cam seal” is flat out wrong. It involves removing the camshaft sprocket, extracting the old seal, and driving in the new one. (If the camshaft is removed from the head, a bit less is involved, but that doesn’t always have to be done to replace the head gasket.) And while the timing belt tensioner has to be withdrawn and the belt removed from the cam sprocket, the belt does not have to be removed from the crank sprocket to replace a head gasket. Replacing the timing belt at that time involves some additional disassembly. The charge should not be the normal amount for doing a timing belt, as there is some overlapping labor, but to say there should be no additional labor charge is not correct.
Okay, Gary, Thanks. About a warranty replacement, I’m not the orginal owner - I bought the car last year with 35k on it. However, I understand from surfing the web that there’s a class action suit in the works - for whatever that’s worth…
Head gasket leak (and a known problem at that) on a car with 35K miles. :rolleyes: Wow! I’m looking at cars for my college-age daughter. I was wondering why those puppies were so reasonably priced. Guess I’ll just cross the Neon off my list.
Gary T is much more knowledgeable than I on matter’s of the internal combustion engine. I am a huge backyard learner who basically thrives on tinkering 
Gary is the guy to go to for the real knowledge on your dilema
Take it to a Dodge dealer and raise a stink. You’re correct that head gaskets were a problem with Neons and they should give you some kind of pro-rated discount based on the age/mileage of your car. Also have them check some kind of plug that keeps the oil in. It’s not the regular plug or whatever that comes out when the oil is changed. It’s some other plug. That fell out on my Neon and they knew about that problem, too. They even had an extra part manufactured to hold the thing in. If they give you any guff get the number of the district manager.