ThatLS400

Hey guys, I was working on my car a little yesterday and I gave her fresh coolant because the tank/container whatever you want to call it was empty. I let it run a little bit and let the car warm up and held it at 2k rpm to let the coolant settle. Sunday my car nearly broke down and it was shaking because the coolant was empty, somehow made it home. Yesterday it was shaking again, smell of gas was pungent and pure and a lot of white/blue smoke was coming out of my exhaust. My neighbor who's a mechanic checked it out with me, said it's possibly blown header, my uncle said it Is too, he's also a mechanic, and my neighbors buddy whom also is a mechanic said the same thing. If this is true, I know it's a lot to fix, how much could I be seeing?

Shmee

iTrader: (3)

they probably mean or said you have a blown head gasket, not a blown header.
it's possible.

coolant consumption results in a pure white cloud out the tail pipe while oil consumption is more blue.

you could have a leak which cause the coolant loss and an overheat.
what year?
how many miles?
when was the last timing belt and water pump done?
how long have you owned the car?

dicer

So then you didn't get enough coolant in and then overheated it? It sounds like one of those deals where trying to save a buck with a DIY, back fired into a nice high priced fix.

ThatLS400

I didn't realize the coolant was empty, I think there's a broken hose, there's no way the coolant ran out in a week after I put some. The car was breakin down and my mom forced it back home because she didn't want to breakdown, and she overheated the car because she's too stuburn. Now I have a pretty penny to pay for it

randal

That is very plausible that the overheating damaged the gasket. Hopefully no other damage. You will need to run a compression test to identify if it is a blown gasket. As a first step, I would remove all spark plugs, labeling them as they come out. Examine them carefully and you may notice that one or two are very clean. As in steam cleaned. Or if it has a coolant tint color to it. That would be the suspect cylinder(s).

Also, if the engine was severely overheated, I would change the engine oil soon because oil tends to break down very quickly with high temperature.