[NorCalAdrenalin]

first of all- hello everyone. I'm back and asking for advise. Now here's my car's problem. i was driving it on the freeway(6:45 am) and floored it going uphill to aviod and accident, then after slowing down my car suddenly surged and started running funny(rough idle) at the stop sign it died, and smoke came from the under the hood, the temp read 195ish. i started the car up and it surged and really idled rough, but i made it to the side of the road. i also heard a thumping noise when i revved up the car at high rpms in the park position.it would not go into drive without instantly dying. it has no power to move the car.
So, at home i ran a compression test on all four cylinders and thats where i get stumped. cylinder 1= 30psi cylinder 2= 30psi cylinder 3= 0 psi and cylinder 4=60psi.
i need suggestions on where to start or what other test to run to pin piont the problem area, blown head gasket?,timeing belt snapped?, cracked cylinder head?,bent valves?. HELP!!!
i need to add that the lower half of the engine has been rebuilt and has 30,000ish miles on it, new rings,cylinders,bored 30 over,new bearings,crank machined,rods,basically new lower part of the engine. the upper half is used, the head.
this forum has helped me before so im hoping you can help out again, thanks for your time, please list any info you may need to further assist in the pin pointing of this problem.

[TOM RENZO]

DUDE you blew the head gasket. Welcome to the world of 2.3 FORD ENGINES

[DROPTOP STANG]

glad to see someone else is from sacramento. buch of crazy as sholes on 50 and i-5 in the mornings... gota be careful lol

[TOM RENZO]

Your compression readings are strange numbers indeed. You may not be doing the test properly. But the thing that bothers me is why did you loose compression in all the cylinders? When the HG blows you only effect 2 cylinders usually. Take another reading and crank over each cylinder at least 10 or more times. I still think the head gasket is blown.

[NorCalAdrenalin]

yea, i tripped out on my readings too. but i cranked it five times each cylinder during the first test and then 7 times on the second and third time. total of three test and the readings where the close to the same +-3 psi. i dont know why i get these readings but im gonna take the head off and see what i find. thanks for your input. oh yea, any ideas on the thumping noise from engine compartment?

[TOM RENZO]

THAT HAPPENS SOMETIMES WHEN THE GASKET BLOWS.

[b_chandler]

Don' t yank the head just yet. Make sure the timing belt is still intact.

Either pull the rubber plug in the front of the timing cover or look up top where you can kinda see the cam pulley and have a buddy crank the engine. If the pulley doesn't move, the belt is broke.

It would help explain the odd compression readings. The only thing that I can come up with is that there's a valve in each cylinder partially or fully open because of where the camshaft stopped when the belt broke.

Sound plausible Tom?

[TOM RENZO]

I am leaning twards what chandler said. Its very unusual that a head gasket would effect all the cylingers. The belt may have jumped. the more i think about it the more i am leaning twords a jumped belt. String test it or pull the cam plug like chandler suggested.

[PINTO POWER]

Yes this sounds very much like a jumped timing belt. When you do a compression test you have to watch the gauge while you crank the engine. You should only need 2-3 compression strokes to get the highest total psi. The first compresion stroke should be around 75% of the total. For the most part if it takes 5-7 compression strokes to get the psi numbers up to or close to where they should be, the engine has probably seen better days. So if the timing belt has some miles on it I would start there.

[NorCalAdrenalin]

with great sadness i will mention what i found.
after we removed the head i expected to see a blown head gasket , what i found was worse, my brother and i where amazed. the number 3 piston was deformed, it had a slight pushed in half mooned shaped indention in the side that would have faced the intake valve. we thought the valve hit the piston, but apun further examination i could see the crosshatching marks on the cylinder walls, then i seen it. the cylinder wall was cover with melted aluminum from the piston, so we think the valve failed to close causing the piston to overheat and warp,melt into the cylinder wall.
takeing the head into a machine shop tomarrow to have it examined. and the block to the machine shop to rebore the cylinder wall. i took pics but am not sure how to post them in this thread. any suggestions? well thanks to everyone who responded.

[93stangfutr5.0]

wow post them on photobucket then just put in a link i deff want to see some pix i wouldnt expect this to happen on only 30k miles.

im actually down in manteca at the moment visiting my dad and let me tell you i miss my stang