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Blown engine

Discussion in 'Gen 3 Prius Main Forum' started by Lino, Feb 3, 2019.

  1. Lino

    Lino Member

    Joined:
    Jan 4, 2015
    61
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    Vehicle:
    2013 Prius
    Model:
    II
    I blew the engine in my 2013 Prius with 283 K+, I don't if it overheated or not, my wife drove it to work one day and said it started rough, then I tried it and it was misfiring bad, I checked the coolant and it was low I knew it blew a head gasket.
    Anyway I figured this out as I was leaving for work, but it ran OK once the water was out of the cylinders so I took off, i realized how bad it was whenever the car would go into electric mode the engine would shut off and water would get into cylinders and misfire as soon as engine started.
    I kept going and to eliminate water in cylinder, I shifted to engine brake, this way it stayed running, I stopped at an Autozone and bought some K-Seal put it in and finished my drive to work anther 5 miles, by the time I got to work problem was solved no more water leak.
    After a few trips I started loosing some coolant, not much so I just kept the adding some, my trips are a little over 200 miles a day, I new I had a bad head gasket and that at least one cylinder had to have some damage from when the engine started and it had way too coolant in it, can't compress liquid so something else has to give, I my case the rod bent most likely so I new the engine was junk anyway with so many miles.
    Finally one day on the way to work climbing the first hill when the engine exceeded 4K RPM the rod went, put 4 holes in the block and into the top of my AC compressor damaging the electronics.
    No big deal I will just replace the engine, so I bought another engine with 9K miles, the head looked like real low miles, but the engine had seen repairs, the head and timing chain cover looked newer than the block, so I installed it.
    During the installation I filled it with coolant as I was finishing up but the coolant that was going in was more than the Prius capacity, so eventually I stopped and was ready to run the engine, started engine runs good but I have coolant coming out of exhaust, this does not look good, now I'm not new to being a mechanic, I have done way more complicated jobs than this, and this Prius engine was actually pretty simple.
    The guy that sold me the engine claims it was running and that he even drove the car that I must have done something wrong, so after my troubleshooting just as I suspected, there is a head gasket issue with the engine, and I' m not repairing it because it has a warranty.
    So I took the engine out, told the guy to come up with another engine or give me my money back, I don't want this engine.
    After taking the engine out I plugged the water pump port and 2 other ports on back of head and stuck water hose into the main port on back of head turned the water on, and I get water flowing out of all intake and exhaust ports except maybe 1 where the valve were closed.
    Enjoy the pictures if I can figure out how, more to come I'm sure.
    https://photos.app.goo.gl/a6X9rUyKqSD6FHGB6
    [​IMG]
     
    #1 Lino, Feb 3, 2019
    Last edited: Feb 3, 2019
    amos, Bay Stater, bisco and 1 other person like this.
  2. bisco

    bisco cookie crumbler

    Joined:
    May 11, 2005
    108,038
    49,114
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    Location:
    boston
    Vehicle:
    2012 Prius Plug-in
    Model:
    Plug-in Base
    wow, you the man!(y)
     
    Lino likes this.
  3. amos

    amos Active Member

    Joined:
    Aug 19, 2017
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    Location:
    los angeles
    Vehicle:
    2016 Prius
    Model:
    Two
    Woow. What an owner.
     
  4. Lino

    Lino Member

    Joined:
    Jan 4, 2015
    61
    38
    0
    Vehicle:
    2013 Prius
    Model:
    II
    Ok, I don't know what happened to the photos I had linked to, so I am putting them up again with an update.
    Finally pulled my Prius out of the garage this morning, and for anyone thinking about changing the engine on the Prius, the hardest part of the job is the EGR, so if you can do the EGR, you can change this engine, it is way easier then older cars, you cant plug things where they don't belong, there is no flywheel to torque converter bolts, its just easy to do, don't be scared by all that stuff under the hood.

    Original block front of car left side of engine.
    [​IMG]

    Right side of engine
    [​IMG]

    AC compressor damage need a new one.
    [​IMG]

    Engine that I received and installed then took back out, water coming out of intake ports, not good.
    [​IMG]

    Water coming out of exhaust ports.
    [​IMG]

    Coolant coming out of exhaust muffler, even after installing another engine I got so far at least a gallon out of muffler, and its going to smoke for a while because the muffler is coolant logged.
    [​IMG]

    Quite a lot of new expensive coolant wasted and coolant in my fresh clean oil.
    [​IMG]
    [​IMG]

    I purchased my engine from a place in LA because I did not want to drive down to Huntington Beach where they had an engine with 25k guaranteed to me, bad mistake.
    The guy I bought engine from with supposedly 9300k miles was obviously a liar who tried to cheat me with a block from one car and a head from another.
    I used car-parts dot com, as I have done many times in the past, my wife did some reseach on the company that sold me the engine and they had some bad reviews, do a little research before forking over 2k for engine.
    After going round and round with this guy he finally delivered a good engine, he claimed 29k, I could tell it was not driven hard, high amount of carbon build up around fuel injectors.
    Local shop is going to charge me 45 dollars to evacuate my AC system Freon so I can replace AC compressor.
    Hopefully the end of this story.​
     
    kc5dlo, scona, bisco and 3 others like this.