Son of a Witch... Same bike another problem

[storysunfolding]

So I'm warming the bike up this morning to take her to work. Starts fine, looks fine, sounds fine. Go inside to suit up, come back out into the fog, calmly walk over and cut off my fog machine (Magna v30), wave to the neighbors, go back inside and curse my way through gear removal.

Between yesterday and today she smokes like a bandit, happened when she hit operating temps so if I recall, that means a coolant leak somewhere. She also had a puddle of this next to the right pipe. I'm pretty sure it wasn't there before and I don't know what could have caused it so I'm going to say that this came out my exhaust.


How much work am I in for and what should I take care of while I'm doing it?

[oldschoolorange]

that looks like a coolant and oil mix, if you are lucky it is just coolant. Check the oil consistancy in your crankcase then pressure test the cooling system, who knows could just be a hose

[fireguzzi]

+1

might have a blown head gasket or base gasket.

that looks like a coolant and oil mix, if you are lucky it is just coolant. Check the oil consistancy in your crankcase then pressure test the cooling system, who knows could just be a hose

[storysunfolding]

The only way I know how to check to see if it's a head gasket or a cracked head is to pull the engine, pull the head and check it out. I'm hoping there's a better way.

What hose might be the problem? If that's something that's easy to check out, then color me happy.

One thing I noticed is that she doesn't smoke until after she gets to operating temperature. I haven't had the chance to pull the radiator cap and check to see if it spews coolant everywhere when she's running (just got home and neighbors go to sleep early... motorcycle is loud) which I've been told is a quick way to confirm that it's a head gasket/cracked head.

[storysunfolding]

Do I need special tools to do a pressure test? I was under the impression that you needed a particular pump and somethign to take the place of the radiator cap.

[oldschoolorange]

ya you need a special pump to pressurise your cooling system or you could just get the bike hot and then check, you may have to go to a motorcycle shop tp have them test it for you if you do not have access to one yourself. It only takes about 1 min to put the pump on and pump up the system

[storysunfolding]

On the advice of a car mechanic, I pulled the radiator cap and let it run. Coolant started overflowing and he told me that pretty much guarantees it. So we pulled the plugs and sure enough the front right cylinder's spark plug was soaked. Now I just need to pull the head, see if I need to replace that and get a new gasket. How do you tell if it's a cracked head? Is it going to be obvious?