Block Seal?

Engine has been overheating, new stat fitted but found water in the oil, this has only just happened. I have ordered a head gasket set but have been told that block seal is brilliant and will fix it. The mechanic that I sopke to said that he had used it on cars that were much worse than mine and it worked fine, so has anyone else used it, was it any good, and which brand did you use?

i have only ever used k seal in a k series, and to good effect, but others on here say nooooo.

When I thought I had hgf on a BMW I also looked into one of these miracle cures (I think it was called steel seal). without exception every forum I visited, those that tried it said it was a waste of money. It might work but I wasn't convinced, far from it. Luckily I ended up having a radiator leak which was difficult to spot & the radiator was less than a year old which was why I ruled it out initially (always carefully check everything) so I had no need of it. I wouldn't have bothered after what I read though.

Steel Seal is supposed to be good. Haven't used it myself but a mate did on a Mondeo with suspected HGF . Car still running after 6 months with no other work done on it. Can't give you a link but Google is your friend.

Thanks for you're response, I have bought a bottle of Steel Seal and will post how it works.

Well I have put it in the Steel Seal and ran the engine to normal running temperature three times as per instructions so we shall see. I bought a new rad cap and fitted a new thermostat as well but noticed that the cap still works loose, it would seem the header tank thread has been crossed at some point, also I think the new stat that I fitted is duff. The pipe on the engine side is red hot but the pipe on the other side of the stat is cold. So I will have to drain the system and boil up the stat in a pot to see if it works. I will ask this question again (no reply last time) does anyone know where the senser is that controls the radiator fan? It has never worked and is adding to the problem.

My suspicions were confirmed. The old stat was left in the block, which of course was u/s. So thats something to bear in mind, all of you having overheating and HGF, and you have the inline stat behind the rad, check to see if the other one was taken out. So I'm taking the head off, getting it skimmed and fitting new gaskets and head bolts all round.

The cooling fan is controlled by the ecu and this takes its reading from the ECU sensor. To test the fan is working, unplugging the connector to the sensor should make the fan come on. The ECT one in this photo.

Thanks for the photo, I thought that might be the senser. The engine in bits now and I am confident once we take out the old stat it will be fine.

You'll need the blank stat ring to replace the old one, it just packs out the mating face of the stat housing, or remove the gubbins from the old one (drill out the 4 welds holding the bulb to the ring)

You've stripped the engine down, so does this mean that the Steel Seal didn't work or did you just get fed up and decided to have a proper look inside?

I'm sorry to hear that the steel seal didn't help, it's pretty much what all my research confirmed. Only people with a very slight issue seemed to think it helped a little but opinion seemed to be that a head gasket is fairly highly stressed & once it goes these magic potions are unlikely to be of any use. Interestingly some guys thought that if your gasket hadn't blown but was not far from going, then the steel seal might in some cases help reinforce it somehow & could delay a failure but of course it couldn't be proved.

Hope you get sorted without too many £££s being spent.

also don't skim the head unless it needs it.

The Steel Seal didn't work because the old stat behind the block was closed, therefore the seal only added to the problem, further restricting the coolant circulation. Therefore I can't honestly say it's no good, but it did seem to me like a long shot. If the head gasket has gone it really does need relpacing. The mechanic helping me ( a local Freelander specialist, what a mate to have!) ran a steel rule over the head and said it needs skimming, so it is away now. I have the new gasket set and will of course do the cam belt at the same time. Hopefully by the end of the week it will be back on the road.

if it has done a reasonable mileage fit a new water pump as well, saves disturbing the timing belt when that starts leaking.