head gasket?
 

ive got a 97 uk spec wrx and i thought the head gasket had gone on sat so am about to rip the engine out to change the head gasket but now im doubting my self ( not wanting to remove the block )

now the temp dosent go over half way but my top pipe gets very hot and the top half of the rad but the bottom hose and half of the rad stays stone cold but when i rev the engine with my hand on the top or bottom hose with my hand tight on the hose i can fill it expand big time then when it comes off the revs it gose down ( with rad cap off ) with rad cap on it stays expanded but presures up so the hose is nearly double its size

have you made certain its well bled?? sound very like an air lock , i would def investigate all options before pulling the engine,

if it turns out to be HG then get tore in , its not rocket science if you have a reasonable socket set and a set of manuals, but there is a fair checklist to work through before thinking the worst

Good luck

similar problems not long ago here mate, sounds more liek an air lock or could be same as what mine was.... thermostat :) gl

hi there m8 my car has been doing that for nearly a year, there are a few things to check out first tho. Firstly did or has the temp ever gone to nearly full, does it appear to have an air lock only when driven hard? and lastly which confirmed my head gasket failure i extended the little hose on the expansion bottle so it was visible (the windscreen) and went for a drive only to find coolant spewing out under boost.

So i pulled out the engine yesterday and stripped it to find the head gasket had gone, i have obviously changed the gaskets today and put engine back in and that has cured the problem.

I have tried and tried so many different things advised to check before actually taking out the engine and doing the HG i wish i had actually just done the HG in the first place for what it takes. This is only my opinion tho bud there are many ppl that can advise you on here, hope you get it sorted soon tho bud

Sod it started taking engine out today going to do both heads and thermo and spark plugs it's on 16800 miles so at least Its done

When I did mine I discovered it had fibre head gaskets on so replaced them for steel multi layered ones