87 gl 1200 i headgasket

[ronscycle1]

hi I think I got a blown head gasket,when I first start it it misses and smells like antifreeze ,steam comes out exhaust till it quits missing . You guys think thats whats is is ?Would I be able to use same head ? Help please

Thanks
Ron

[dingdong]

Classic symptoms of a blown head gasket.

[ronscycle1]

Should I replace both head gaskets ?

[rzaugg]

Should I replace both head gaskets ?

That is completely your call. If you know that it's only one side, pull plugs and look (spark plugs shouldn't be green), other side may very well last longer than the new one. If it was me I would do both. But that's just me.

As far as being able to reuse the head, you won't know till you get it off and take a look at it. If you really want to know for sure, take it to a machine shop and have them pressure test it and/or magna-flux it. Is there something that happened recently to cause this "head gasket" leak?

[ronscycle1]

I was stopped and laid it over on that side would that do it ?

[rzaugg]

Sorry, I've gotten really busy and couldn't get on here much.

Laying it over when stopped wouldn't make the head gasket leak. Unless you took all of the crash bars off, I doubt that the head even touched the ground. It still wouldn't cause it to leak. I got T-boned on the right side by a car on mine hard enough to break the intake tube on the front cylinder and punch a hole in the gas tank. Head gasket wasn't leaking afterwards. Did start and run on three cylinders though when trying to load it on the trailer