My buddy's Exploder had a head gasket leak so he put in Bars Leaks Head Gasket sealer....
after giving him a rash of Why Not To's! I told him I was going to post on the forum for opinions.
Your thoughts on this product are welcome!
NO do not use it ! ,
& no one I knew / know , would use it who knew anything about cars ,
waste of time & money , do the head gasket/s & move on . :Twocents:
Quote from: tan top on February 28, 2018, 02:33:01 PM
NO do not use it ! ,
& no one I knew / know , would use it who knew anything about cars ,
waste of time & money , do the head gasket/s & move on . :Twocents:
Thats what I told him Tan Top....lots of "holes" in the cooling system....how does it know which to plug...it doesnt so its just plugs all kinds of stuff lol
He's gonna be replacing a radiator & heater core soon after he uses that stuff......it's just snake-oil, doesn't work
I was doing head gaskets on a turbo Volvo, and we had agreed on 3 payments, one to take it a part, and see what it needed, two to get the parts, and three to put it together, well after taking it apart, the guy flipped the script on me and told me no we agreed on $600 whole job, I was like your high, no one on earth would do a turbo Volvo head gasket for that, we said 3 payments anyway after a huge fight, it was clear I would not be getting any more money.
So I went to the local Autozone, bought a $35-40 can of head gasket fix, drained the coolant, and put the liquid magic in, and followed the directions.
and well it worked!!!!
It worked well enough, that the car drove out of my yard and I never heard from guy again.
The car had to be towed to my shop, The thing smoked(burning coolant) so bad it would idle and that's it, could barley yard drive it, after I poured that stuff in and followed the directions, I took car for test drive, and it was fixed!!!!!!
I pounded it up the mountain, ran great.
The next day drove to the dudes house, and left it and the keys in his driveway.
I know it lasted at least 3 months.(he went to jail about 3 or 4 months later)
and that was on a turbo car, so it has higher cylinder pressure then N/A.
Anyway, On my jeep, I changed the head gasket, never even thought about that stuff, but when that dude had boned me on the bill, it came to the rescue!!
That was the only time I used it, and had great results.
Thats all I can say about it, that it did do what it said it would do.
I was very impressed.
The only thing the first owner of my car did that has a negative effect was use Bar's Leak on the radiator. It took years to get that out of the system. finall ran cool after it was clean. My opinion - stay away. YMMV.
I've used a similar (not Barr's leaks) powdered stuff in my cooling systems as I've always seemed to have weeping around the studs on heads. When I had my 05 F150 (I know, I know..... it was a dark time for me) Ford actually put sealer in the coolant from the factory so I guess its not as bad as what we thought.
Never used it but when I started working here at the truck plant in 88, still here, every new truck, Chevy or GMC got one pellet in the rad. from the factory.
If you want your radiator (most times) and heater core (nearly every time) to be eventually blocked by that stuff....then go right ahead!
I had to use a similar product years ago, when one of my headgaskets blew somewhere in the middle of nowhere in the south of France.
Have to say I was impressed with the stuff, it sealed the leak and got me to my destination & back home... but a few months after that the radiator got totally plugged...
It's only a band-aid for emergency situations imo.
Double post!
Quote from: A383Wing on February 28, 2018, 03:22:55 PM
He's gonna be replacing a radiator & heater core soon after he uses that stuff......it's just snake-oil, doesn't work
Thats what I tried telling him :slap:
Quote from: MoParJW on March 01, 2018, 06:40:55 AM
I had to use a similar product years ago, when one of my headgaskets blew somewhere in the middle of nowhere in the south of France.
Have to say I was impressed with the stuff, it sealed the leak and got me to my destination & back home... but a few months after that the radiator got totally plugged...
It's only a band-aid for emergency situations imo.
I could see it being used as an emergency fix. :2thumbs:
My former 66 Charger 318 poly had a cracked block, put the sealer in followed the directions and it worked perfectly. Traded the car a few years and miles later, dude had the car for a few more years and miles and eventually traded it for a paint job on his house.
No problems with the radiator or heater core. New owner eventually swapped it for a 440. It shows up on craigslist every now and again for 12,000
Quote from: Bad B-rad on February 28, 2018, 04:25:21 PM
I was doing head gaskets on a turbo Volvo, and we had agreed on 3 payments, one to take it a part, and see what it needed, two to get the parts, and three to put it together, well after taking it apart, the guy flipped the script on me and told me no we agreed on $600 whole job, I was like your high, no one on earth would do a turbo Volvo head gasket for that, we said 3 payments anyway after a huge fight, it was clear I would not be getting any more money.
So I went to the local Autozone, bought a $35-40 can of head gasket fix, drained the coolant, and put the liquid magic in, and followed the directions.
and well it worked!!!!
It worked well enough, that the car drove out of my yard and I never heard from guy again.
The car had to be towed to my shop, The thing smoked(burning coolant) so bad it would idle and that's it, could barley yard drive it, after I poured that stuff in and followed the directions, I took car for test drive, and it was fixed!!!!!!
I pounded it up the mountain, ran great.
The next day drove to the dudes house, and left it and the keys in his driveway.
I know it lasted at least 3 months.(he went to jail about 3 or 4 months later)
and that was on a turbo car, so it has higher cylinder pressure then N/A.
Anyway, On my jeep, I changed the head gasket, never even thought about that stuff, but when that dude had boned me on the bill, it came to the rescue!!
That was the only time I used it, and had great results.
Thats all I can say about it, that it did do what it said it would do.
I was very impressed.
Ha! That's a great story! Thanks for sharing.
https://store.gobdp.com/head-gasket-sealer-38386/
I daily drive a 1996 f150 300i6
350,000 miles
head gasket started leaking at about 315k
installed a bottle of the above hasnt leaked since
FOLLOW THE INSTRUCTIONS 100%
Should be called BARS FLOW !! :smilielol:
It WILL fix a leak, but will break loose and plug everything up when you are passing 5 cars at a time by Marathon Key, FL in 1975.