I have a really strange issue with my '94 2.3 (the junkyard dog truck) yesterday was running fine, i stop at the bank after work for maybe 5 min, shut it off while i was there, went to leave and its missing bad, didnt think much of it, once in a while when starting it would miss but straighten out, figured it was a fault fuel injector, it is a 94, 145K miles on it. well anyways, i went to the dmv then the house, still missing bad, got worse the more it ran. this morning, same thing, drove it 5 miles to work, can barely pull itself, 4.10 gears and the most it will do is 45, 4rth gear, will idle but horribly. work my 8 then before i leave i check things over, nothing seems wrong, oil level and coolant level fine. drove it home, about halfway its smoking alot, i pull over and pop the hood, can see its oily around the #3 manifold port on exhause and its smoking from where the manifold joins the downpipe (i knew it was leaking there before) i get it to the house, pull plugs for a compression test, i had done a compression test when i first got the truck in july, it was roughly 150/160 across all 4. well now i have 160 on 1, 155 on 2, 20 on 3 and 5 on 4. so yes, 2 dead cylinders, my thought is blown head gasket between cylinders (havent pulled head yet) but theres one thing yet puzzling me. after the engine cooled down i checked fluid levels. coolant fine, oil down to the add mark..... yes, i lost a qt of oil i under 5 miles of driving. i did notice oil pressure guage acting weird during driving, it would dip halfway down then go back up. almost acted like a bad connection it was moving so much back and forth. motor sounded like it was "hammering" while driving too. i took a couple of videos, at idle after the drive from work it almost sounds like a diesel. both 3 and 4 plugs were oil soaked, i cant understand why the oil loss/burning is happining. any ideas? yes, i know i have to keep digging and take it apart. but this is just incredibly weird. ran great up until it didnt..... was surprized it lost 2 cylinders. guess that proves that its not always as bad as you think it could be.... sometimes its worse....


this was how it was running before, took about a month ago:

on the drive home today:

parked after the drive from work, idleing:

heres a picture of the exhaust manifold side, look at how oily it is at the #3 exhaust port...
https://www.flickr.com/photos/154582...3/24861638758/



sick....not in a good way....

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blue streak ( R-140) build-->https://flic.kr/s/aHsmBWXRwL
'93 s/c 4.0 4x4,"the green machine" (retired-r.i.p.)
'92 reg cab longbed 2.3 "polar express" (stolen)
' 97 reg cab 3.0 auto ($500 project truck)-rolled
'94 2wd longbed 2.3 manual trans-"R-140"
pictures--> https://www.flickr.com/photos/154582...h/37156884305/

That last compression reading says bad head gasket, but could also be lobes worn off the cam, or bad rockers, pull the valve cover first.

after nearly a month, its back on the road again,had a bad head gasket, blown between 3 & 4, and was eroded clear to a oil retun passage. head was found to be cracked across every valve seat, and a junkyard head was found to be in the same condition. ended up getting a autozone reconditioned head with valves already in it, that was 300+ bucks but a new head complete with cam was over 500. also put in new water pump, timing belt, timing belt tenstioner, thermostat, and a oil change after i got it running again. fired it up last night about 10:30, like most 2.3's it seems to run on the cool side, even with a new thermostat, only issue ive really seen is that the oil pressure reading isnt as high as it was before all this, could be the sender, i dont know. i did change the oil after its first warm up, 5w30 pennzoil. nothing is knocking or tapping like a oil pressure issue, guess i'll just watch and see what happens. nice to be able to go through all 5 gears again and not be stopped at 3rd with a max speed of 40. took some pictures before putting cap back on, kind of like the look of it without the cap but need the weight for the snow thats here now and its nice to keep the bed cleaner this way, i had took it off mainly because i was putting all the parts in the bed while i worked on it and it was alot easier to just reach over the side vs going through the back.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/154582...in/dateposted/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/154582...in/dateposted/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/154582...in/dateposted/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/154582...in/dateposted/

__________________
blue streak ( R-140) build-->https://flic.kr/s/aHsmBWXRwL
'93 s/c 4.0 4x4,"the green machine" (retired-r.i.p.)
'92 reg cab longbed 2.3 "polar express" (stolen)
' 97 reg cab 3.0 auto ($500 project truck)-rolled
'94 2wd longbed 2.3 manual trans-"R-140"
pictures--> https://www.flickr.com/photos/154582...h/37156884305/

My heater went out in my Ford Ranger 2003 it has 186,000 miles on it so this particular day my heater went out on a freezing cold day and the next thing I know my check engine light comes on and then check engine started blinking and was runny no really rough So I brought it to a guy and he told me that I’m only running on two cylinders and he said I’m may have blown a gasket can anybody help me figure out how to fix this on my own? Any help would be appreciated! The guy said it wasn’t the end of the world and I have been driving it for over a month like this but frankly I’m waiting on my taxes in order to get it fixed so if there’s any kind of advice anyone could give me please do so thank you so much