What do I do? Change the head gasket? Time for a new turbo? I checked the oil on the dipstick and there's no bubbles and the oil looks clean. If there's mixing going on, wouldn't the problem be both ways? How long can I keep driving like this? I need this car to get to work.

I'll have to upload the pics when I get home. My phone won't let me right now for some reason.

The coolant basically looks like oil and there's this clumpy gue on the bottom of the reservoir cap.

 

You're oil cooler is leaking oil into the coolant tank,it needs to be replaced.

 

Thanks bro, I didn't even think about the oil cooler. So the symptoms I described pretty much just point to that then? How hard is it to replace it? I guess you just drain the oil and unbolt it?

 

Easy swap - drain the oil, remove the filter, remove the two coolant lines from the cooler (plug them fast so you don't lose coolant), change out the cooler, and reassemble. It could be a head gasket too. Or it could be a mix of G12 coolant and green generic coolant if someone put the wrong stuff in. Gotta narrow it down some.

 

Thanks man. I'm not worried about losing the coolant because it looks like pure oil now as you can see in the pic. I hope it's not the head gasket. Wouldn't I hear like an exhaust leak or something if it were the HG though? The engine only has about 90k on it. The coolant was pure G12 and not mixed since I did a flush myself a few months back. My car isn't showing signs of overheating, but how much longer can it run like this? I'm a little short on funds at the moment and I drive over 100mi. a day commuting to work.

 

From the look of it, it's either oil cooler or head gasket. Best bet is to do the oil cooler - way less downtime and a lot cheaper. You'll be doing a cooler swap (get a new o-ring for mating it to the engine), coolant flush, and oil change. Give it a shot and hopefully that'll do it. And a head gasket may or may not give exhaust leaks or other sounds - it all depends on where it fails. An internal tear between oil and coolant galleys won't show an exhaust leak, but a tear from a cylinder to the outside will.

 

Thanks again. I'll order an oil cooler and o-ring asap. I hope that'll fix it.

 

I don't mean to sound annoying, but how long do you think I can drive like this? I might have to wait a couple of weeks to change it out. I'd have to get another $20 gallon of coolant too which I didn't think of and engine oil with a filter on top of that. Should I drain the coolant and just add water for now? I mean, could the mixture cause more damage than just using water? TIA

 

I think for a little while you'll be ok, but I'd definitely try and do it sooner rather than later.

 

Ok, thanks.