Poniac sunfire 99

Asked by Guru5GBCD Feb 14, 2018 at 09:27 PM about the 1999 Pontiac Sunfire

Question type: Maintenance & Repair

My car has 167000 miles on it and about a
month ago I was driving on interstate 80
and it began to over heat but bc I just
bought the car I feel it may have had this
problem for a while. When driving the engine
got too hot and the belt came off. When the
belt came off I seemed to lose power
steering a bit and the breaks were hard. And
the heat also put a hole in the coolent.
Someone suggested the head gasket but I
need to figure out how to do this myself any
suggestions?

101,575

KenF answered 6 years ago

Hate to be the bearer of bad news, but this car might be on it's last legs. It would not be worth the cost to fix a head gasket. You can try servicing the cooling system, it might be something simple like a thermostat or radiator, or it might be something more expensive like a water pump, or worst case scenario, blown head gasket. You *might* get a replacement engine from a salvage yard on the cheap and have them install it for $600 or so (really depends on where your from), but that's taking a gamble on another engine with unknown miles. I have very little faith in a nearly 20 year old GM product with high miles lasting much longer anyhow, it might be better for you to cut your losses and move on. BTW, if you lose the belt all your belt-driven accessories are naturally going to be much harder to use (like steering), and if the engine conked out, then the brakes lost their power boost as well.

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