I have my upper manifold plenum out, coil pack out, and when I stick my fingers down there I felt a bunch of black stuff crumbling. Digging a bit deeper, and its crumbling in flakes as far as I can reach my hand into the valley. Pic attached. Is this the gasket? If its the gasket I guess I need to remove the lower manifold and replace it. Any other recommended parts while I'm at it?

The flakes are only about 1mm thick. Seems manufactured...

Was hoping to have the car ready by this Friday for a trip, but it's not looking too likely.. keep finding another thing that causes me to remove more and more parts.

 

That is the material that they put on the pan gasket to prevent corrosion.

 

That is the material that they put on the pan gasket to prevent corrosion.
It is simply a piece of stamped sheet metal and would corrode if not treated.

 

Thanks... that makes sense. I'll go ahead and replace it then. To do or not to do the head gaskets at this point...

 

If you are talking about valve cover gaskets I would replace them now. If you are talking about THE head gaskets,if they aren't leaking don't bother them. JMO D*

 

Head gaskets. I'm not aware of any leaking, but I don't know how to check. for what its worth, the engine is covered in oil... everywhere. The exhaust does burn a little white until warm, can't tell if its coolant smelling or not, but I have mostly distilled water in there until I changeover the radiator and hoses.

 

Do you plan to change the radiator and hoses befor starting it again? Mostly water in the cooling system is not good. If there is that much grease and oil I would opt to power wash the engine,do a die test and leakdown test to check head gaskets. They may be fine but with all the gunk on it it would be hard to tell if any of it is coming from a blown head gasket. D*

 

Yes, I've been filling with water, run to temp, drain, repeat, in order to flush out whatever coolant was used by PO. I spent an hour finding the drain plugs, and another hour trying to get them off.. gave up. Then I will attach new hoses and radiator, drain, fill w/ coolant. Then maybe another drain and fill to get close to 50/50.

Power wash is on my todo list. I'll do that first. Now that I know how to get the plenum and stuff off, it will be much faster next time anyway. thanks

 

Sounds like a plan,let us know what you find after the power wash. D*

 

If you have no problems with the head gaskets, I would leave them alone! That's a whole can of worms you don't want to get into. Especially if you want to do them properly AND drive the truck Friday. Any time I do head gaskets on anything, I send them out to the machine shop to have them fully checked out.