Looks like something is leaking from my car, leaving white milky puddles on the drive. Is it likely to be the radiator?

Bloody thing's starting leaking oil too, god knows how/why.

Head gasket, sorry.

No, don't tell me that…

Would that explain both leaks?

If it's milky stuff it would normally be an oil/water mix, generally from the cooling system water. Where exactly it's coming out is another matter as is why it's managing to happen. Head gasket is the most common but not only cause.

I assume that me driving it down the motorway tomorrow morning is a bad idea?

Take your oil cap off and see if it is creamy colour sludge – if it is then its Head Gasket – although i once had an oil cooler that failed and it impersonated a head gasket failure.

Our car has just done the same, coolant loss, gurgling/air lock in the heater matrix, and mayo inside the oil cap. I wiped it out and it had started to return after just two short trips, less than 5 miles total. I can even see where coolant is leaking out from the gasket.

At least its only a crappy little Punto 8v so not too expensive to fix.

Have a good poke round with a torch and try to identify where the oil and white stuff is coming from.

We have a positive on the mayo/oil sludge. C0ck. Guess I'll be calling the garage in the morning.

What car is it?

I wonder if this is common at the moment due to weak coolant freezing in the rad and allowing the engine to overheat.

Mk IV Golf, 1.6 petrol, 116k

Is the cooling system pressurising? Does it overheat? Is there a misfire? There are a number of different symptoms that can point to a head gasket failure and without further information I wouldn't like to say whether a headgasket has failed or not.

Due to emission regulations becoming ever tighter over the last couple of decades the engine has to 'breathe' back into the inlet system. Due to the constant temperature changes this creates a fair bit of condensation within the breathing pipework and can sometimes lead to the white milky substance you describe. If one of your breather hoses has split you may see this on the drive where it leaks.

I would suggest if the headgasket had failed you would get either leaking coolant or leaking oil from the head itself not a emulsified mixture of the two. You need to have a look and find out where the leak is coming from first.

could be a number of things and would need more detail to give a more educated diagnosis.

Just my two penneth worth.

But in ay case, give the M-way a miss till you get it checked.

It's not overheating or misfiring. It's driving perfectly normally. I've had a head gasket go before and know the instant overheat/loss of power/clouds of black smoke that happen, nothing like that has happened at all.

The only thing 'out of the ordinary' it's done was sitting in the car park at Bristol airport all last week, during which time it was blinkin' cold and snowy. Started first time, drove fine straightaway. Thing is, I now have an oil leak (the leaked oil is perfectly clean) and these white leaks.

My boss will be thrilled when I tell I won't be in tomorrow…

Head vgasket failure can cause a number of symptoms including all the ones you have described and others.

Does the engine have antifreeze in it? If it is not up to the right concentration it is possible that the coolant/water froze and therefore cracked the block?

Sorry for not being more concise but it could be caused by a number of things

Is your drive the local dogging spot?

So what did it turn out to be?

The breather pipe for for the oil system is right below the oil cap on the mkiv golf. 'Mayo' on the cap and in the neck of the filler is commom. They are push fittings so pulling them off and cleaning them out is very easy. Disc brake cleaner does the job very well.

If the head gasket is leaking water into the oil then all the oil will be emulsified. Check the oil on the dip stick. If that's not emulsified then the head gasket hasn't gone.

Can't think what would produce a milky white fluid other than emulsified oil.

Your coolant should either be red or blue. Washer fluid is either green, blue or pink. A/C fluid would just evapourate. That's it for fluids.

Have you topped up the coolant recently? If you did, did you use the right type of coolant? VW have two and you can't mix them (according to VW).

As an alternative. Could it be a water leaking out, that is then mixing with oil/enigine grime/road salt before dripping on the floor?

As an alternative. Could it be a water leaking out, that is then mixing with oil/enigine grime/road salt before dripping on the floor?

That's what I was thinking. If you've already got an oil leak it could just be mixing [somehow] with water on the engine and looking milky when it drops to the floor.

Or

Water/condensation running off the engine and picking up oil (from the leak) on it's way down….. then drops off forming a milky puddle.

Check your dipstick.

There wasn't a grumpy looking fella pumping up his bike tyres with a track pump just before this stuff appeared?

Not Badger?

http://bigjohn.fotopic.net/p25428957.html

http://bigjohn.fotopic.net/p25428958.html

(Never seem to be able to link fotopic images these days)

And the marks go to….

MK1Fan

Head gasket fine, oil leak mixing with crap on drive = white patches

Oil leak from dinged sump (must have done it in the snow), liquid metal on hole, leak gone, the beast lives another day 🙂

One error I did make was to miss out Brake Fluid from my list. This would be yellow.

Depending on how handy you are with the tools and your proximity to a decent breakers yard can I suggest you get a replacement sump. The 1.6 is pretty common – in both 8 and 16 valve guises. Check with VW the price of a new one first so the breakers don't try and diddle you.

New gasket, a few bolts the next time you have an oil change and you're sorted.

Whilst you're at the breakers source the tough abs plastic sump cover that sits directly over the sump. Not the thin wind deflector that's fixed to the inner wings. They [the plastic sump cover] seems to be a hit and miss as to whether VW fitted them. Certainly protects against road debris that can crack metal sump covers.