Got it towed next morning and took it apart last night. Tensioner pulley exploded, there WAS NO pulley, which explains the screeching - yikes. See pics, remnants of belt and pulley casing (arrow), can't find the bearings anyway
Coolant is low in bottle by about 2 inches, but still some in there, however there is a bunch of it in the skid plate and all over the right strut, brakes, etc. Seems like it may have overflowed from the coolant reservoir based on location/path. I think this was the rising of the fluid due to water pump not moving and fluid heating (it was at max before this). I didn't see any bubbling while engine running, coolant still bright green, oil is clear. There is wetness/drips under the coolant reservoir, could be from overflow from cap day before or maybe it's leaking and extra pressure from rising temps exposed it more than it usually drips. Just thinking out loud...Just want to validate, as much as possible as least, that the head gasket is OK before I throw money into all these other parts. I suppose it might be worth installing a new tensioner and idler pulley just to check things out when it's running. Ideally I would replace the water pump while there (maybe power steering pump too? Don't want anything trashing that serpentine system with water pump in it).
- Any tests I can do to confirm head gasket is ok?
Pulled the plugs and they seem pretty consistent, with #1 (left in photo) probably burning more oil than the others. But no real signs I can see of coolant burning.
- Can you do a compression test using the start button on these cars?
- Manual specs amount of tranny fluid, but where's the dipstick hiding for that? I wanted to see if it had coolant in it as long as I was there.
