Head Gasket Problem?? or Not??

[redfishpowerstroke]

My truck is totally stock and just turned 100K about 3 months ago and is now up to 105K. The truck was given the once over by Ford at 98K other than two injectors. I am having no noticable issues..starts fine, power fine, runs smooth, no smoke since injector change, fuel mileage fine etc. Two weeks ago I was pulling a boat in traffic, light boat.. total weight under 3K pounds. I was in heavy traffic, flat terrain (central florida) and it was hot. I noticed the smell of antifreeze in the air, checked my guages (stock) and everything was in the middle. No steam coming out of the engine or anything like that but I felt like I needed to check..once I got out of traffic..no smell so I just moved on. Finished towing the boat another hour, then drove home another two hours, nothing out of the ordinary.

Next day I notice a strange sound from the engine compartment..like someone hitting a plastic jug. I noticed the Degas bottle was near empty so I filled it with distilled water and moved on..no sound.

Further inspection and I saw a white residue on the passenger side valve cover that hasn't been there, not a huge amount but some (don't know what that is, I keep things clean though)

With it having 100K I was going to start making some changes to make it a bit more bullet proof starting with the EGR valve delete treatment from BDPower. I'm wondering if I need to attack somewhere else now.

Is this a headgasket problem developing?

[Robsr]

Sounds like maybe the heater control valve or possiobly hose clamps is/are leaking. it is on the heater hose over the valve cover. Hope this is it! the other things it could be are scarry, lol

[speedycop732]

Ive got a 05 and just did the same thing, I was stacking edge juice and sct and notice a smell of antifreeze. Im going to delete the egr cooler wednesday. My old 04 did the same friggen thing and it ended up being a cracked egr cooler. My guess is your losing ur water through the cap on the degas bottle due to the exhaust leaking through the cooler.