Oddball Piston

2000, 3.0 Flex

I had water gushing out of the radiator a few months ago so I parked the truck in hopes of selling it as is. After fielding numerous idiot offers of $500.00 I decide to fix it myself. Over last weekend I pulled both heads off, head gaskets don't appear to be blown but that does rule out warped heads. What I found odd was the last piston back on the driver's side appears as if it's brand new, problem is we've owned the truck 4 years now.

Anyone ever seen something this clean after running for the past 4 years? I'm dinking around with replacing the whole engine as the truck has nearly 250K on it and rear main is leaking.

As looked as that cylinder had water. Water will work as cleaner, when water enter the cylinder head it will break down the carbon.

Makes sense, back in the old days we'd take off the air cleaner, start the engine and pour water down the carb. I 'think' I may have found the cause of the problem. There are two lower head bolts on each side that have a metal 'ring' that sticks up to hold the head gasket in alignment. One side only has one of these so it appears as if the last 'mechanic' left one out. Now the job is finding a replacement as I'm thinking it's there for a reason.

Gee, the original owner had to gave his truck away because of a mistake...