'Mayo' in the oil filler cap

[Stu-1.8T]

My wife's 2.0 has got alot of white gunk around the top of the oil filler neck. I know that sometimes this points to a head gasket failure, but i'm pretty sure it's o.k. The cars a 2001 and has only covered 30k. A fair bit of this has been short journey's, but it does get a long run now and again.

Has anybody else had this problem? and could it be a breather pipe that's not working? the car does smoke a little bit out of the exhaust from cold but otherwise runs fine.

Any comments would be appreciated

Stu

[Mantamad]

I'm not an expert on Golf's but reading bits here and there, it has been mentioned that the 2 litre can be bad for this. Certain engine designs can be prone to mayo - my previous car, An Astra also had this problem with no head gasket defect. It was always worse in winter.

[Ivor Mk4 Turbo]

Could possibly be just condensation, or a split hose as said above.  I'd only be thinking H.G. failure if you've got a serious overheating problem.

[>>Mart<<]

is it loosing any water check the header tank and also look inside the header tank bottle and see if there is a film of oil on the top

it could be woth giving it a oil change and letting the oil settle to see if any water seperates from it

[welshgar]

my mate had the exact same problem... 2.0 gti...46k on the clock loads of short journeys.

he took it to vw and they said the oil breather pipe had blocked.

cleaned it, changed the oil and it was ok for another couple of months.

no H.g failure tho'!

hope this helps

[heywoodgti]

 i had a astra mk4 and the head went on that from the water jacket into the cylinder cost me £ 730

but i dont know much about the golfs so can say much but it sounds like the h.g. gone !!!!

[GolfGL]

Mine gets like that too but is just condesation. If it was HG was gone there would be the same stuff on dip stick and in the water tank aswell.

[Stu-1.8T]

Thanks for all your reply's guys.

The car has never overheated and the dipstick is clean. I'll check the water in the header tank tomorrow but I feel more confident that the head gasket is o.k now.

[Agreeable Slick]

Take it for a proper run, and use the full rev range, it will blow everything out of the car and get it running much more nicely. HG is not going to have gone i reckon.

[welshgar]

i read somewhere that the oil cooler can sometimes degrade causing the coolant a nd water to mix... there is a quick check list/fix for it....i'll try and remember where i saw it.

i still dont think its the HG tho m8y