new to the forum but got an issue that i hope you can help with. bought a 02 p5 has about 145k miles on it. issue 1 was the belt pulling the water pump broke and ended up super heating coolant and popping a hole in the radiator. fixed this issue(replaced radiator and belts.) current issue... bout 9 months after issue 1 i started dumping cooling pretty regularly. close to all at once. i refilled with coolant and replaced the termostat and the coolant held for about a month. no overheating. then the next month same thing happened, but this time when i refilled the coolant it wouldnt even hold it for a 5 mile drive. when i took it to a shop the repanned and sealed my "new radiator" and said i needed a new water pump. which could have been possible, so i did that. while doing that he said my timing belt jumped up and was stretched so i got that replaced also. final straw is that now he is saying i am low on compression (possibly the last 2) and that i have a blown head gasket. i really am unsure about what to say and wether to listen to him and fork out the bills or any other suggestions that anyone has as far as to what else it could be. hope the background helps. thanks in advance.

 

if your head gasket went you would be useing alot of coolant check your oil dipstick because if it did crack you should have mixed antifreeze with the oil. honsetly in my opinion if the head gasket did go its almost easier and sometimes cheaper just to replace the engine. My mazda is having ALOT of problems im giving it one more chance and if something goes again im selling it, i thought my ford focus was bad for repair's, but in 6 months i have owned it ive droped over 1000$ in repairs alone.

 

thanks ill go and check that right now. im having the shop do a liquid seal test today before thay make the move so hopefully that will help say for sure also.