Soon as I fired it up, I notice steam from the pipe...yup. Hrmmm....brand-spankin new head and gaskets, torque checked, then rechecked, then rechecked again...

Figured it might just be condensation, so I gave it about 10 minutes to warm up. Noticed the lash adjusters just didn't want to oil (loud longer than I expected), odd. Pulled the dipstick to look at the oil. Sure as s**t, creamy grey foam!

WTF happened? I checked EVERYTHING 65 times before I committed anything, now this?

Cracked block somewhere? I did notice a tiny bit of oil in the antifreeze when I drained it before tearing everything down, just assumed it was the head gasket I knew was on its way, if not completely dead. Oil was dirty, but sure as hell not mixed with water/ethylene glycol!

Not so much as looking for "the answer", but anyone have any ideas?? Where do I start, now? Could go as extreme as stripping it to the short block, jacking it up, pulling the pan, then give the engine a double rotation back to TDC...just to visually check the block. Bore tolerances were fine (even 78.8mm).




Edit:

Never did get the head to final torque @75ft/lbs hot. Only got to 69ft/lbs cold. Should I just do final torque and pray?