1998 Blown Head Gasket in 2 Cylinders

I bought a 1998 Toyota 4Runner a few months ago with 285,000 miles and have since done a fair amount of maintenance, including new fuel injectors, radiator, thermostat, all coolant hoses, and the oil cooler gasket. The truck runs great, holds steady at around 192°F, has no oil in the coolant, and overall drives smoothly.


The only symptom I’ve noticed is a small amount of white smoke on cold startup that goes away after about 30 seconds.


I recently performed a compression test and found that all cylinders were between 195–200 psi, except for cylinder 4, which came in at 175 psi. I then did a cooling system pressure test and used a borescope, where I saw coolant visibly dripping into cylinder 4 near what appears to be the head gasket area. There was also a small amount of oil on that spark plug.


Wanting to rule out further issues, I inspected the other cylinders and found more coolant dripping into cylinder 5, although not as heavily. Since cylinders 4 and 5 are on opposite banks, I suspect both head gaskets are compromised. The first three photos are from cylinder 4, and the last two are from cylinder 5.


Is it common for head gaskets to fail in multiple places like this? Would I be better off pulling both heads, resurfacing them, and replacing the gaskets, or should I look into a lower-mileage replacement engine instead? Based on the videos, it looks like the leaks are coming from the gasket area, but is it also possible the heads are cracked?


The overall condition of the truck is excellent with no frame rust and a very clean body, so I’d like to invest in the right long-term fix. Any advice from those who have been through this would be greatly appreciated.

 

I'd do the head gasket.

Hard to know if an engine is lower mileage unless it comes straight from a wrecked 4runner with known miles. Otherwise, Junkyards just make up mileage numbers for engines they sell. Since yours runs really well...I'd keep it and do the head gasket.