2010 Engine blowing coolant

[ljcpwalker]

I've got a 1963 2010 that I recently bought from the 3rd owner. He never used it much and before that it was used at a small placer mining operation. It's a gas model and has been blowing coolant out the overflow tube. I have changed the oil and antifreeze recently when I gave it a tuneup and they were both clean. I'm figuring that it just needs the head gasket replaced as I havent run it much and it hasn't over heated. The question I have is... is there a way to tell that the top head gasket is leaking and not the bottom. If i replace the top gasket and it's still leaking then i'll need to take the bottom of the engine down to replace the gasket under the sleave plate right? Once the top gasket has been installed then taken apart again will this ruin the gasket? Is it a really bad idea to rebuild the top end and replace only gaskets and have nothing else done? It's main use is to plow snow a few times through the winter and skid logs. I used it to backfill our basement last summer and put in/maintain our 1/2 mile road. It doesnt get tons of use so I don't want to sink tons of $ into it. I would have had it rebuilt by a shop until we started receiving substantial medical bills from complications of the birth of our second son.

I also have a quick question about the hydraulic tensioner on my right track. It recently started pushing grease out the seal. I have a complete owners and parts manual and it shows a different kind of tensioner for the tracks. A threaded lock nut type. Is it possible to remove the hydraulic tensioners and replace them with the manual tensioner in order to do away with grease, seals, etc.? We have temperatures ranging from -70 to +80 and are 4 hours from Fairbanks so the simpler the better.

Finally is there any sources for the track seals and engine gaskets/kits besides John Deere? Can I get them through here?

Thanks Much!

I'll got a few pictures here.
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_By4NDzHdkJQ/S ... CT0048.JPG
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_By4NDzHdkJQ/S ... CT0054.JPG

[jtrichard]

Nice looking machine as for the plate gasket if it is bad coolant will run on the out side of the block if the sleave seals where bad it will run coolant into the oil pan the only ways to push the coolant out of the rad. is a bad head gasket crack in a sleave which i dout or a cracked head or a stuck t stat but that would show as hot and just boiling the water out you can do just the head gasket without doing the plate gasket just dont turn the engine over with the head off unless you put atleast two bolts in the plate you might be abel to get the head gasket form any good parst store i just did my 2010 diesel and JD was not bad on the price there gas 2010 gasket sets on ebay as for the track adj. if you reseal it it should last for years i would not go to man. adj. for anything hope this helps RICHARD