this is going to be pretty long, but i feel you need to know whats been going on the last few days to fully assess the situation, so please bear with me.

8/25
i have a 96 gsx, and i took it to a friend's house to have an 02 housing put on. the car sits too low to fit a jack underneath it, so i drove the car in between the driveway and the street to create a space for the jack to fit. i turn the car off and the turbo timer kicks in. well after the tt runs for it's alotted time, the car is still running. and all the while the coolant/temp needle is steadily rising. we unplug the battery. no go. at this point the coolant needle hits the top of the gauge and coolant starts to spew from the overflow tank. we unplug the spark plug wires and shut the car off. after letting the car cool down, we bolt the 02 housing back in, add coolant and i get the car home asap.

the problem isn't the fact that the car stayed running, thats been taken care of. read on. during the drive home, the car didn't overheat. i even let it idle and it didn't overheat. the fan came on like it was supposed to.

8/26
in an attempt to change the 02 housing out again, i drive over to my friend's house(car is fine, no overheating) and he changes out the 02 housing. i hop in the car ready to leave, turn the keys and the car starts and then dies almost instantly. we thought the problem was electrical, since the gaskets were put on correctly, and everything was bolted up like it should've been. fast forward to today.

8/27
we start the car up, it idles really crappy at maybe 100-400 rpm. it dies most of the time, but we catch it idling a few times and try to give it gas. a stream of white smoke comes out of the exhaust, not alot but enough to make me think that a blown head gasket is a serious possibility. the car is outfitted with a 4 layer cometic hg, so it'd take a lot to blow it. we burped the coolant lines after adding some. no go. we replaced the spark plugs. no go. unplugged the maf sensor and even changed the 02 sensor. no go. there was no coolant leaking from the seals or anything of that nature, and we checked the dipstick to make sure there wasn't any coolant in the oil.

honestly, i'm leaning toward a blown head gasket. but the car NEVER overheated that rapidly before, while idling no less. sure it would slowly rise a bit if you stayed in WOT/boost, but i assume that's normal for boosted applications. any ideas? anything would be appreciated at this point. thanks in advance guys.

you can reach me at 757-619-0970 if you wanna talk in person. my name is ri.