Guess what - HGF

Well you've answered your own question really by saying you'll have to get someone to do any work required.
But please make sure that whoever you get to do the job is up to speed with K series engines.

Hi Hogweed. Its certainly worth getting it checked. As D4KGP has rightly said plus the received wisdom of others; it is imperative it to take it to one of the reccommended specialists who know the K series inside out.

From everything I have read it wont cost any more than using a knockabout corner garage but the job will be done right by experts and there is no risk it will need to be repeated again in a few months due to a mechanic failing to measure the cylinder liner height so picking the wrong gasket.

Looking at your picture, it doesn't look promising!
There is no way of really diagnosing a warped head without removing it and putting a straight edge across it, you can use a compression test, a cylinder leak down test, a sniff test or a coolant system pressure test to diagnose a failed head gasket, and they can indicate other possible combustion chamber problems such as a cracked or warped head, a unseated, cracked or porous cylinder liner, but the only way to know how bad the problem is, will require removing the head to be sure.

Thanks everybody. Yes just trying to track a specialist down here in NI is the problem - we did have an excellent guy who was a magician with all things MGR, but he lost interest a couple of years ago and just packed the whole thing in. Sadly he can't recommend anybody else either, so it may be a struggle. I have one lead to follow up - will post any updates here.

The guy is about 15 miles away - I'm assuming it wouldn't be a great plan to drive the car to him

Update - managed to get hold of him. He's done dozens of these in his long career (ex main MGR dealer mechanic here) and can do it in February hopefully. Will post updates...

Good news! Fixed in time for a Spring outing.

Thats really good news

So... my local guy is now showing signs of not wanting to do it - though he used to be a specialist, that's years ago now, and I think he's less keen than expected.

There is still a semi-local expert, but he's about 15 miles away. So the question is... I've only driven maybe 20 miles since I noticed the problem. Would it be very inadvisable to drive it slowly to him, with maybe an hour's break in the middle, or would this be seriously risking making things worse?

Ta

Hi,
It maybe worth having a look at Rough Luck Racings web site.
I know that they used to get around quite a bit, UK wide and most of Europe.

Or Russell Walsh. He did mine in the middle of January, outside. Good man.

Thanks for the recommendations - unfortunately, a phrase we in my part of the world get very familiar with is "excludes NI"

The ride of shame.......on the back of a tow truck!