Well I m 22 now age does not matter b/c SM made me into pretty knowledgeable person on my car ..... I went from fixing everyone bikes in the neighborhood as a kid to working on a non turbo supra at 17. My advice you is buy your self a camera and take pictures of everything so can remember where everything was located before you took it apart and make sure you mark things with nail polish. Buy all the different colors and take the time to mark all the parts and connectors. Do not trust your memory. I tried to trust my memory when I was working on first supra and it failed me horribly.
I spent 4 months on a head gasket job but my second head gasket job on my current car took me a few days. But the machine shop had my head for a day just to check out and they did a minor resurface. I could have been done in 3-4 days keep in mind I am student, I manage valet company and I coach soccer in the evenings. I was working on the car in my free time during the day which is only a few hours and did the majority of the work on the weekend.
Seriously if you are not willing to learn how to do things yourself….. Get another car. A head gasket job will cost a minimum of $1000 at most shops and price only goes up. If you do it your self and have a machine shop inspect the head and do some work on the head it might cost you $200. A gasket set is like $150. For tools go and buy set of sockets and a wrench for like $30 while your at it buy some wrenches 10mm, 12mm, 14mm, 17mm, and 19mm that’s all you will need to take the car apart. But buy a quality tq wrench (craftsman or snap on just to name a few) and the head gasket bolt “tool” I forgot what is called.
The head gaskets job would only be $350 I don’t count the tools b/c they will come in handy for a lot of things plus anyone with a car should have some tools. I hope you would not have someone change your battery and charge you lol
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Or you could just buy a newer car …..
