oil consumption... member needs help

Member-
I have an oil consumption problem, like a quart every 200 miles or so. The car sits alot and I haven't noticed any oil on the garage floor so I'm assuming it's lost while the engine is running. The other day I got underneath it and looked around real good. There's alot of oil from the front of the engine to the middle of the transmission, from a couple inches above the oil pan on down. Above the oil pan there is oil, but not as much. I don't think it's road grime or whatever, I'm pretty sure it's oil. There seems to be oil coming out of the heads, and when I removed a couple of the spark plugs the threads were pretty heavily coated with oil, and they were fouled pretty bad - black sooty stuff. The thermostat housing is leaking also, but someone told me (not sure if it's true) that almost all chrome thermostat housings leak anyway. Also I can smell exhaust from inside the car, even while driving, and the headers have soot on several of the pipes close to the block, where the pipes meet the flange. So basically I am assuming all the seals are dry rotted. Before I have a big problem, I'd like to fix it all at once, I would imagine its easier to do it all at once anyway. That's it in a nutshell, what do you think?

Me-
First things first, before you do any major work, run a compression test on the engine to check its overall health. If youre burning that much oil, my first guess is that youve got blown piston rings, this might also explain the other oil leaks. When the piston rings go, the pressure of combustion will pressurize the crank case and will force oil out of the valve covers, oil pan, PCV, and will burn the oil. My brothers bronco just had this problem and was spewing oil all over the place. We just bought a new engine. So run the compression test to find out if youre going to have to completely rebuild the engine rather than just put new gaskets on it.

Now if it passes the compression test (id be surprised) you have some pretty standard work to do. First thing though is that if your compression is fine, make sure you are really burning oil, are you blowing blue/white smoke behind the car as you drive? have you failed emissions testing??? (you probly dont run emissions but i thought id ask) and even if you dont run emissions, it might be a worthwhile tuning tool, have it run and see if its burning clean. If there isnt any evidence to suggest you are burning oil, then you are just losing that much oil from leaking gaskets which is pretty friggin scary.

The valve covers are pretty much a no brainer. Alot of people mess up here on details though, skip the cheap cork gaskets first off, get the steel core rubber ones, they seal alot better. Also are you running thin stamped valve covers? my brother put some edelbrock valvecovers on and they leaked like a siv. Also make sure you dont over tighten any gasket clamping surface. This isnt a point of tighter is better, you can overtighten and crush the gasket and it will leak.

It also sounds like you have a front main seal leaking at the front of the oil pan. This along with the rear main seal is a very common leak to small block chevy's. Youll have to pull the pan off, although im not sure if youll have to pull the crank out or not. This shouldnt require the removal of the engine, but it would certainly make it easier. I would probly pull the engine to do this job.

As far as the leaking thermostat housing, if it leaks, its not worth the pretty factor, get a good old cast unit. or buy a better chrome one. The fact that its chromed shouldnt mean anything, its the quality of the manufacturing process.

So thats pretty much the quick and dirty of your possiblities, I am pretty confident that you have blown piston rings though, So thats where i would start.

So let me ask a few questions just out of curiosity...

is this the original engine?
how many miles on it?
has it ever been taken apart?
did it sit for a really long period say in a field?

looks like you covered all the bases short of cracked head or block

Geno... you're gonna make me cry. It failed compression test, 4 cylinders @ 180, 3 cylinders 175, 170 160, one @ 40. Mainly driver's side out of whack.

I think I might park it overnight someplace near Broad and Diamond in Philly with the windows open...

you can just drop it off at my house and forget it ever existed :D

Before you scrap it, try adding a qt of auto trans fluid to the oil and run it around like that for a day. Drain it, change the filter add new oil.
It could just be stuck rings, the trans fluid will eat all of the gunk out of everywhere and loosen up the rings (if they are just stuck).

i have a 87 iroc i will trade you . i love your ride man. a 50 yearguy would look great in that car

earlsfat; somebody should slap you for talking like that about the red camaro. i hate youth

earlsfat; somebody should slap you for talking like that about the red camaro. i hate youth

That's a "mature" comment, what did he even say that was so bad? I can't see it, was the post erased or something?

He meant leaving it for someone to steal. The part of he's missing is... I collect insurance and buy new one without the headaches.

Hey Harley, if 33 qualifies for youth then you must be in rotten shape!

Hey, ealrsfat, i'll trade you MY broken down 3rd gen for your broken down 2gen, sounds like all fair trade for me since you're ripping me off. Lol :D

I would start with the valve seals and work my way thru, but such great sonsumption of oil would be from failing rings- I had a problem like this before , but i got lucky and totalled the car the same day it started really smoking (than I realized that it had 220k miles on 305) And when a v8 smokes its a lot of smoke) When rings fail the car smokes from time to time and u wont even notice it at first, maybe if its a sunny day and the engine is cold. The compression test might not show the condition of your oil rings which can be scuffed or broken or impropely seated now. I would take the heades off and see whats wrong with engine-maybe its time to swap...

my best friend is having the same problem with his mustang gt, but his compression is fine... had it checked... someimte the valve seals can cause this problem too.

valves seals will cause oil consumption, but the drop in compression is either blown rings, or a blown piston for sure. Remember guys this engine is an 11:1 big block driven on the street. id say it just beat itself up. time for a rebuild. run a race engine, work on a race engine. :)

sniff sniff, time to get greasy? is replacing broken shit easy (relatively speaking) or am I gonna have a nervous breakdown trying to figure out what the hell size rings and pistons etc I need?


You know all I have to really say is: fuck.