2.3L ('83-'97) Oil pouring from between Engine and Tranny

[4RingCircus]

Hi all. 2.3 1987 Lima, fm145 5 speed manual. Was pouring oil before I changed the rear main. Yes, I waited too long. I was literally adding 4 quarts of oil between every tank of gas!

Well, Just finished putting it back together… and it still pours oil. Did a compression test, and lost about 1/3 cup in just a 5 minute warmup idle.

Thought maybe a bad head gasket as well. Compression was 170, 170, 180, 170. The compression test would suggest it’s fine, yes?

thoughts? still a bad head gasket? Rear main install error? I also read that possibly bad crank bearings could cause the crank to move with the pressure plate and clutch push on the flywheel, thus causing a rear main leak.

Here’s a pic from right before I replaced the rear main…..

 

[RonD]

Oil is pretty high so could be the cam shaft seal plug, 3rd picture, but "it looks OK"
Or the new rear main didn't seal

Did you feel the crank surface for lines?
If crank surface is not smooth the it will tear up a new seal almost instantly

You can get Sleeved Rear Mains for most engines
It comes with a sleeve that slides over the crank shaft so new seal has a smooth surface to seal to, if crank is not
And the seal is slightly larger diameter to fit the now larger crank diameter

I have used these on a few different engines, but not a Lima, and they worked great



You compression numbers are very good

 

[scotts90ranger]

I agree it's wet high which would be valve cover gasket, the blue FelPro one you have is usually pretty good but it looks somewhat crusty, the bolts like to back out too... no cam plug on the back of the Lima engines, the valve cover goes around the back of the cam.

The only other oil up high is the oil pressure sender/switch which is the only clean part of the oil system on your engine, if that thing is loose it could be your problem... Oil only goes through the head gasket in a tiny spot right above the oil switch up to the camshaft so it's very unlikely to be that.

Believe me, I've had serious oil leaks on my '90 over the last few years so I've pondered most of the possible leak areas... I even had my head rebuilt just to be sure since I thought it had loose valve guides... turns out it was the turbo drainback tube was about 40% of mine, another big chunk was the camshaft pulley bolt and now I think the oil galley plugs on the back of the block are the rest of it...

If I had to venture a guess it would be your valve cover bolts have backed out a bunch if not a couple missing (BTDT) judging by all the sludge that leads from that area along with a loose oil switch (BTDT there too...) grab yourself a 5/16" socket on a nut driver and check the valve cover bolts (even just the ones you can get to with everything assembled) and start there, maybe wiggle your arm to the oil pressure switch and try to turn it by hand, if it does I think it's a 7/16" wrench or maybe 1/2"...

 

[RonD]

OOPS on the rear cam plug

 

[scotts90ranger]

That'll happen , I've spent too much time thinking of oil leak areas over the years, and I forget too, until I saw the blue line in his picture...

 

[4RingCircus]

@scotts90ranger Yes, the back valve cover bolts were loose. I tightened them and it stopped smoking (yeah, it was smoking too). But, oil is still pouring out.

@RonD. I think you might be right. I did feel the crankshaft and no, it wasn’t perfectly smooth. It had some whitish sort of build up. I scraped it off and smoothed it out to the touch with a soft scraper. But I bet it needs a sleeve.
Here’s a screenshot of a video I took right after tightening the valve cover. Those brown streaks are oil dripping from the bottom, and the left side by the mounting bolt