7genmarathon

iTrader: (1)

Yo. I finally got bored believe it or not and thought I would try to diagnose my engine oil leak and take a few pics while im at it to show you guys.


^^^ Leakage looks like its from that plug adjacent to the EGR. I found a thread with the exact same leak like that...Thats the GOOD news..


Hope you guys can see the exent of the leak in this pic ^^(top left corner and the area below where the EGR sits) Looks delicious...


Front side looking down. You can see the stock chassis ground in the middle of the pic if you cant figure out where this is at.




Oil pan...





Evidence it may be the oil pan gasket ^^ I doubt it in the following pictures.


This is looking at the timing belt etc from the wheel well while jacked up.





Im hoping it to be just the cylinder head cover. I dont have any proof its a head gasket leak. Doubt it. Trance amount of coolant in resevoir, and no white smoke out of the tailpipe. From the looks of it, there is leakage on the belt's side, front side(in the pic) and left side(egr side).

Its a slow leak. It burns oil in the summer. Last oil change was in June 2010, only put a quart in since. Yeh its coming on a change..Im waiting until I have the time to change it out and clean all that gunk out to get a better idea of where its coming from.

Whats the verdict

xRiCeBoYx

iTrader: (22)

Your oil pan is an RTV gasket all the way around. You can buy a tube of the stuff at autozone.

The plug next to the EGR valve is your cam seal. It may be a little trickier to get that one out. You might be able to pry it out if you wanna replace it. Either that, or you're gonna have to do a little disassembling under the valve cover (removing the top half of the rocker assembly). Not hard, just make sure you have a torque wrench handy. A haynes manual wouldn't hurt either, if you don't have one.

For future reference, when supporting the engine using a jack, put a block of wood between your oil pan and the jack. The oil pan is only made of aluminum, and you may risk damaging it.

for now, I'd grab some engine degreaser, clean the areas you think the leak(s) is(are) coming from, then monitor for leakage every other day or so. It'll help you pinpoint the actual location.

7genmarathon

iTrader: (1)

All im going to do in the short term future(no later than mid-march) is just clean the crap out of everything to get a better fix on the locations. Until I can identify beyond a reasonable doubt that its the oil pan im not gonna rush into it. Its not a major leak ive just had enough of it scarring my driveway!

xRiCeBoYx

iTrader: (22)

haha, fair enough. All the potential leak sites you pointed out aren't terribly hard fixes. They might just be tedious, or you'll have to removed a seemingly unecessary amount of things just to get to it.

The oil pan may be a bit of a bitch to get off, as it's effectively glued on with RTV, and you just gotta be careful with the rocker assembly.

Oh, and if you find a leak from your valve cover, that requires a dab of RTV as well, just where the gasket makes shark bends. The rocker assembly also requires a dab of RTV on the 4 "corners" of it.

But seriously, if you don't have a haynes manual, grab one.

7genmarathon

iTrader: (1)

I have a software version which is pretty similiar to haynes...give you step by step, etc..Ive looked at it and it mentioned the sharp edges where replacing it might require rtv. I just really hope its that, its best case scenario realistically.

I ran out of daylight to check around the oil filter.lol.

boosted01civic

iTrader: (2)

Change the oil pan gasket. Very simple and it wouldn't hurt to go ahead and change it. Will also eliminate one of the suspected culprits. Took me about 35 mins to do mine and mine is turbo. Why waste time with cleaning first and waiting longer for problem to get worse just spend an hour one night sand change the gasket.

7genmarathon

iTrader: (1)

I cleaned up a little on the engine block and took a picture of what might help solve my oil leak. Hopefully this pic helps narrow it down! It might be useless I dunno.



The upper block is distinctly cleaner than the lower block, where the oil filter is attached to. That wire is the knock sensor I think?

Help me out!

TRIZ

iTrader: (14)

Well it looks like all around the oil filter is dirty with oil (more so then what would come from oil changes) and it looks burnt on, as well as on the side of the block by the belts... I'd pull out the air intake manifold and get a better look with a good LED flashlight and spray engine degreaser all over your engine bay and under carriage. Shoot it with a steamer afterwards if you have one, that will really clean it up. It'll take a few hours, but you can go back and look the bay over a week later and find exactly where the oil leak is coming from because everything is clean and the oil is fresh.

7genmarathon

iTrader: (1)

Thanks for the feedback. Im slowly narrowing it down with yalls help. I did some cleaning behind the belts and after coming home from class I noticed the freshest looking oil drip flowing down from an area under the timing belt cover.


^^This rubber seal does not look good..I spotted it while the vehicle was running and I could see the crankshaft spinning(the little sliver of shiny metal beyond the rubber seal) I read on this DIY that Gearbox mentions this rubber seal. Crankshaft oil seal, oil pump right?



The yellow circles show where im guessing the oil is coming from. I will get a better view when I take the timing belt cover/s off<< That can be done easily right? Ive peeked in Diy's but they have been taken off after removing major engine components...

lazlong

^^ Yeah that gasket is bad. What are we looking at, the camshaft? If that's the camshaft then that's the head cover gasket. You should be able to get it as a set with the spark plug gaskets at the auto parts store.

If your gonna take the timing cover off, you might as well change the timing belt and water pump if it's anywhere near time. It's not hard to get the timing cover off, it just takes enough time and scraped knuckles that you don't want to be doing it again in the next year.

7genmarathon

iTrader: (1)

I wish that pulley was the camshaft. It's crankshaft, or the lowest one to the ground... The belts and h2o pump was changed..20k miles ago. See that little spec of metal between the rubber seal and the oil pan? That's the crankshaft. I could see it spinning round and round while idling..most def have to take timing belt off for that one. But before I peel away I need to find that upper leak too...since tb will inevitably come off, I should replace every gasket/seal as possible...overhaul!!

lazlong

^^ That blows, sorry dude.