850 Engine leak down problem Topic is solved

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Help. I have a 1994 850 turbo wagon. I took it in for a NOX sensor. This turned into needing a new turbo because of oil leaking into the breather box/intercooler. Then, the mechanic told me the head was bad and needed to be rebuilt because the seals were cracked. I had the head rebuilt and installed a new turbo along with new breather box and all new crank case breather hoses. Unfortunately, the car still smokes like the batmobile. Now the mechanic is telling me I have 40% leak down in a number of cylinders and he wants to re-ring the engine. Anyone know anything about this? Can you re-ring this engine? Will this fix the problem? I called another mechanic and he said to quadruple check the crankcase breather sysstem. Help?

[Paul93-850]

Be sure to have your mechanic invite you over for at least one swim this summer in his new in-ground pool! Did you ask him to fix the turbo or did you ask him to fix the smoke problem? Try to stay general so that at some point you can say - the problem is still not fixed and now you are paying for it Mr. Mechanic! Dare we ask how much you've spent up to this point? I know repairs aren't always cheap. I had my rear main seal replaced recently for $800CDN. After awhile, one runs out of organs to sell.

cheers.

[matthew1]

Not just any pool -- a big pool with a high dive and a bbq pit next to it.

Sorry jcabrower, don't mean to make jokes at your expense, but it sounds like there could be some shenanegans going on with your mechanic's diagnosis. I'd take it to a reputable indy mechanic or dealer with a list of fixes that the mechanic did. Sit down, go over them, see where you are and where you need to go with repairs.

[Starting to dislike volvo]

my 2000 s70 has 93000 miles and it leaks oil. 6months ago i had the front and rear seals replaced. the dealers service department did the repairs. it was ok for about 8000 mi but has begun to leak again. i am getting pretty unhappy about it all because i bought the volvo based upon it's reputation for long service. i had planned to keep it 4-500k miles. doesn't make sense to me to replace seals every 6 months.

[White850Turbo]

I called another mechanic and he said to quadruple check the crankcase breather sysstem. Help?

I was wondering when someone was going to mention this. I think you need to start seeing this other mechanic you called. It is completely normal for the turbo to cause oil vapor to be deposited in both the intercooler piping and the intercooler itself. It's how the PCV system works on these cars. Speaking of the PCV system, it being clogged can cause you to use up quite a bit of oil and blow blue smoke out. The PCV system being clogged also places excess pressure on all of the seals in the engine, and as the last poster just mentioned, it can cause leaks. What people will often do is treat the symptoms of the problem, but not the cause of the problem, and expect it to all be better. Unless you're past about 130k miles, the rear main seal doesn't just "wear out". If it goes out before then, there's a good reason it did so and it can most often be attributed to that blasted PCV system. A simple way to test your PCV system is to pull the dipstick out while the engine is running. If you get a moderate to heavy amount of smoke coming out, the system isn't working right and you need to pull the manifold to fix it.