Post Timing Belt Blues (Valve Cover Leak?)

bright · Post by **bright** » 02 Nov 2009, 22:11

Hello All,
After a successful (and frustrating) timing belt chance I noticed something new. Oil is leaking from both the upper right corners of what I can best call the cam/valve cover. It's the piece of metal that separates the cam from the outer world. It's not the black cover, but the one underneath it.

I'm not sure what I did, but I've included some pics. Might it be a gasket after all?

: RightCorner.JPG (195.26 KiB) Viewed 2041 times

Could it be oil being blown from the cyclinder one area of the valve cover to the cyclinder six area?

: FrontUpperCorner.JPG (184.09 KiB) Viewed 2041 times

Thanks.
Lee

EDay · Post by **EDay** » 03 Nov 2009, 03:32

yea..that is just from the cam/valve cover gasket. replace it and it will be just fine.

bright · Post by **bright** » 03 Nov 2009, 23:09

I checked the area near cyclinder 1 several times and noticed that an increasingly larger amount of oil was coming out.

I figured that I had nothing to loose by tightening the bolts, and it turns out that bolt nearest the leak was very loose. So it is possible that was the problem. Oil was being blown from cylinder 1 to cylinder six area after all. I hope that this cures it.

I couldn't find any parts number for a valve cover gasket on any site. So if anyone knows of a place let me know. It could be good practice just to replace it anyways.

I'll keep y'all updated.

Thanks,
Lee

EDay · Post by **EDay** » 04 Nov 2009, 01:27

try to tighten the bolt as recomended using torque wrench and clean the oil surface on that area, if lucky you don't need to replace the gasket and helps keeping you budjet

bright · Post by **bright** » 04 Nov 2009, 02:06

Thanks for the advice. I saw that you are from Brunei. I head that it is very expensive to own a car there. Is that true? In American we consider car ownership an unspoken right. It takes a *lot* to have one's license revoked.

Post by **billofdurham** » 04 Nov 2009, 11:47

The valve cover gasket is liquid as is the sump (oil pan) gasket. You can read about it here.

Bill.

bright · Post by **bright** » 04 Nov 2009, 22:44

Bill, thanks for the info.

To conclude this thread:

During my haste I accidentally loosened this bolt. It was loose enough for oil to escape under pressure.

I tightened the bolt to the same torque as the others. The leak at cylinder one is cured.

The leak near cylinder 6 was, in fact, oil being blown down the rail by wind.

Thanks to all for their help.

Lee

Post by **billofdurham** » 05 Nov 2009, 11:49

Glad all turned out well. Thank you for the update.

Bill.