2000 V70 2.3L Oil leak

[callmeskywalker]

Hi there, my name is Kyle and I acquired my car about 2 years ago now.
I noticed a slow leak in my oil system about 3 months ago.
Over the past 3 weeks it has worsened.
Yesterday the problem became very noticeable.

I have been driving this car back and forth between Syracuse and the Bronx frequently. (~250 miles)
Yesterday was another one of those road-trips. (avg speed ~65mph)
Before I left yesterday there was a little bit of oil on the dip stick. (maybe 2cm on the bottom)
I added enough oil to it so it hit the set of x's on the dipstick and began the road-trip.

I stopped about halfway through the trip and noticed a smell as well as a thin coat of oil on my rear tires and the back of the car.
I should have added more oil at this point but I didn't think to do it at the time.
When I got into Syracuse I checked the oil again, after having the car off for about 20 minutes and it was completely empty.
I added enough to get it into the acceptable range and proceeded going home.

This morning I had the car towed to the local Pep Boys.
They called me about an hour ago and said the following parts were leaking and gave me price estimates.
Though I am skeptical about the diagnosis.

• Valve cover $470
  Head gasket $2000
  Exhaust manifold $470

Some more relevant information:

About 2+1/2 months ago a check engine light came on.
I was able to check out the code with an Autel tool.
It was a bad air-fuel sensor.
This part costs about $250.
My father and I decided to wait on repairing this.
I don't believe that this should be connected to the oil leak.
However at this time (around March) no warnings showed up in the Autel tool regarding oil systems.

Unfortunately my father and his friend who we do all of our auto repairs with and together are 5+1/2 hours away from me.

Observations:

The leak seems to be coming from the passenger side of the car, right behind the wheel.
When I was looking underneath there was oil all over the place in that area.
It appeared as if the oil had blown back all underneath the passenger side of the car.

There were two places in the middle and rear of the car where there were drips coming from. (passenger side)
I think that this was due to the oil blowing towards the back of the car.

This car has an oil warning light on the dash board.
This light was not illuminated at any times during the past 3 months.

When I opened the hood and looked at the engine, I did not see any oil on the top of the engine.
I did not see any oil along the upper sides of the engine.

The engine sounded within a very small margin error, normal.
I did not hear any knocking sounds or any other weird noises.
It sounded no different than what I am used to with it.

Concluding:

If this fix really is going to cost $3000 dollars obviously the car is shot.
I guess what I am hoping to hear back from the forum members are similar problems and advice.

As of now I think that I am going to attempt to drive the vehicle to my fathers where we can work on it ourselves. (5hr drive)
Obviously checking and filling the oil frequently during the drive.
I have trouble believing the diagnosis from pep boys.

Hearing any comments, concerns or suggestions from the forum members will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

p.s. here is an image of the oil stains the car left on the road last night. I know this is hardly enough for a diagnosis but here it is anyways.

http://i.imgur.com/kScnBV2.jpg

[abscate]

Welcome Kyle!! Go Orange....brace yourself by sitting down.

1 Make sure your oil light is operational. Turn your key on, without starting, and make sure you see the genie oil can symbol so you know that at least you have a chance at saving your engine if you run out. The light is an oil pressure warning light, not a level light.When it comes on, you are seconds away from major engine damage, not minutes.

2 Running the engine low on oil is b...aa....d....its a quick way to really destroy a nice car. Now that you know you are using oil, you need to do a weekly - daily- hourly check of your oil level. You also need to keep a cheap case of oil in your trunk because when you are off the stick, you CANT DRIVE - even to get more oil.

3 The AUTEL tools only tell you about engine management issues - ECU, fuel, ignition stuff. It won't tell you about leaks and other malaise

4 All your oil is coming from the engine somewhere. Candidates are

oil cooler (looks like a biscuit on your 2000, way under the engine.
One of the two Camshaft seals on pass side (front on engine)
Front crank seal

5 Ignore the PEP boys diagnosis for now - its unlikely these guys know these cars well enough to make this kind of call. These cars don't have anything called an air/fuel sensor, so they are learning about your car with you. Read off the actual code on the AUTEL (P####) so we can see what that is saying. You are correct, the code has nothing to do with your oil leak.

I just had a friend nurse an old Honda from Boston to Detroit using a liter of oil every 125 miles. She stopped every hour, waited 10 minutes, then checked oil and topped off. You can do this, but you have to pay attention the whole way.

[callmeskywalker]

Hi abscate, thanks for the detailed and quick response.

1 Make sure your oil light is operational. Turn your key on, without starting, and make sure you see the genie oil can symbol so you know that at least you have a chance at saving your engine if you run out. The light is an oil pressure warning light, not a level light.When it comes on, you are seconds away from major engine damage, not minutes.

I will check this when I go to get the car today. Good to learn that is a pressure warning light. Hopefully there is no issue with this light. I recall that when we had the AUTEL hooked up to it a few months back the light was functioning when we ran a dashboard gauge test.

2 Running the engine low on oil is b...aa....d....its a quick way to really destroy a nice car. Now that you know you are using oil, you need to do a weekly - daily- hourly check of your oil level. You also need to keep a cheap case of oil in your trunk because when you are off the stick, you CANT DRIVE - even to get more oil.

I actually have been keeping oil in the trunk, and I will continue to do so!

4 All your oil is coming from the engine somewhere. Candidates are

oil cooler (looks like a biscuit on your 2000, way under the engine.
One of the two Camshaft seals on pass side (front on engine)
Front crank seal

Thanks for the targets. I will keep these in mind and look into them some more.

5 Ignore the PEP boys diagnosis for now - its unlikely these guys know these cars well enough to make this kind of call. These cars don't have anything called an air/fuel sensor, so they are learning about your car with you. Read off the actual code on the AUTEL (P####) so we can see what that is saying. You are correct, the code has nothing to do with your oil leak.

OK, I will continue to ignore the diagnosis for now. I actually came up with the name for that sensor myself. I think may actually be called an oxygen sensor? This was a code we had looked into with the AUTEL. I forget the code at the moment but that sensor is producing incorrect voltages, which we actually were able to monitor as a function of time with the AUTEL (in real time). We decided it would be harmless to wait a little while for that fix as long as fuel-efficiency did not dip way down.

I just had a friend nurse an old Honda from Boston to Detroit using a liter of oil every 125 miles. She stopped every hour, waited 10 minutes, then checked oil and topped off. You can do this, but you have to pay attention the whole way.

Good to hear that it is possible. For now I am going forward with getting the car back home. I will check every hour along the way.

Thanks, again. I will try to post updates with how things are going.
Look forward to hearing more from you abscate or anyone else.

[cn90]

Stay away from Pep Boys.

Search forum, tons of info but you have to do your own search. Also tons of DIYs...

[callmeskywalker]

Stay away from Pep Boys.

Search forum, tons of info but you have to do your own search. Also tons of DIYs...

Will do. Thanks.