Frustration level 10! Round cap blown off top of engine Topic is solved

[Legofan]

Passed a car on a rural road and then smoke comes billowing out of the hood. F**K!

Open the hood to find oil all over the passenger turbo, heat shield and top of engine. WTF is that hole on the head?! g*d d*** cap blew off.

Ok, I'm frustrated....why did this pressed in cap blow off? HOW?!

I found it sitting on the heat shield and popped it back in. Now what?

[jimmy57]

Your crankcase vent system is likely stopped up. Clean the area around cap and the push in the cap and then tap it in the middle to flatten it a bit as that expands it. Then to assure it is leak proof seal put JB Weld around the perimeter to adhere cap to aluminum of the head.
I have only seen those come out if there is too much pressure in engine so it might come out again if the crankcase vent system is not serviced.

[ThommyKent]

Don`t blame Volvo. If you skimp on maintenance shit happens. You PCV system is clogged, fix it or get it fixed. In your case since you seem lacking in knowledge get it fixed. expect $500

[s10lowrider1994]

Things tend to fall apart when you neglect them, any car with a bad pcv system will give you a headache sooner or later. My Saab had a failing pcv system when I bought it and that alone caused all kinds of issues. The turbo seals were blown, front crank seal leaking, oil pump seal leaking, oil pressure switch dripping everywhere. It was using a quart of oil every 200 miles and the car only had 88,000 miles. Owner gave up and sold it to me for peanuts, it's a great car now but dude could've spent like $70 and avoided all of those problems.

[Legofan]

Your crankcase vent system is likely stopped up. Clean the area around cap and the push in the cap and then tap it in the middle to flatten it a bit as that expands it. Then to assure it is leak proof seal put JB Weld around the perimeter to adhere cap to aluminum of the head.
I have only seen those come out if there is too much pressure in engine so it might come out again if the crankcase vent system is not serviced.

Thanks for the input, after talking with the dealer it was a bad cover so I'm replacing it. Crank pressure is good, but like with most engines at higher rpm there is crank pressure. I bought the car severely neglected and I've been working on it for the past eight months. It's frustrating when things like this happen that shouldn't. I blame Volvo for bad design.

Getting some other work done and I should be good to go.

[Legofan]

Don`t blame Volvo. If you skimp on maintenance shit happens. You PCV system is clogged, fix it or get it fixed. In your case since you seem lacking in knowledge get it fixed. expect $500

Hey thanks, your comment was worthless and also wrong.

Things tend to fall apart when you neglect them, any car with a bad pcv system will give you a headache sooner or later. My Saab had a failing pcv system when I bought it and that alone caused all kinds of issues. The turbo seals were blown, front crank seal leaking, oil pump seal leaking, oil pressure switch dripping everywhere. It was using a quart of oil every 200 miles and the car only had 88,000 miles. Owner gave up and sold it to me for peanuts, it's a great car now but dude could've spent like $70 and avoided all of those problems.

It's not the PVC system, but thanks for your reply.

[s10lowrider1994]

What nobody has addressed is that caps like that don't randomly blow off unless there is excess pressure where it shouldn't be. Your car either has a pcv problem or the engine is clapped out to the point where the factory pcv can't expel pressure fast enough thanks to increased blow by. Many higher mileage cars or neglected cars have issues like this and it's why you see people increasing the size of the hoses on the pcv system so it can handle the excessive blow by. Your engine is building pressure under load faster than it can expel it for one of two reasons. JB weld a new cap on though, the pressure will find somewhere else to escape.

[Legofan]

What nobody has addressed is that caps like that don't randomly blow off unless there is excess pressure where it shouldn't be. Your car either has a pcv problem or the engine is clapped out to the point where the factory pcv can't expel pressure fast enough thanks to increased blow by. Many higher mileage cars or neglected cars have issues like this and it's why you see people increasing the size of the hoses on the pcv system so it can handle the excessive blow by. Your engine is building pressure under load faster than it can expel it for one of two reasons. JB weld a new cap on though, the pressure will find somewhere else to escape.

Solid advice, jb weld.....right

[s10lowrider1994]

I was kidding, hence the part about the pressure going somewhere else. Installing a new cap isn't going to fix what caused it to blow out. Did the dealer do a leakdown test or just put a glove over the dipstick and assume things were fine? You're not going to find anyone that has seen one of those caps blow out all by itself which is why people keeping telling you that the problem is elsewhere. Things like mileage, modifcations, etc. can all play a part in what might have happened, but you didn't mention any of those. You just assumed the cap fell out and the car was designed poorly but these engines don't randomly pressurize and destroy unless something isn't right. It sounds to me like you bought someone else's problem and nobody who's touched it so far has the slightest clue what they're looking at.

[ThommyKent]

It could be a bad cap that came off under normal pressure, unusual though and in that case I could see blaming Volvo. Glad it turned out to be simple and not expensive.