Crazy Engine Oil Leak (1 Viewer)

[sfrolich]

I had a new 350 engine built up with Edelbrock Aluminum heads and a high pressure oil pump. I mash the gas yesterday and when I got to about 450RPM a big cloud of smoke comes into the cabin. That kinda freaked me out.

So today I start slowly increasing engine RPM while under the hood and sure enough it starts smoking again. I see the bottom back valve cover bolt are spewing oil. It looks to be forced out the hole because in one engine rev I was able to get oil to drip onto the floor. This doesn't look to be just dripping out of the valve cover.

So what's causing such a high pressure in the engine? I have a PVC valve hooked to the carb and another line from the valve cover that doesn't have the PVC valve to the air cleaner. I would have thought that would take care of and pressure.

I would replace the valve cover gaskets but I don't think that will help if the oil is being forced out. What do I do?

 

[Buckwheat]

Diagnose, don't guess

The hose w/PCV should be connected to manifold vacuum, the other line is the breather line, from the valve cover to atmosphere. It seems to me if you had excessive crankcase pressure, you would be blowing oil out everywhere. With the high volume pump, you may be squirting so much oil up top it ain't got time to run back down to the pan & is accumulating at the spot it's leaking, one of the reasons builders cleanup the oil drains in the heads. Pull the valve cover & reseal if the PCV is properly connected & try again.

 

[sfrolich]

The hose w/PCV should be connected to manifold vacuum, the other line is the breather line, from the valve cover to atmosphere. It seems to me if you had excessive crankcase pressure, you would be blowing oil out everywhere. With the high volume pump, you may be squirting so much oil up top it ain't got time to run back down to the pan & is accumulating at the spot it's leaking, one of the reasons builders cleanup the oil drains in the heads. Pull the valve cover & reseal if the PCV is properly connected & try again.

Thanks for the info. I really think it is a crankcase pressure problem because it doesn't just drip out of the valve cover screw holes but flows when the RPMs get high.

 

[bigassbike]

Ok I am no expert so forgive me if this sounds stupid...
My crate motor was built to have a dip stick on either side. I put it on the driver's side because that is where the engine I replaced had it. The passenger side hole had a plastic cap in it and I never thought to replace it. On my first test drive the plastic cap blew out and I had a lot of oil dripping and smoking. I thought I had blown it up. When I realized what it was I plugged the hole and the problem was solved.

I hope you are lucky on this like I was.

Cheers.