Common oil leaks?

[carpenduh]

So I bought my spider running but with an oil leak. The seller stated that the car had never leaked oil but had overheated on a prior test drive and now seemed to be leaking. My first thought was something got hot and warped and I offered a very low price for the car and got it. In looking for the leak I am having a bit of trouble. The motor is very clean and the leak seems to be in the very front of the motor. Unfortunately, it seems to be hitting the belt and flying all over the front and top of the motor. I was wondering if these cars may have an inherent or common spot that they leak or if it is going to take me tearing down the entire motor to find it.

Thanks

Gordon

[geospider]

Front, top of motor: I would check the Cam Seals. I had a leaky one and it made one hell of a mess.
Easy fix, but requires timing belt chnage. If you are not sure when last changed; on your to do list anyway.
do both seals since you are in that far. With the timing belt, do the water pump and tensioner while you are there. Common maintenance items, esp if unsure of last change.

haven't ha t do the front main seal, so can't speak to that
geo

[Nut124]

A leak that soils the timing belt would seem to be oil spraying, not just seeping. With the "over heating" report, I would worry about oil spraying from the head gasket where the pressurized oil goes from the block to the head at the front.

Can you tell if it seems to be front left or front right?

I seem to recall the pressurized oil passage to the head is at the front right corner of the block.

Cam box gasket leak usually just puddles oil in the spark plug recesses and on the head bolts.

[carpenduh]

Definitely not a high-pressure leak. There is no discernable point of origin that I can find. I ran it for some time continually blowing off any oil but it is being distributed by the timing belt to the entire front of the motor. I did notice a decent amount of oil coming out of the dipstick tube which looks to be aftermarket, Could the oil be picked up from there and sprayed by the timing belt?

[Nut124]

Could be the front main seal. If not, then the cam seals. If the cam seal, then the back side of cam pulley should we wet w oil.

Check for crank case breather function. If you plug the breather hose, how much and how fast does pressure build up?

[18Fiatsandcounting]

I did notice a decent amount of oil coming out of the dipstick tube which looks to be aftermarket, Could the oil be picked up from there and sprayed by the timing belt?

Possibly. I would fix the issue with the dipstick tube, and then look into the oil seals on the front of the engine as others have suggested. Leaks around the dipstick are fairly common.

-Bryan

[Nut124]

Where is the oil coming out of around the dipstick? At the fitting where it connects to the block?

Hopefully not at the top end of the tube.

[carpenduh]

Dipstick tube fixed, the oil seems to be coming from the driver's side cam seal. Guess that's the next to tackle.

[carpenduh]

So the leak was the drivers side cam seal, got it changed and tried to be careful of the timing but it got messed up. I ordered a manual that will hopefully shed some light on the timing procedure as I am running into some issues. Is there a walkthrough that anyone can link that details the process?

[aj81spider]

I have a couple of documents I've acquired from various sources over the years. PM me your email address and I'll send you copies.

It's a pretty straightforward process once you know what to do.

[Nut124]

Gordon, how do you assess that the timing is off?

Can you tell what is off and how much? One tooth on the belt is quite a bit. That is the increment of adjustment you have.

If so, you should be able to adjust as needed. Right?

Do you have a reliable crank timing mark?

I like to set the crank at TDC, and the cams a bit behind of TDC, then try to get the belt on. When tightened, the belt will pull the cams a bit more into TDC.

Do not set the tensioner too tight.

I recommend using locktite on cam pulley bolts. They are hard to torque to spec w/o spinning the cam off timing.

[carpenduh]

So upon removing the belt I had marked the top pullies with paint so as to see that they had not moved, there is no factory timing mark bracket on this motor so it was not possible to use that for reference. Prior to removing the belt I had checked the accessory pully and not noticed a timing mark on it. Got called away for a bit and when I came back completely forgot to mark the accessory pully, rookie mistake all my fault. When I pulled the belt off immediately the bottom pully moved considerably. After changing the seals and replacing the belt the upper timing marks I had put the white paint on were not in the correct, same positions. The motor also will turn over by hand only about one/ half revolution whereas it comes up against something and stops turning. Can only assume the timing is off to a degree that there is considerable contact between the internals.

I have done many GM and Ford engines in the past so figured the timing would be not that difficult to figure out, another mistake on my part, so now I sit waiting.

Long story short I messed up the timing and need to procedure to get it back to the correct starting point.

Gordon

Gordon, how do you assess that the timing is off?

Can you tell what is off and how much? One tooth on the belt is quite a bit. That is the increment of adjustment you have.

If so, you should be able to adjust as needed. Right?

Do you have a reliable crank timing mark?

I like to set the crank at TDC, and the cams a bit behind of TDC, then try to get the belt on. When tightened, the belt will pull the cams a bit more into TDC.

Do not set the tensioner too tight.

I recommend using locktite on cam pulley bolts. They are hard to torque to spec w/o spinning the cam off timing.

[Nut124]

You will need to establish TDC at the crank. Is there a timing mark there? When you marked the cam pulleys, was the engine at TDC?

There is a little pointer on each cam box. These are the cam timing marks along with the holes in the pulleys. Carefully turn each cam a little bit at a time until hole lines up with the pointer. Make sure the pistons are not in the way. valves can interfere w each other as well. Remove the cam covers and try to watch the lobes if you feel valves interfere.

Once you get the cams at TDC, you can rotate the crank. You will need to find TDC using a piston stop or similar method and then have a TDC mark of some sort.

The aux pulley has a hole for timing mark. The hole will need to point to 1pm, at the tensioner retaining bolt at TDC.

[18Fiatsandcounting]

Nut124 has pretty much covered everything, and I'll just stress that it is really crucial to NOT rotate the engine with the starter motor, or even too aggressively by hand, until the timing is sorted out. Two things can cause the engine to lock up: 1) valve timing is so far off that valves hit each other, or 2) the lobe on the auxiliary shaft (for the fuel pump) can hit the #2 connecting rod if the auxiliary shaft pulley isn't timed right.

Both are not good. Lock ups when turning the engine very carefully by hand likely won't cause any damage, but if there's too much rotating force, bad things can happen.

-Bryan

[Nut124]

You might be able to adequately find TDC by feeling crank resistance.

Take plugs out. At TDC the crank should turn easy, by hand a few degrees, maybe +/-5 deg or so. TDC is in the middle of this easy movement.

Timing belt needs to be out for this.