Oil leak around top of exhaust manifold gasket?????

[sleepypsi]

I finally got my talon running yesterday and was pretty excited until I started seeing oil bubbling out around the top of the middle part of the exhaust manifold. I Thought it might be a blown HG but its no where near the HG And it doesn't smoke like oil usually does Its just brown bubbly like oil substance. I'm having a hard time understanding whats going on. Would you think my head is cracked? Anyone else had a similar problem? The car runs great no smoke out of the exhaust and the wideband is reading around 14.5 at idle.

 

[jdub1992]

I had this same issue and mine was a valve cover gasket issue that I fixed but the oil had settled on the gasket. No smoke or anything just bubbling and once I replaced all the gaskets and degreased that entire side the issue ceased! Good luck

 

[sleepypsi]

I hope like hell that is the problem. I almost put the car up forsale after I seen that.

 

[Mickey6]

Wipe the head down and clean it with brake cleaner to get any oily residue off. Then make sure all the cleaner has either been evaporated or completely dried off (if you don't, that stuff likes to burn and has a low flashpoint, and you can see where that would get you). Then start it up and see if it starts smoking within a few minutes. Then maybe take a short drive, keep your eye on the oil pressure gauge making sure it doesn't drop, and water temp gauge to make sure it doesn't sky rocket. Then pop the hood when you get back and make sure its not smoking.

If you see evidence thats its from the valve cover gasket....its a simple fix. Extreme psi has all the seals for 70 bucks I believe.

 

[deflator]

Is this coming out from around the manifold? Did you copper spray your exhaust manifold gasket? When you use stuff like copper spray to make gaskets, or when you spray a lot of PB blaster on parts, they smoke and bubble the first few heat cycles.

 

[boosted99_420]

Either valve cover or may also be valvestem seals to depending on how many miles are on the head.