Valve Stem Seals... or worse?

[bbray]

Well i have noticed a slight oil leak in the front of my engine bay and i tried finding where it was coming out at. I also had smoke coming from under my manifold from the oil burning off. If i let my car idle for atleast five minutes i start to have some smoke coming out from my exhaust as well.
The only place i thougt it was coming out was my valve cover where the half moon gasket picece is and dripping down to the manifold. I also thought that the oil was seaping in the manifold gasket and that way why smoke was coming out the exhaust.
So on Wednesday i relpaced my valve cover gasket and the next day i go to work on my car and i let it idle for awhile to make sure i have no leaks. Then after a few minutes my car starts to have smoke coming out of the exaust and all fresh oil on the manifold. So i take off my manifold right away. And i notice the head is all wet inside where the manifold and head connect. And i guess the oil was seaping out of the manifold and that is why i have oil in my engine bay.

So my question is what is causing this? My guess is my heads valve steam seals right? Someone also to me that it could be my block. I have great compression and my car runs fine so i just dont understand how it could be my block. Also how bad is it to be driving with this problem? I dont want to ruin my new evo316g by having oil dripping into it. If it is the head i dont have the money right now to get it rebuilt.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

Brandon

 

[nightspeed87]

Are you sure that your turbo seals arent shot? How is your oil pressure?
See right now im blowing a lot of smelly smoke thru my exhaust and putting a quart of oil in it every week because, well at least what I believe to be bad turbo seals on this old used 14b/ I have a evo3 at the house waiting to be bolted up when my gt manifold comes in but ialso started wondering about valve steam seals also. I guess i will find out once i put the 16g on whether it was the 14b smoking or not. *( It shouldnt be coming from the valve seals though because its a freshly rebuilt 6bolt and everything was suppose to have been replaced and it has good compression, it just has extremely high oil pressure because of not having balance shafts )
I wonder if the high oil pressure could be pushing excess oil past any of the seals?
I smoke very little at idle then smoke a puff soon as I hit the gas and it will stop smoking till i let off the gas and hit it again, and will blow a lot of smoke if I floor it under boost.
Any opinions, does mine sound like Brandons problem or the turbo?

 

[bbray]

Well, I know mine is not the turbo. I just installed an evo316g and I only have about 2000 miles on it and there is no oil in my lower intercooler pipe so i know it is not my turbo. I know it is my valve stem seals because one day after i went for a drive, I took off my exhaust manifold a couple of mins later and i had oil coming out of the exhaust holes on my head. The exhaust holes were wet with oil and i also have oil caked on the inside of my exhaust manifold. I would suggest taking off your exhaust manifold, after you go for a drive, and seeing if your exhaust ports on your head are wet.

 

[Calan]

Nightspeed... My bet is that because of the high oil pressure, you are blowing oil past your turbo seals. Read the FAQ at FP: http://store.forcedperformance.net/merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=Info_FAQ ... about half-way down at "My tubo is smoking and it's brand new".

Also search the forums or see this link for porting your oil filter housing to fix the high oil pressure problem. Just did this a couple days ago myself while my car is apart.

 

[nightspeed87]

Yea i was thinking that. But i still have it tapped to the head thats why i didnt think it would cause the oil to blow past the seals so much just because the fact that the head sees a lot less oil pressure. I think my seals are just shot period because i noticed that its not a constant smoking. Therefore id like to assume that its not an oil pressure issue, seems more like ist puddling up then releasing a lot of smoke then so on and so on.
Like if I floor it it will throw a ton of smoke but will discontinue after a little bit and then when i left off the gas and then re hit it again it will throw more smoke but not during the entire pull... Does that make sense.? How hard would it be to take off my oil filter housing to port the relief valve?