91ChevyRS

Hey guys, long time no see. Anyway, as far as I am concerned I really don't see it as a problem, but I am still kinda skeptical.

My main concern, is that if my oil is burning through in the engine, wouldn't that be a potential hazard for an engine blow out? I believe burning oil can be caused by bad valve seals, or bad valve covers. I know my valve covers are leaking so I am probably going to get those replaced this weekend.

But, all I want to know is if my oil continues to burn is my engine still gonna be ok? Replacing the valve seals are indeed costly...the car still runs fine, I just want to know if I let it go, will it hurt the car in the long run?

Thanks

12SecondTA

well there are two main types of oil burning, blow by, and well oil getting to the combustion chamber via bad valve seals.

Blow by will always be noticable, always, this is from bad rings, cylender wall damage, bunches of things.

Valve seals are mainly noticed on startup and when giving it gas after sitting for a minute or two. Ifd they get bad enough it can burn constantly much like bad rings.


your decidion, valve seals are cheaper to fix!

91ChevyRS

well I doubt any of the cylinder walls are damaged, or anything serious for that matter. My oil pressure stays pretty consistent throughout driving, and I use the high mileage heavier oil too so that I can help the car a bit.


However, whenever I open the cap to where the oil goes to, or even take out my dipstick after driving for awhile, smoke arises and thats what led me to believe that I indeed have oil burning in the engine...

12SecondTA

thats a good observation there, what color is the smoke? whitish clear? if so thats water, condensation evaporating.

Try running the engine in near dark conditions without the oil cap on, if you see a steady or frequent puff of smoke, guess what you have blow by!

91ChevyRS

the smoke on startup is a bluish tint, and if its a blow by what do you mean by a blow by.

Does that mean a piece of my engine is cracked or something and would that mean I need a new engine?

camaronewbie

Blowby is when rings aren't sealing well with cylinder walls, allowing oil from the crank to get past the rings and into the combustion chamber - thus it "blows by" the rings. Every engine has minimal blowby - none can seal 100% - however the PCV (positive crankcase ventilation) takes care of a minimal amount - but when there's excessive amounts, then we start talking about "blowby". My engine has some blowby - if I remove my oil cap I get slight smoke from the valve cover - and it's oily if you hold you fingers in the smoke for a minute you'll feel it. But even with mine as bad as it seems to me, I was told not a big deal, run it til the wheels fall off.

White smoke or steam a worse concept to me - means water in the oil, thus a leak between in motor - either a cracked head or bad head gasket - ruins the oil properties quickly - heads must be removed to fix.

Blue smoke on start up only is valve seals - not a huge issue either - not very damaging, just annoying - but fixable without removing heads at least.

Is this "dummy" explaination half right everyone?

91ChevyRS

alright thanks for the info. I wasn't really sure so thats why I asked, I am gonna do the valve covers this weekend hopefully. Nice chrome edelbrocks cost about 30 bucks so there isn't much to lose. Although I heard chrome absorbs heat alot faster...I am not totally sure yet but we will see.

puffcat

Arent you supposed to always use the oil that is specified on your dipstick? I heard that putting a heavier one for any reason is bad to do.

zstalker

cracked rings (blowby) can be checked by doing a compression test. If there's one cylinder lower than the others, most likely the rings are leaking. blowby can only be fixed by a total tear-down with new rings.
valve seals leaking can be fixed with the heads on the car, but you DO have to take the valve springs off with a valve spring compressor (and not the "big c-clamp" type) and something to hold the valve in position with the spring gone. That's not a terribly difficult procedure, but not really something an inexperienced wrench-turner should jump into without supervision. Your valve covers themselves aren't the problem, but be sure to replace the PCV valve if you haven't recently.
neither of these problems are related to oil pressure, so basically if you're not going to fix it, just make totally sure that the engine always has enough oil.
...good luck
~Erik~

91ChevyRS

Nah, my motor is supposed to take 5W-30 but I put in 10W-30 just because my car runs alot better on it...and also the heavier oil is used because my car has high miles...so this way, by using heavier oil, you can protect the seals and rings better...As the age progresses in your car, it is always a good idea to put in heavier oil...

You can stick with the regular oil if you want, but it never hurts to put something like high mileage oil in. I wouldn't recommend putting that in though until your car reaches over 100k miles

EDIT: Oh and also, completely unrelated to the whole topic but, I find it in an extreme annoyance especially when I am in a hurry in the morning. Whenever I start my car up for the first time in the morning, the rpms just sit at 1500 for like 3 minutes until the car gets down to just below 1000rpm range. I was told its normal for the car to do this, but is there a way so that it can just jump to normal RPM when I start it up and not have to wait 5 minutes for the thing to warm up....

12SecondTA

that high rpm surge is to warm the engine up, there are ways, costly, i'd say just get over it, its normal and a good thing.

Spazz698

that has lots of factors, like miles, your location (warmer weather you'd be using a higher weight oil than in colder weather) how it's driven, etc. My camaro I wouldnt put anything less than 10-40 in it because it leaks (learned the hard way 5-20 = LOTS of leakage) unknown mi tho pretty sure well over 100k, and WA weather can vary day to day.

Now to put this kind of back on topic: my camaro blows white smoke in the morning pretty much til its warmed up which I kinda think it normal considering its cold at night, but blows a lil bit of blue smoke every time its shifted, just enough to see it. What could that be?