Without pulling the motor apart, is there any way you can tell which of the two is causing the motor to burn oil? I believe the valve seals will be more noticeable on startup because as the car sits there, oil will drip into the combustion chamber and burn when the car is started, right?

 

Yeah from my understanding if your gettin some blue smoke on startup its the valve seals(mine does the same thing). I think its a fairly common problem with our cars. If your burning oil though you can do a compression check and see if its your rings. Good Luck

 

How much oil are you using between changes?

 

When my valve seals went bad I was losing about a quart of oil every 1,000 miles. If it's burning a puff at startup, it's probably the seals where if it's more of a constant burning, I'd start to think it's the rings.

 

Do a leak down test. If it's bad your rings are probably bad, if not probably the valve guides, though if your valve seats are screwed it'll affect the test. Unfortunately if you don't know this already, you probably don't have the equipment, and I don't think it's on the autozone lend a tool program. You'll have to find a garage to do it, or a friend with the equipment.

 

Its not my car with the problem. My cousin bought a car for really cheap a week ago, and it smokes a bit at idle, and the more gas you give it, the more it smokes. Its clearly oil though, its not a rich condition. I don't think hes even planning on fixing it, just adding oil when he needs to. Thats not a good idea, but hey, its his car.

The reason I asked though is cause the more I thought about whether it would be the valve seals or the rings, the more confused I was. I just wanted to see if it was possible, how to tell which was causing the problem without taking the engine apart.

I know that if the rings are worn, a compression check would yield low compression. If the valve seals are worn though, would that affect compression as well?

One more question- what is a leak down test? I'm not sure what that is exactly, or how to do one, although its already obvious I don't have the equipment for it.

 

There's something you could try with the normal compression test. Do the test and check the readings. Once you establish a low reading, add a couple of squirts of oil through the spark plug hole and do the test again. If the compression rises after the oil is added, it's the rings. If not, it's more likely the valve seals

 

I just did a little thinking on this issue and my vote is going to have to go to the rings. If it smokes a little at idle and gets worse as you give it gas that just doesn't sound a seal. Sorry but in 7 years as a Junk Tech (dismantler in a junkyard) I'd say that 9 out of 10 motors with those symptoms turned out to be rings. My car seems to have developed a bit of this lite smoke on start-up crap too , but a little stab of the go pedal and it quits . Just an opinion based on my experiences. Hope it helps.

 

It's pretty simple, if it smokes on start up, it's the typical camaro valve stem seals. If it smokes all the time, and it's blue smoke, it's pretty much the rings...
good luck,
Rudy

 

Yeah I've found during harder shifts and hard acceleration, if you see blue smoke, it's bad rings. It's very common for the GM o-ring valve seal to go. That's why you gotta get some umbrella valve seals.

 

5-7kid gave me these instructions


As for the compression test, you first run all the cylinders in the normal fashion (all plugs out, coil disabled, choke and throttle held full open, crank each cylinder until max pressure reached, record each cylinder's pressure, etc.). That's the dry test. Then, you put a tablespoon or so of oil in the cylinders through the spark plug holes, turn the engine over a few times to spread it around the cylinder, and then repeat the compression test. If the rings are worn, the oil will tend to enhance the seal and raise the compression pressure significantly from the dry test. You have to do both in order for the wet test to have any meaning. If the dry test numbers are close cylinder-to-cylinder and where they should be (say 150 psi), and no significant change to the dry test, then everything's fine. If the dry test is low and the wet test is low, then you have valve sealing problems.