Hi everyone,

Got the motor running without dieing, must have been the vac elbow thingy on the back of the upper plenum leaking plus the timing was off by a hair.

BUT Now I have an oil leak... Can oil leaks throw off the oil pressure sensor and guage?

Anyhow, the leak seems to be coming from a small hole behind the oil pan where there is a shroud on the tranny. The hole is actually in the shroud. I suppose it is leaking behind this and is building up behind that hole.

It looks like that hole is made for drainage, possibly for leaks just like this...

Is that where the rear main seal is and where it would leak from?

I'm sure it is oil and not trans fluid, I crawled under the car and watched the oil as it dripped on my face.

Considering there used to be a fuel and crayon smell, this oil smells fresh and looks fresh but it leaks out!

This leak also seems to be the source of the white smoke coming out of the engine compartment, but not to speculate, one major problem at a time...

 

It could very well be your rear main seal. However, on my 83 the major culprit(s) were the oil pan gasket and the pressure sensor itself. If you do replace the oil pan gasket DO NOT get the felpro rubber gasket. They have to be the poorest fitting gasket ever made. Get the cork one. On the 85 and up F bodies the rear main seal is a one piece design that can be replaced with the engine still in the car. My 83 needed to be pulled to change it

 

I am far from the expert here(tom will know what to do) I would suggest checking a few places. Start with your valve covers. Maybe use a mirror to make sure they are not leaking down the back and dripping down the backside of the engine.

Could also be you distributor o-ring leaking, that often makes it seem like a rear main leak.

Or the leasr fun of all, your rear main seal.

those are never fun to do, trust me.

the white smoke would lead me to believe that it is hitting you exhaust manifold somewhere and burning off. If thats the case, it may not be your rear main!!

 

Ding Ding Ding!! I think this is the most likely answer, especially if the distributor has never been worked on, and the seal is the original. The o-ring dries up and leaks. When you pry the old o-ring off the distributor shaft, it'll snap (because it's so dry). Pry it "backwards", so you're "opening it". You'll see a ton of little cracks in the rubber.

That shroud is the flywheel inspection plate. It's held on with a few 10mm bolts.. you can remove it. If you look up at the rear main seal, you'll see oil dripping around the back of the crank- so it really looks like a rear main seal. Try this; with a stopped & cold motor, try to rub your finger at the base of the distributor, where the distributor goes into the intake manifold. (This will be Below the cap; feel for the distributor shaft). Oil might be puddled up here. But I almost guarantee if that's the original seal from '88, it's shot.

The O-ring is a 1-inch inside diameter o-ring. Any "real" parts store (not a pep boys or autozone), like the local kind that charges $10 for a bottle of bug-and-tar remover, will have a red box behind the counter- you tell them the ring you need, they take it out of the box, and charge you 50 cents. I bought a bag of 5 at Pep Boys for $1.25.. it wasn't from the parts counter. (Ask a parts counter guy at Pep Boys and chances are good that you'll confuse him for hours. "O-ring? It's not in the computer." "Yeah, no sht sherlock... just go get me an o-ring." "But it's not listed!" "So you can't get me an O-ring?" "Do you have a part number?" "NO! It's a frickin' O-ring!!! How could it have a part number??" "I'm sorry, I need a part #." ) It was in metal drawers by their lugnuts and bolts and screws and fittings and springs and brake bleeder screws and freeze plugs. Oh, hey, I think someone dug that part # up for me.... yep, found the message! The message is:
And here's a message with another store's part #... looks like the "214" suffix is popular.
Unfortunately, you will have to pull the distributor to change the o-ring. Fortunately, this is the perfect time to rebuild the distributor and get back some of the power you've lost over 14 years! (Module, pick-up coil, cleaning up the air gap) KED85 (Karl) suggests using a distributor gasket for a small block chevy. If you do a <a href="search.php?s="><img src="images/top_search.gif" alt="Search" border="0"></a> in the V6 forum, you'll find messages on "distributor rebuild" "distributor remove" "distributor gasket" "spark module". This might be helpful, too: https://www.thirdgen.org/techbb2/sho...threadid=98371

 

Hey Thanks ....

I had suspected the o-ring on the dist but I didi not notice oil building up by the dist hole. I will double check it though. Since it didi not seem to be the dist, I then suspected oil leaking at the back of the engine somewhere, but it is so damn hard to see there with the motor in the car.

I will check all of these places and keep you posted. I should get a mirror! That would help...

Thanks again.

 

Okay, I pulled the dist. out once again to throw the o-ring in there. I don't thinkt here was a leak from there, since I am still getting drips. I think there has to be something else leaking but I couldn't get the car back into the garage to lift it up because now the car isn't running.

There is a lot less smoke coming off the engine, probably because it is possible that there was a slight leak at the dist, which the o-ring helped, but there is still another leak or possibly built up oil.

I set the timing the TomP method with the screwdriver to check TDC and all, and found that TDC on my car is at 6* rather then the 10* mark! Wow, thats off a bit. So I got the car running at a smoothe idle! HOLY CRAP! But then whenever I gave it gas, it spit, sputtered, and backfired from the TB. I also still have a knock or ticking from the passenger side, so maybe I should check the valve leash when I get a chance to.

But there is still no power when I throw the car into drive or reverse. The car also runs for a while, then dies. It will not start again until it cools down. When it gets to the warming up point, I can step on the gas and it seems that nothing is hapening except the car wants to die. I even put in new gas thinking a month of gas sitting there might have gone bad, but no help there.

 

INTAKE MANIFOLD LEAK!!!! My 83 had the exact same problem. The black RTV they supply with the gasket is not nearly enough to properly seal the intake end rails. You really have to goop it on thick. My 83 would run until it got warm then would stall out and crank but not start.

 

Uh oh, I hope you're talking about timing and not TDC. For checking TDC, the balancer mark should line up at 0 degrees. This check just makes sure your balancer is okay. Then you'd use a regular timing light to go to 10 deg advance.

Car dies when hot, won't start until cool? Sounds like the ignition module took a crap... anyone else think the same thing? Uh, wait, didn't you just replace it?