Sudden severe oil leak -- blown oil gallery plug, now fixed

[jtauxe]

The good news is that the oil pressure switch works.

It was all running so well. This is a '77 2.0-L GD engine that I had just refreshed, including cleaning, replacing oil cooler seals, dipstick seals, oil pressure switch and many other things that would not be relevant here. Got it reinstalled last August, and it has been running well, and leaking very little oil -- really just a drop or two on the pavement.

And then today, I drove about 400 meters (city streets, here), and the red oil pressure light came on. I thought, "Wow, that's really odd, but I know what to do." So I immediately pulled over and turned off the engine. To my surprise and horror, oil was falling to the pavement in a steady stream, and there was a long trail of it about 200 m behind me. i could see right where it started, and it was a constant stream after that. Damn! I checked the dipstick, and there was only about 5 mm of oil on the bottom of it.

Now, this was not the catastrophic type of failure that I had seen (twice) before when a galley plug is lost. That is one big splat. This was a steady stream, dripping off the mustache bar--that is, the rear of the engine.

Towed it home, and took a look underneath. It seems to be coming from the left side, so I do not suspect the oil pump seals. No oil is visible on the top side of the engine or tin, and it is not the distributor or oil pressure switch. I am currently suspecting the oil cooler seals, but I replaced them in August, and they held just fine. Why would they decide to go out now?

Before I pull the engine (which may wait until spring, since we like to use the garage for our daily driver in the winter) I'd like to do as much diagnosis as I can, so that I can have parts on hand. Does anyone have ideas about what I can do to diagnose the problem with the engine in the bus?

This is discouraging, but I was starting to build a list of things to do at the next engine pull. I just wasn't counting on doing it so soon.
_________________
John
"Travelling in a fried-out Kombi, on a hippie trail, head full of zombie..." - Colin Hay and Ron Strykert
http://vw.tauxe.net
1969 Transporter, 1971 Westfalia, 1976, 1977, 1976, 1977, 1971, 1973, 1977 Westfalias,
1979 Champagne Sunroof, 1974 Westfalia Automatic, 1979 Transporter, 1972 Sportsmobile, 1973 Transporter Wild Westerner, 1974 Westfalia parts bus, 1975 Mexican single cab *FOR SALE*, 1978 Irish 4-door double cab RHD

[Wild Bill]

Oil Cooler seals or split seams on cooler itself. , Loose oil filter?? Push rod tube seals, valve cover gasket??? Fan housing can be pulled off with the engine still in vehicle. Put some more oil in it , crank it up , climb underneath and have a peek. Should be able to narrow it down.
_________________
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"Life in the Fast Lane ?....What the Hell does that feel Like?"


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1978 Champagne Edition (High Top Camper Converstion.) 2.0L FI
1969 Squareback 2.0L


www.rareairvw.com

[stuming]

I had that when a nut worked loose on the oil cooler.
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[jtauxe]

[EZ Gruv]

[aeromech]

I'm betting on a split cooler.

Sounds like it was really cold. You started the engine and drove a short distance with very high oil pressure then the bad thing happened.
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[RatCamper]

[Wild Bill]

[SGKent]

John I would put oil in it and have someone start it for 10 seconds with a big pan under it. It could be as simple as a o-ring on the filter blew. Someone recently popped the seam on several filters too. Maybe we have a run of bad filters starting to appear.

When I put my first T4 together I used a light coating of gascacinch on the gasket between the oil filter housing and case - it worked fine. I did the same the second engine I built. About 5 minutes after I assembled the filter housing to the block I was standing there near the engine and I heard a crack-pop. I went to investigate and found that the gasket had oozed out on one corner of that assembly and then that corner had cracked as it was no longer supported evenly by the gasket. Now I put those gaskets in dry. You might have something like that going on too.
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“Most people don’t know what they’re doing, and a lot of them are really good at it.” - George Carlin

[jtauxe]

Well, we just got a huge dump of snow, so it's all on hold for awhile. At least our driveway (and the bus' rear end) face south and get dried out relatively quickly. I like the idea of adding oil and running it for a bit just to see where the leak is coming from. I should definitely be able to see it pouring out of somewhere!

[Busdriver79]

a very simple thing to check first is the seal on the oil filter itself...sometimes the seal sticks to the filter housing and you put the new filter on with the old seal still in place....it will then blow out causing a huge leak....double oil filter seals will fail....maybe you will get lucky with this and all you need to do is fix this oil filter seal.....much easier than an oil cooler if this turns out to be your problem.

[aparrothead]

One thing to check is the valve cover gasket. I had a 1" piece blow out (not sure how) and oil was draining out onto the heat exchanger, header pipes and basically everywhere. It wasn't quite as bad as you're describing but I had to put two quarts in to get home (about 200 miles).

[jtauxe]

It's definitely not the valve cover gasket. And, although it could be the oil filter seal, I doubt it, but will check. Like I said, this is after the bus running fine for months, so it is not due to any recent service like that, which would have made itself evident immediately.
_________________
John
"Travelling in a fried-out Kombi, on a hippie trail, head full of zombie..." - Colin Hay and Ron Strykert
http://vw.tauxe.net
1969 Transporter, 1971 Westfalia, 1976, 1977, 1976, 1977, 1971, 1973, 1977 Westfalias,
1979 Champagne Sunroof, 1974 Westfalia Automatic, 1979 Transporter, 1972 Sportsmobile, 1973 Transporter Wild Westerner, 1974 Westfalia parts bus, 1975 Mexican single cab *FOR SALE*, 1978 Irish 4-door double cab RHD

[Wild Bill]

[Amskeptic]

[jtauxe]

I had not even thought that I could see these -- now I need to look closely, and with better light (and definitely some protective eyewear). Thanks for the suggestion, Colin.

Now, if the snow will just melt...
_________________
John
"Travelling in a fried-out Kombi, on a hippie trail, head full of zombie..." - Colin Hay and Ron Strykert
http://vw.tauxe.net
1969 Transporter, 1971 Westfalia, 1976, 1977, 1976, 1977, 1971, 1973, 1977 Westfalias,
1979 Champagne Sunroof, 1974 Westfalia Automatic, 1979 Transporter, 1972 Sportsmobile, 1973 Transporter Wild Westerner, 1974 Westfalia parts bus, 1975 Mexican single cab *FOR SALE*, 1978 Irish 4-door double cab RHD

[Wildthings]

You can blow the top right out of the oil pressure switch. This will cause the light to come on instantly and will drain the crankcase in a minute or so of running.

[jtauxe]

Finally, we have weather nice enough that I could climb under the bus without getting cold and wet. I added oil, cleaned up the bottom of the engine so that I could spot new leaks, removed the left hand bottom tin so that I could look around better, and had my lovely assistant give it a crank.

Well, oil is pouring forth like a fountain under there, and it seems quite localized. I can definitely rule out the following suspected sources. It is NOT
- the oil cooler or seals,
- the oil filter gasket or flange gasket,
- the oil pressure switch or anything else "topside",
- a pushrod tube seal, or
- the oil filler tube seal or dipstick tube seal.

Now, what's left?

The oil is pouring out from a place I cannot see, but it seems to be directly above the left side motor mount. That is, just above the metal bracket that supports the top of the left rubber motor mount. What is there?

I seem to remember seeing a gallery plug in that general vicinity. I've had gallery plugs go before (not on this engine, and always at the front of the engine) and they definitely spit the oil out fast. And, in the cold weather, perhaps the metal of the gallery plug shrunk away from that of the case. (?) Another bit of corroborating evidence is that both times when this happened before on the other engine, it happened after I took off from a stop. This time, too. In all cases, I was accelerating from a full stop, and perhaps that is just the time when the pressure builds enough to blow the plug.

So, that's a possibility, if indeed there is one there just above the left motor mount. Does anyone have a photo of that area with the fan shroud off?

What else could it be? Any ideas?

Ironically, I had toyed with the idea of retrofitting all the gallery plugs while the engine was out in August. On the engine that I had earlier that blew two gallery plugs (at different times), I tapped the plug holes with a large NPT fitting and put in brass NPT "stoppers", or end plugs. After insertion, I cut off the square heads. Those held well, though I was a bit nervous drilling and tapping the case like that. If I were to do that again, I would look for a recessed Allen head type fitting.

So - I'm looking for other possibilities besides the gallery plugs.
_________________
John
"Travelling in a fried-out Kombi, on a hippie trail, head full of zombie..." - Colin Hay and Ron Strykert
http://vw.tauxe.net
1969 Transporter, 1971 Westfalia, 1976, 1977, 1976, 1977, 1971, 1973, 1977 Westfalias,
1979 Champagne Sunroof, 1974 Westfalia Automatic, 1979 Transporter, 1972 Sportsmobile, 1973 Transporter Wild Westerner, 1974 Westfalia parts bus, 1975 Mexican single cab *FOR SALE*, 1978 Irish 4-door double cab RHD

[busdaddy]

Sure sounds like a gallery plug to me, remove the fan to see them, you can run it for a minute or two with no fan for testing purposes if the leaks not already obvious.
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[SGKent]

If you look at this photo from another thread you will see there are not only plugs in that area but the oil filter housing is there too and it can crack and leak. The red arrow was in the photo already. When we mounted the oil pump, the paper gasket squeezed out so I used the locktite sealant. I guess the oil pump gasket could fail too.

_________________
“Most people don’t know what they’re doing, and a lot of them are really good at it.” - George Carlin