About six months ago I replaced my clutch and while I was in there I replaced the cam seal and rear main seal. When I replaced the rear main I was uncomfortable with using the sheet metal screw method. So I removed the rear plate that it compresses into. Then I replaced the Oil Pan Gasket.

Afterwards it would leave little drips on the driveway on the drivers side so I assumed it was just dripping out of the CCV Tube. But a couple of weeks ago I went to pick up a team of horses about an hour away and when I got out of the truck the whole underside of the truck and front of the horse trailer looked like it had been sprayed with a couple of quarts of oil. So I poked around under it and found that the Oil Dipstick tube had cracked flush with the block. So off came the oil pan again. Punched the nipple out from the bottom. In went a new dipstick tube and new oil pan gasket. Drove fine for a couple of days.

Well, I went out of town for 4 days and the truck sat. I took my family for a horse ride this weekend and it had spewed oil all over the underside of the truck again it is definitely coming from the breather tube. I know there are several things that can be the issue here.

1. blow by - I have done the oil cap trick and it just vibrates around. There is some grey smoke coming out of the oil fill and vent tube when it is hot.

2. bad injector making oil - I have not gotten an oil sample. But it does not start or idle rough. It does blow a little more black smoke that usual. The oil doesn't smell like diesel. (the oil is still new from the above oil pan adventure so it still stinks like rotella)

3. I have read that a clogged CCV will cause build up of crankcase pressure and cause it to puke. I also read that changing this can clear up the vapors coming from the fill and vent tube in item 1.

Any help or suggestions would be appreciated. If it is blowby I am out of my depth and it will have to go to a shop to be repaired. Does anyone know an approx. cost I may be looking at.

Again, thanks for your help.

 

After Re reading my first post I realized their is not much of a question in there.

My questions are: What are the chances of me changing the CCV and it fixing the problem?

If not, does it sound like it is more likely to be extreme blowby requiring engine work or and injector leaking into the cylinder head?

I should also mention that the truck has 125,000 miles.

Thanks again for the help.

 

It is possible the excess crankcase pressure is an issue (you have not measured it). It is also possible that if you have excess crankcase pressure, a clogged CCV might be the cause, but other issues can create this problem like broken piston rings and bad turbo bearings. Are you using oil, if so how much? I would suggest measuring CC pressure first.

 

Steve, thank you for the reply. How would you test the blow by? I did a search but did not find anything definitive.

Thanks for your help.

 

I would make a plug that looked like a fuel injector, but has a simple hole in the cylinder end and an air fitting on the other end. I would then attach my SNAP-ON leak down tester to the plug. The leak down tester is then plugged into an air supply. It will then display leak down as a percentage. Somebody probably makes these adapters, but I have a machine shop, so it isn't a an issue for me.

The advantage these leak down testers have is that in the case of a leak, you can easily tell where it is by listening for escaping air into the crankcase, exhaust pipe, inlet manifold or bubbles in the radiator water. In any case, this is a very definitive way to detect engine faults.

 

Well, it looks like I have bad rings causing blowby, quoted between $3,000-$6,000 to repair.