Where is my oil going?

[Walter Moore]

Is the engine leaking oil somewhere, like the main seals perhaps?

If somehow the crankcase vent or PCV valve is plugged the increased pressure caused by a new cylinder head could have blown out the main seals.

I have had cars with a bad main seal and they absolutely hemmorage oil, but only when they are running. Sometimes is isn't very noticable until you get under the car.

[Pir0San]

I think the engine may be leaking a bit of oil from the rear crankshaft seal, but I'm totally unsure if that is the only issue. The car smokes like crazy, especially when accelerating, or even when revving at idle. I decided to try a quart of Lucas oil additive today, and so far, I haven't noticed a difference in the level of oil inside of the engine. I figure the lower half needs a rebuild anyways, so I might as well save up the $500 or so it'll take to buy new rings, and maybe even buy new bearings all around and get the crank micropolished if it needs it. I figure I could rebuild the engine in less than a week....

[Pir0San]

I'm thinking though that this oil use didn't start until putting this new head on right? If it didn't use oil before the head change then the only thing I would be looking at would be the head or head gasket. Compression is good so that would pretty much rule out the gasket in my book, time to look at the head. Yeah, I know all new, but maybe not done right, or seals left off, or seals torn. With bad seals on the exhaust valves you'll burn a lot of oil but not see it on the plugs, bad intake will show on the plugs. The only way to check the seals it to pull them out and look at them, might as well replace them if you look at them...

I'm unsure if it did it with the other heads, I never got a chance to drive the car for more than a weekend with the older heads, and now that I recall, it was down on oil with the old head...hey, the block was free though...so it all balances itself out.

[=Enigma=]

I talked to one of the guys at Kragen's today while I was getting some oil, and he said that the reason he thinks my motor is eating oil is because the new head is so "tight", that it is creating better compression, which is sucking oil past the rings. Does that should right?

Not at all. Sounds like bull to me. And as Ed rightly points out, when the engine is in the intake stroke, i.e.(sucking) the intake valve is open so there wouldn't be enough vacuum in the cylinder to "suck" oil past the rings. Kragen is not the best place for serious auto maintainence or diagnostic advice. At least not any Kragen I have ever been to.

[Pir0San]

yeah, I thought about that right after I posted it, and I smelled bull all over

[Pir0San]

I read in another post about the PCV system, and I went outside today to see if there was any oil in the hose going between the crankcase breather valve and the pcv valve, and I did not see any oil built up around the pcv valve, but yet when I took the hose off of the crankcase breather valve, there was oil buildup and chunks of dried up oil. Is this exactly what you were saying about the pcv valve force feeding oil into the combustion chamber? If I put a seperate air filter on the breather valve, will this stop the feeding of the oil into the combustion chamber? Will I have to worry about the pcv valve being an open vacuum?