I was racing down the 1/4 at the track, and ended up running a 14.8@98mph the first pass. I was faster than that stock!

But the 2nd run, I ran a 15.0@90mph - because my engine died at the top of 3rd gear.

I pop the hood and there is oil ALL over the engine. There's small puffs of smoke coming from the disptick tube and oil fill cap.

I manage to get the engine restarted to limp it home, and the engine had almost no power off the line, and stalled easily. Sometimes the engine would die if I was steering while it was idling.

Does this sound like broken rings? If it is, what is my best way of approaching this? I don't have much money, so i was thinking I could just take it to a reputable shop for a re-ring and some new bearings while its torn down...

btw: my engine has 95k miles on it.

 

also, i'd like to add that it never blows smoke out the tailpipes...

 

if it doesn't burn any oil (and your not using some insanly thick oil) its probobly not your rings... i'd be looing in the valvetrain first

 

thanks for the reply, trey.

This issue is driving me mad!

The strange thing is, is that the passenger side valvecover pressurizes VERY fast, and blowbly comes out of it quickly. Oil seeps out the bolt holes.

However, on the driver's side valvecover, no oil seepage at all. When I take out a valvecover bolt, there seems to be no blowby or puffing/smoke coming out of it. I'm confused, because if it was blowby, both valvecovers would be pressurized with blowby/oili coming out right?

What could it be? I redid the rocker arms today. Could a missing o-ring on the valvestem do something like this?

 

I am just throwing out a possibility but I am no expert....maybe someone else could tell you if this is possible.Could it be a rocker arm or two that are overtightened so much that they are causnig the valve to stick open during the compression stroke and pressurizing the crankcase by cylinder pressure blowing by the valve seals.Just a thought.I know when I did my valve seals I overtightened a rocker arm and the engine ran badly popping and missing.I turned it of immediately I can just imagine what it would have been like with a full throttle attempt.After I readjusted the rocker arms a little it fixed the problems.

 

possible, but he'd be burning some oil no?


PCV ok?

 

I would think that the cylinder pressure would be enough to keep the oil from entring the cylinders on the compression stroke and then the seal may be resaling do to the vacum created by the stroke down not allowing oil to enter or at least not enough to be noticable. don't know for sure,just a theory. Do check the pcv though,its cheap and easy to replace.

 

yep, PCV valve is functional, rattles, and the hoeses aren't plugged. There is vaccum at the tip of the pcv valve..

mike, i think your theory might have some possibility, at leaset, it may lie in the valvetrain. I've never blown out any smoke, and I'm not burning oil.. the only reason I'm losing oil is because it blows out of the valvecover and such..

man, I'm praying that its not rings.. I can't afford the rebuild.

If it were rings, I'd notice a *major* power loss right? So far my engine feels pretty darn torquey from 1.5k-2.5k rpms, but loses all power outside of that range.

 

valve seals would have to be really bad....

but i dont know, certainly a possibility

 

What about the possibilty of a blown head gasket?

 

car doesn't smoke and oil blew everywhere, not coolant

 

I have seen "broken" ring lands do this.

 

I was thinking that too, although busted pistons would be unusual for a lightly modded NA car. Have you looked under the valve cover yet? If a retainer let go or a pushrod bent and you had an intake valve hit a piston and bend, then maybe the exhaust pressure is causing this pressurization under the valve cover. If you don't see anything under the valve cover, I'd do a compression/leakdown test on each of the cylinders on that side to try to isolate the source of the problem.