VCCA Home Forums TECHNICAL - 1945 AND EARLIER 1912-1928 Oil leack from valve lifter, 1926 engine

My 26 engine have some oil leak from the valve lifter in the engine block. All lifters goes clockwise. I grind a corkscrew left hand tread on the lifter side. The problem are gone. Oil screws back to oil pan and not outside the engine block

Bluezone I will have to try that on mine. Thanks for the tip.
Steve

Hi Bluezone,

Did you see a noticeable reduction in overall oil consumption after you grooved the lifters?

I'm debating about doing this to my '28 engine, it's freshly rebuilt however I am using about 1 qt of oil every ~170 miles or so. I'm assuming 95+% of this is due to leaks as she likes to mark her territory and does a good job coating the engine compartment and the oil pan in a film of oil, particularly on the lifter side of the engine compartment.

-Tyler

Your -28 engine have larger valve lifter than 26-27,and -28 have a flat side on the body. I have not seen large oil leak from 28 valve lifters.If it works on -28 lifter, I don't know. Are you sure the oil come from the lifters?

Hi Bluezone,

The lifter side of the engine and the oil pan becomes covered in oil after going for a drive. My first thought was that the oil filter tubing (I have a reproduction '28 oil filter) was leaking however, after wrapping all of the connections with paper towel and tape and going for a 20 mile drive, it appears that that is not the source of the leak.

The other thing I am going to try before I think about grooving the lifters is to replace the oil breather cap. The original breather tube from the block to the carb inlet on my engine is gone and the hole in the block has been plugged but I still have the original solid oil filler cap. My thought is the solid cap is causing the crankcase pressure to get high enough to cause leaks or to make existing leaks worse.

In the end if I need to add a quart every 170 miles, it's not the end of the world, just a little messier than I'd like.

-Tyler

Tyler,

Does your carburetor have the inlet for the crankcase tube that comes from the block? If so, I suspect someone has a spare tube to sell you so that you can route the oily air pressure from the crankcase into the back of the carb as originally designed.

If your carb is not set up to receive the crankcase pressure relief tube, the pre-28 oil breather caps have holes in them to vent the crankcase pressure into the engine compartment. You could make a temporary cap from some heavy aluminum sheet (like the bottom of a pie pan), poke a few holes in it, and see if that makes a difference.

I'm sure someone has a spare pre-'28 breather cap in their stash that would be available. I might have one, so if you need it, let me know and I'll dig it out and you can have it for the price of mailing to you.

Cheers, Dean

Hi Dean,

Unfortunately my carb is aftermarket and does not have a breather tube connection. I debated about modifying the carb intake to add a breather tube connection but decided that was probably more work than it's worth. On a positive note, I did find a vented cap that fits my filler tube nicely so we'll see if that makes a difference.

Out of curiosity, how many miles can you go with Lurch and Justin before you need to add a quart of oil?

-Tyler

Hi again,

Justin goes many hundreds of miles before he needs a drink of oil. ;-)

Lurch, on the other hand, leaks 0.8 teaspoon of oil per mile. The problem here is that the gasket between the cam gear back plate and the front main bearing caps leaks. I caused this leak when I fixed an engine knock during the rebuild in 2017.

Here is a link to that part of the story: Putting Depends under Lurch's engine

Speaking of Lurch and his 'accessories', for the first 20+ years I've had him, I used the Stromberg carb that came with that '28 engine. And, yes, the crank case oil pressure relief hole in the block was plugged up most of that time.

I eventually made an adapter to fit onto the back of the carb to accept a 7/16" tube and still be able to hook up the air heater hose. Then, I ran a tube from the block to the carb. See the pic below of the adapter.

At the end of the engine rebuild, I purchased a used correct Carter RAKX-0 carb, rebuilt it, and that's what Lurch has been running with the last three years.

As you can see, I still have the adapter, but I do not need it. If you want it, you can have it for the cost of mailing it.

Ever onward, Dean

Thanks for the info Dean! I may try the foot powder spray trick as well to help pinpoint where the leak is coming from if the breather cap doesn't do the trick. I really appreciate the adapter offer however I'm not running the heater tube so at this point I wouldn't be able to use it but I will keep that in mind.

I'll also have to take a closer look on the gasket seals in the front and back of the pan. I remember those being a bit of a booger last time I dropped the pan, I would not be at all surprised if that is part of my issue.

-Tyler

Just a quick note on running the engine without the air heater hose.

The previous owner of Lurch's engine did that and the carb frosted over to the point where the engine stopped running! Maybe the Stromberg was super good at atomizing the fuel.

Here's a post that describes the forming of the curved gaskets for the front and rear of the oil pan: Tip for forming curved oil pan gaskets

Cheers, Dean

Well, I took "Otis" out for a drive tonight with his new breather cap and he's still leaking. When I get a chance I'll pull the oil pan and re-gasket it paying close attention to the seal on the front and rear main bearings and pull the front right engine mount through bolt and seal the treads to see if all that helps.

All that said, I'm ~95% sure some of this oil is coming from the lifters because it looked like a little stream of oil was draining out of the rear lifter/pushrod cover. Bluezone mentioned the hadn't seen large oil leaks around the '28 lifters, curious if anyone else has and if so what if anything you were able to do to stop/slow the leak. Would Bluezone's spiral groove trick be worth a short or is there a reason not to do this with the '28 lifters?

-Tyler

Here are a couple of thoughts from outer space. ;-)

Is it possible that the oil is not coming up from around the lifters, but instead is draining down from the rocker area? I can think of two scenarios that would cause an excess of extra oil on top of the head.

1. Over oiling the rockers. Before every drive, I only put a few drops on each rocker and a little squirt of oil onto the felt pad. I repeat this application every 50 miles on a long drive. More oil than this might cause extra oil to run down the side of the engine.

2. I have seen pictures of Chevy 4 cylinder engines where someone rigged up an extra oil line that went from the oil distributor up to deliver oil to the rockers. If this is the case, the extra oil would need a way to drain back into the oil pan from the wells around the valve stems. If the engine is set up this way, maybe the return oil line is plugged or too small and extra oil is spilling down into the lifter/push rod cavity.

Caveat: the next scenario is pure speculation, not experience.

If the lifter holes in the block have so much clearance as to cause oil to come 'up' from around the lifters and if the push rod covers were sealed better, the extra oil might just accumulate in the push rod cavity while the engine is running. Then, after a drive, the extra oil might just drain right back into the oil pan through those worn holes while the engine is not running.

If you think this scenario is a possibility, I suggest that you also put new gaskets under the push rod cover plates.

That's all I can think of.

Keep us posted on this interesting problem and the solution you come up with.

Dean

Thanks for the extra terrestrial oil leak thoughts :-P

Regarding oiling the rockers, Otis still has the original setup and I typically oil it through the valve cover holes however I tend to error on the side of over oiling so I'm sure I do get some leakage from this area.

When I get a chance I'll re-gasket/seal up the pushrod covers along with the oil pan and cross my fingers.

In the mean time, I'll put in some more miles and keep track of how quickly oil is leaking from the crankcase.

-Tyler