Condensation in my oil, is this normal? Update 05/21/2015 Found a problem

Subscribed....I'm in Iowa as well and I am having the same exact issue with my 4.1 hot air motor. Catch can fills with milky oil every time I boost the car....dipstick is perfectly clean....no smoke. I also am running a 160 stat. Good info here....
 
Only had time for a 20 minute drive yesterday which isn't enough to repeat the issue. Going on a small road trip tonight for some chicken and a beer or two so that will tell the story.

I did eliminate the catch can so I'll report back.

Where in Iowa are you?
 
Milk in the catch can is not a good sign. Pretty good chance coolant is getting in the case....

Rick
 
Its pure water no antifreeze smell or color. Drove the car 30 miles to where I am now and have milky oil in breathers. Ran 18 boost on a stretch of highway and oil pressure gauge stuck at 20 psi after run. Pulled over immediately and checked sending wire. Noticed oil breather popped out of valve cover. Put it back in and started the car. Oil pressure is fine now. Prob loose wire or sending unit is full of milky shit. Not real happy right now. Oil level is exactly where it was when I left. No smoke out the tail pipe, no smells and I have no idea what to do now. I can't believe coolant in motor at this point, no typical signs. Just bummed I spent so much money on this car in the last year and it has never had one single trouble/concern/question free day.

Posted from the TurboBuick.Com mobile app
 
I'm in south east iowa. Mt pleasant. Right now I'm in Bonaparte iowa eating chicken.

I have stock head gaskets. Did a block test and no combustion gases in coolant system.

Just got off phone with Husek and I'm good to go home. Oil pressure normal. Going to do a compression test in the morning and go from there.

Thanks for the posts

Posted from the TurboBuick.Com mobile app
 
Subscribed....I'm in Iowa as well and I am having the same exact issue with my 4.1 hot air motor. Catch can fills with milky oil every time I boost the car....dipstick is perfectly clean....no smoke. I also am running a 160 stat. Good info here....

E85 will cause a little more water in the catch can. You guys are both probably normal but a regular pcv just sucks the moisture out where you guys are seeing what normally just gets run through. If crank case oil is good, the of pcv is doing it's job too so I wouldn't worry.

Especially Brett, you've done the right checks and if compression checks, no worries. Cold, moist air will cause more water too vs hot humid air. Just a thought.
 
Got back to the shop tonight and checked oil again. Looks fine on dipstick. Same level and clean.

Blew through breathers and they are water logged. Did a selfie video on my phone I'll post tomorrow if I can figure out how. Got the water on my hands and rubbed it in. No residue left over on my skin. Feels just like water.

Set the SM on coolant temp after the 180 thermo change for most of the drive and temp was up and down a lot. 174 to 190. Could be air left in the system or a gasket leak somewhere. Head or intake? The 160 thermo was rock solid.

I hooked the catch can back up before I left for home and no extra moisture in it when I got back. I drove easy coming home so I'm thinking my problem is under boost. Either I have a head gasket problem or a a shit load of blow by based on what I've read. I guess blow by can create moisture?

I have no oil smoke, no white coolant smoke, no smell, motor runs smooth and strong, nothing out the tail pipes, passed block test. I'm out of ideas.

This milky water situation happened from one day to the next. The motor has not been abused and quite honestly out of the 1100 miles on it 1097 miles has been cruising speed easy peazy. Ran it at 10 psi to seat the rings several times early on, then 15 psi off and on then at 700 to 800 miles I ran it to 18 psi. Basically just blips of KR at tip in and zero KR at WOT. Really nothing that should or could have hurt this motor.

I'm going to throw out some questions, some may be in outer space so bare with me.

Can an intercooler issue cause this?

How about the CAI? My air filter in mounted down low in front of the drivers front tire. The air will be cooler there and have more moisture this time of year.

Can I get moisture from a gasket leak but not raise the oil level or have a coolant smell or tell tale white exhaust smoke? This water has no left over residue like coolant does when you wipe it on your fingers..

Can I be too rich in the fuel department and or Alky? The oil doesn't smell like fuel nor do the breathers with the moisture but can too much fuel create more blow by causing moisture? I'm on the safe side with AFR so I can pull fuel if needed.

I'll do the compression test in the AM and post back.

With my cam and 9.1 compression what kind of numbers should I be looking for other than consistency between cylinders?
 
The burning of gasoline (or ethanol or alcohol or any other hydrocarbon for that matter) results in the production of water vapor. It is part of the exhaust gas and should exit the tailpipe. If it is accumulating in your catch can and breathers, one very logical explanation for the pure water is blow-by. I'm not saying you have excessive blow-by, but my opinion (especially since there is apparently no anti-freeze in the catch-can water) is you are experiencing some blow-by. It's my understanding that most engines have at least some blow-by.
I am not an expert, but am just stating some facts and my opinion.
I don't think a little blow-by is damaging. I do think you benefit from using the can though. Better to have the water in there where you can keep tAbs on it. Subscribed.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Posted from the TurboBuick.Com mobile app

No oil cooler. I would think the oil cooler would help heat the oil faster this time of year? May also keep a more consistent oil temp as well. Funny thing is I never had this problem until the cooler weather came here in Iowa.

Got to the shop this morning and looked things over again. Used my camera scope and got inside valve covers. White milky stuff coated on the cover but not down on the head, just normal oil there.

This stuff is pure white and no odor. Something's up just not sure which way to go from here. Radiators down a little but just did a crank seal so may not have had all the air out of the cooling system. Temp gauge was up and down like I had an air pocket or I'm getting crankcase pressure in the cooling system and it's leaking back. If I am it's gotta be minimal because there are no gasses in the coolant. Not going to panic on that right now. Going to bleed the cooling system again first.

Going out to pull plugs and do a compression test this morning.

I asked Husek this last night and I'll run it by the board too. Why is it we run 2 breathers on the valve covers? I know it's a turbo motor and they are different than say my 78 Trans Am but in order for a PCV to function properly it has to have vacuum. Now on my other motors I run a PCV in one valve cover and a breather in the other. My point here is with 2 breathers can the PCV create enough vacuum to be effective at cruise speed and get rid of moisture and unsavory gasses? Take your vacuum cleaner out of the closet and use the suction hose. Cup your hand around the end and start to close your hand, the vacuum will increase as you close the gap. With 2 breather can the thing even pull enough vacuum? My other point is are we pulling too much air in the crankcase with 2 breathers? It doubles the volume of air, in my case cooler moist air.

Just a thought.
 
Last edited:
Did you try the GM seal tabs like Nick mentioned earlier? You can get them from a dealer if not else where. I don't know if the glycol will vaporize at such low temps, so that may be why you are only seeing water and oil in the breathers and else where. I had a leaking head bolt before, and it looked like what you are seeing. I had enough to up the level on the dipstick a little though. I did not use the seal tabs, will not make that mistake again. The oil on the dipstick looked fine when this happened. You may try letting a small amount of oil out of the drain plug, the coolant would settle to the bottom. Hard to tell from the color with everything mixing, but the you tell from the viscosity if it is coolant. Just let a little out. I pulled my motor back out after the leak and took it apart, other than being gunked up, everything looked OK. I live relatively close to Dave Husek, I was having him do my trans, and he took a look at my disassembled engine, and thought it looked really good considering it was a 100k short block. I put it back together only changed the rod bearings which weren't to bad others were in great shape, so far so good. So even if you got a little coolant in the oil, stopping the leak and getting fresh oil in, you would likely be good to go if it turned out to be a small leak.
 
I'm going to try the tabs today. I just had a conversation with Rich my engine go to guy and we're a little stumped but he recommended the tabs as well at this point. I did not have this problem for the 1st 600 miles so we got to talking about what changed. I do not believe my driving habits could have hurt the motor, could be a bad head gasket etc etc but those things are out of my control.

Here's what I changed. I went from Castrol 10w 30 to VR1 10w 30. Same time I drilled out my baffled breathers so they would breathe better. That's it. I changed the pan gasket and everything looked honky dory. Drove the car after that here and there and one morning I noticed my engine temp was above normal. I was close to Riches shop so I pilled in. That's when we noticed the milky stuff. My coolant was down but the pressure test showed leaky upper rad hose. Decided to put new hoses on and hotter thermostat. Did the crank seal at the same time and here we are.

I changed the oil and filter after fixing the crank seal, drove the car 60 miles last night and when I got back the milky stuff turned pure white. Thought maybe I was making progress cleaning the milky stuff out of the motor with more heat.

Thought I better just be thorough and pull the valve covers and clean as much as I could so I didn't have residual milky stuff fooling me.

Here is what I found, keep in mind I'm getting pure water out of breathers and pcv hoses.



:eek::eek:
 
Probably a good idea to re-torque the head bolts/studs and the intake manifold bolts. Along with using the seal tabs.

RemoveBeforeFlight
 
I don't think you can retorque the headbolts, you will break the seal. I think that is what actually caused my bolts to leak, I read after the fact here on the board to not retorque head bolts. Studs you can retorque.

I did not drive my car long enough to accumulate that much goop, but that is what it looked like on the top of my engine with 50/50 antifreeze and water.
 
Top