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Showing content with the highest reputation on 06/30/2022 in all areas

  1. My vq leaks considerably less and runs quieter with Rotella T4 15w40 for what that's worth. Valve cover gasket shouldn't affect oil pressure, the oil is just gravity draining back to the pan at that point. If its not smoking and your not constantly smelling burning oil I wouldn't worry about it on the trip. Always a good idea to have a fire extinguisher in the vehicle though! Lol
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  2. If you don't see smoke, I wouldn't worry too much. That's not to say it couldn't catch fire--GM did a recall for their 3800s doing exactly that--but most things I've worked on were leaking some amount of oil onto the exhaust, and none of them came in because of engine fires. I can smell the leak in our snowplow, and it annoys me, but not enough that I've bothered trying to fix it again. My friend's Toyota was leaking bad enough that the oil was pooling between the head and the exhaust manifold gasket. That one was bad enough to smoke after driving, and bad enough that we replaced the gasket for fear of it catching fire. I'm running high-mileage oil in my VG because it's cheap and why not. I haven't tracked my rear main leak to see if it's slowed any. Thicker oil might leak a little slower, but I wouldn't expect any flavor of goo-in-a-can to fix the gaskets if they're hard and cracked like mine were. If you can get to the valve cover fasteners, you might try snugging them up a little. IIRC there's also an oil cooler on the VQs that can leak, something else to check. I wouldn't assume it's a crankcase pressure issue just because it only leaks while running. The engine only pumps oil to the heads when it's running. My dad had the PCV done on his '03 (chasing the quart/1000 miles oil consumption) and the guy said he managed it without pulling the intake, but it didn't sound like he had fun doing it. It didn't solve the oil consumption. I've heard various explanations for why some VQs guzzle oil, from the design of the PCV baffles to the power valve screws falling in and chewing stuff up to excessive bore taper. My dad's smoked on warm starts, but otherwise drove fine so long as he kept oil in it. And, yeah, the IACV leaks coolant into the electronics and smokes the driver mosfet in the computer. Genius-level design at work there. The VG has its own quirks/issues, but, yeah, I wasn't impressed with the VQ.
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