Hello all,

Looming to get an evaluation of this situation. I have a 1989 LX accord with about 64000 miles. Did not seem to have any MAJOR issues while working on it in the driveway / idleing, etc. Today after obtaining license plates I have taken it for a better drive on the highway (45-50 mph). While driving around the performance of the car was great and I did not have any issues with it. Unfortunately there was quite a large problem once I brought it back home. I noticed 10 minutes after parking that two oil spots had formed under the car, none of which were apparent while doing tests while idling. One was at the front driver side of the car and one was almost directly under the oil filter, but I don't think this means much because the oil seems to be dripping from elsewhere and those spots were just for escape. The oil looked slightly green as if it could be a head gasket problem, but I am not sure - when doing drain and fill the coolant did not look oily and the oil did not look milky. After less than 10 miles the oil went from the top hole of the dipstick to the middle, so clearly I can not continue to use the vehicle like this. Lastly I noticed that there was some blow-by from the valve cover, but at idle the smoke was just slightly visible. I am not sure if that much oil could be coming from the blow-by, but if it is a possibility, then please let me know.

I am hoping to revive it but if it is too far beyond hope please let me know.

Thanks for reading

 

You just need to find the source of the oil leak. It may be simple to repair, or complicated.

It wasn't clear in your first post if you just bought the car. If the oil looked, green, maybe someone put dye into the oil to find a leak?

For blow-by, you may want to check the PCV valve.

 

Hello PAhonda. I have done the following maint items after buying the car before the highway drive:

-oil and filter (5w30 currently)
-both fuel filters
-coolant
-ATF
-spark plugs
-air cleaner

At that time the oil was changed, so no dye. (but also no milky color in the old oil) I have already checked the PCV: both the old and the replacement I bought click fine. (unless there are other parts besides the valve I need to look at)

Thanks for reading

 

You will have to get a flashlight and take a close look around the engine to figure out where you have the oil leak. Look for the highest spot where you see oil.

Since you have spots on the ground, you should be able to see oil on the block or components. Try to find the highest point where you see oil to start narrowing down the sources. Also keep oil with you, and religiously check the level. Add oil when necessary.

 

Hi PAhonda,

I appreciate your response on this, I have a lot going on so my troubleshooting is slow but I am still working on it.

The green-ness was because the radiator also had a leak, but it only appeared seemingly when driving fast/hot but not when idling. Replacing the radiator has resolved this issue.

I found the source of the main oil-leak which was lucky, it seemed to be the valve cover gasket. After this was replaced I get no more huge smoke from the leak.

I have another issue though, let me know if I should start a new thread for it, because this one is more difficult: the car has some blow by; I don't know how to judge 'how much', but it is visible from the tube coming from the valve cover. The previous owner has done something I guess illegal by rerouting a tube from the top of the valve cover to the underside of the car instead of where it normally goes to the air cleaner. (the blow-by would likely end up clogging the air filter after a few trips, which is why he/she did it) This is my first time troubleshooting what seems like a huge issue to repair properly, so I would appreciate any tips. The engine only has about 64k miles, but is quite old of course and could have been sitting for a while at some point in it's life. Does it seem reasonable that there would be extensive engine wear causing the blow by with an engine with this many miles, and what is the best way to check? I have already tried to change the PCV valve but it has not made a difference.

The power output of the engine is good enough, it is mainly the oil loss and/or dripping oil everywhere that I am concerned about.

Thanks much.

 

Other than the pcv tube, do you have other oil leaks?

 

Hey,

There are no other oil leaks that are noticeable after idling or driving and parking besides the smog from the valve cover tube (just what condenses inside of the tube and drips down after the engine is turned off) To clarify, this is not the 'PCV tube' (the part in between the engine block and air cleaner where the PCV valve is) , rather I was talking about the tube coming from the very top of the valve cover.

I think my issue is very similar to the one described here: https://www.hondaaccordforum.com/for...il-loss-48201/ which does not look like it got resolved. The valve cover gasket likely was messed up on mine for the same reason (pressure from blow-by)...

 

Hello again, here is an update on this:

I rented a compression test today, and it's not too good, but I also am not 100% sure what I am doing so maybe what I did was wrong too. In any case would appreciate any more suggestions:

What I did: Idle car for 5 minutes. Took off all plugs to ignition coil, and removed fuel pump fuse. Took off all plug wires and spark plugs. Hooked up compression test thingy to one cylinder, crank over counting 7 'turns' (you can hear a pitch difference between each turn). Look at number, repeat for next cylinder. I did not press the gas pedal at all for any of this. (except the idleing part haha) I also re-gapped all of the spark plugs to 0.044 while they were out.

Numbers from passenger side to drivers: 75, 70, 60, 110

So....very bad it seems. Any suggestion what could be checked next? Additionally, there is a problem with the idle I think. With the car cold or hot, shifting into gear, either reverse or drive, has a 50% chance of stalling the car. Is there any quick solution to this such as a common vacuum leak spot or possibly making the idle higher?

In any case, after the car has been being used for a few weeks, it does not seem like the oil loss will be a major concern. It only lost about 1/8 between the two dots on the dipstick after two weeks, so I think that is manageable.

Thanks for all of your suggestions.

 

You need to floor the gas pedal when doing the compression test to allow the maximum flow of air to the engine.

 

Alright PAhonda

Thank you for being patient. Again I don't give up easily I just have other responsibilities.

Here are the readings. Similar procedure with the fix you mentioned. I took out all spark plugs, disconnected fuel pump fuse, disconnected ignition coil wires. For each cylinder I attached the tester, pushed gas to floor, and cranked over 10 times. Then I took out the tester, added 4 pumps (from a transmission pump) of Marvel Mystery Oil into the plug hole, attached the tester, pressed gas to the floor, and cranked over 10 times again. Here are the numbers (from passenger to driver side):

No Oil: 110 ; With Oil 165
No Oil: 70 ; With Oil 80
No Oil: 80 ; With Oil 80
No Oil: 100 ; With Oil 110

This seems pretty inconclusive to me as to what the problem was. It looks like rings on the first cylinder and something else on the rest?

Any suggestions would be welcome. It is still drivable but I am worried about the winter.

Secondly due to this the idle is lower then I would like it to be. I found in the shop manual two screws which would adjust the idle when out of gear and when in gear. The former on the passenger side of the carb and the latter on the driver side. I was able to adjust the not-in-gear idle ok with the passenger site screw, but the in-gear idle stays the same (about 0.8) - the screw in the driver side of the carb does not seem to do anything. I was hoping to raise the idle to 1.0 or so while in gear until I can fix this problem.

Thanks again for reading! It is always encouraging to interact with you folks.