Ford Fiesta burns oil-solutions ??

"I suspect worn valve stem seals or worn piston rings or both. It'll take me the best part of a day to renew both plus grazed knuckles...!!! And I might not have the right solution...!!!"

Those OHV engines do burn oil. A new set of stem seals might improve matters a bit, but probably not a lot.

Mr Tibbs

Don

I don't know if this has any bearing on the problem but my father had a similar experience with a Peugeot 206. Looked fine, no visible leaks but drank oil.

Main dealer flushed the engine and de-coked it as (believe it or not) they claimed that the engine had a design "anomily" that caused it to carbon up if not given enough motorway miles......

Once he got it back - oil consumption was much less, until the miles got added.......

I am no mechanic, but might prevent scarring to your knuckles !

Mr Tibbs & Long-time-dead,

Thanks for your advice.

I won't rush into this one. We can keep topping up the oil after a long journey. And after your advice it seems that improvements might only be slight.

But I will probably try some flushing oil and, presumably, you (LTD) had something like Redex in mind to decoke, as opposed to removing the head and reseating valves, 'scraping' off carbon etc

Many thanks

Cheers

Don

Don

No idea "what" they used at the garage - probably Fairy Liquid - but it seemed to work for a while......

Can you determine the state of carbonisation without going inside ? I have no idea (whoops - open season )

If it were the stem seals or valve guides then one would expect puffs of blue smoke on the overrun. It may require an observer in a following car to spot this.

65000 miles in 8 years is quite low. If it's done a lot of short journeys then bore wear is possible. If you're lucky then it's down to the bores being glazed, so a hone and a set of rings would sort it.

I suspect the latter. It's worth doing a compression test. It's probably not worth fixing it. You could suggest that your daughter drive the car hard for a couple of months and see what happens.

Paul

Half a litre every thousand miles = ~ 1pt. every 500.

If you've ever run a tuned A-series engine, this is rather good. Unless the engine is malfunctioning in some other way, live with it till it dies; the savings to be had are miniscule compared with the cost of doing a better job than than the factory. Otherwise, it's an acceptable loss for the generation this engine hails from - don't sweat it.

M.
(ex-120HP Mini owner)

[This message was edited by Martin Clark on Wed 09 June 2004 at 1:33.]

Longer answer: blue puffs on the overrun = worn valve guides; blue smoke on acceleration = worn rings.

If nothing is actually wrong between the two it's actually very hard to diagnose. Check for a blocked PCV valve, if fitted - Positive Crankcase Ventilation, a check valve that links an oil breather pipe to the intake system to burn waste gases. About £2-3 to replace if it's knackered; they tend to clog with age.

One symptom of truly excessive oil-burning is pinking - belching oil vapour into the intake lowers the octane value enough to cause poor running. Might be an issue with Ford's Lean Burn approach, but I'd expect obviously-poor running generally to be noticable first.

Otherwise, if it runs fine - live with it.

Mant thanks for the advice to date.

Best approach seem to be to live with it and watch for change.

The car starts and runs perfectly. No pinking, no tappet noise, nothing. It accelerates smoothly and cruises at 80mph quite happily.

One other thing that I have noticed is that the rocker cover can get thickly coated on the inside with a yellow/brown gunge that looks like a moist/soft/slightly frothy/oily substance. This gunge also covers bits of the rocker shaft and tappets etc. It cleans of easily with paraffin or petrol, but does tend to reappear. Hasn't appeared in the last 1,000 miles though. Should have mentioned this before perhaps?

Puzzled...

Cheers

Don

The gunge is emulsified oil, it can be caused by a blown head gasket, excessive breathing (piston blow-by) or by lots of short runs.

Ford Fiesta burns oil-solutions ??

So stop putting oil-solutions into your Fiesta and start using normal oil.

The foamy stuff sounds like mayonaise and is caused by condensation forming inside the rocker cover. With the on-set of warmer weather it may not form as quickly. It's generally not a good thing and can lead to corrosion of parts in that area. Usually caused by too many short journies where the engine does not become hot enough to burn off the condesation. I suggest that the engine is placed under load every week or so to burn off the water and petrol that's forming in the oil.

Re the oil consumption. A leak-down test might identify where the problem lies, but I would be inclined to live with it. The advantage is that topping up the oil effectively renews the additives in the oil on a continuous basis.

Regards,

Brian OReilly

The gungy stuff is when water & oil get combined,commonly refered to as " mayonnaise".

Some vehicles / oil combinations seem more prone to this effect than others. ( after a good clean out,try changing oil brand....making sure that it is in the correct performance and viscosity range).

Is there any unaccountable water loss from the coolant ? ( indicating possible cylinder-head/gasket problems).

Does the engine spent the majority of its time in short journies....engine does not fully get up to temperature ?...It is not uncommon for vapour produced from the petrol ignition process to find it's way into the oil,if the car does regular long journies,this gets burned off.

One thing that is puzzling me is that the oil is black after 500 miles ( not just mildly black,but BLACK) I would suspect that the car is running rich,but you say that the spark plugs are normal in colour ?

p.s. If the valve stem oil seals were dodgy,you would get a big cloud of smoke upom starting the car first thing in the morning.

Regards

Chris

Journey times

Until recently most of her journeys were a 7 mile run to work in the morning and 7 miles back in the evening, both outside rush hour, so journey time is about 10 mins each way. This might account for the gunge.

More recently the work journeys have reduced and longer journyes to Birmingham (90 miles each way) and Cornwall (200 miles each way) have been introduced. This might account for the current lack of gunge, plus the warm weather.

I had wondered about the head gasket. But the lack of any oil leak around the block/head joint, or any signs of oil in the water, or water in the oil (other than "mayonnaise") led me to discount this possibility.

I will follow her for a few miles this evening just to make absolutely sure there is no smoke from the exhaust at all. I have never seen any, even though I have watched her drive off and return home many times.

Thanks again for all the good suggestions

Cheers

Don

Just keep a case of straight 50 weight oil in the boot and add as necessary. Much cheaper than having it repaired.

"Half a litre every thousand miles = ~ 1pt. every 500."

Huh?
Half a litre/1000 miles is less than1 pint/1000 miles, surely Martin?

Don,
I reckon your daughter floors the thing as soon as she hits the open road

Those engines run pretty hot and that can cause the gunge to form in the rocker box. As someone else has suggested, try a different brand of oil.

Mr Tibbs

As a person who drove for years old cars, I think that half a liter of oil per 1000 miles is a very good datum. The fact that the oil comes black tells that it does its job to collect dirt from the engine.

Enjoy the car, everything you'll try to do to fix it will cost much more than the half /1000
and no guaranty that what you'll try will help.

Arye

Mr Tibbs you're quite correct, but I plead mitigating circumstances: I don't usually surf after an evening in the pub ;-)

Were you on the pints or half litres Martin

Mind you, I've been there myself...

... take me drunk I'm home... hic

Mr Tippsy