Club 80-90 Forums

Hi all,

Got a bit of problem with bus (2.1 petrol )recently noticed it has been losing litres of coolant and shedding oil from the dipstick and oil refill pipe. After clearing up oil mess and tightening all suspect pipes it's seems better. It did have a oil change not long ago with a new oil filter. Any ideas where to look before I send to the garage, could it bee the oil cooler?

Thanks

standard reply is to clean up as best you can, then run with some cardboard underneath to identify where it is coming from!

I have done that, but it's still tricky to see where actually.
From what I can see the oil appears to coming from the middle join of the refill neck. It's hard to say, I've also noticed some oil around the top of the oil breather tower

ermie571 wrote:standard reply is to clean up as best you can, then run with some cardboard underneath to identify where it is coming from!

is your breather hose blocked or asthmatic ?
brickwerks do a silicone one which is excellent

obviously this is only likely to be part of the problem (others will be along shortly with more detailed advice

Will have it off and look...

hightop ratty wrote:is your breather hose blocked or asthmatic ?
brickwerks do a silicone one which is excellent

obviously this is only likely to be part of the problem (others will be along shortly with more detailed advice

If it was just the oil I would suspect:
At best something like overfilled sump, Blocked or leaking breather system.
Or more seriously blow by caused by products of combustion leaking past pistons and forcing oil up dipstick/oil filler etc. this will usually cause smoke at the exhaust though which isn't mentioned.
Bring water into the equation and something more serious like a blown head gasket or cracked cylinder head or barrel might be the problem.

You need to get someone to advise who you can be sure has specific experience and knowledge with these particular engines. People have been known to put their vans into workshops with inadequate relevant experience and pay for a lot of unnecessary or poorly targeted work.
Hope it isn't too bad.

Update:

Coolant leak fixed. Oil leak persists. What's been done:

Took to garage they changed the oil filler, replaced clip on dip stick they also did a compression test and service. 900 smackers later still has same problem. ..

Today I took off the breather and checked SBoot and tunes all is clear.

Changed high pressure switch just on the off chance.

Clear all oil of engine.

Ran 15 miles and still it sprays and I can see where from.

Where ever it's coming from its hitting pulleys and spraying all over.

Not sure where to go from here. New engine? Or try and find someone who is willing to do the job and not charge me the earth.

Mr Bean wrote:If it was just the oil I would suspect:
At best something like overfilled sump, Blocked or leaking breather system.
Or more seriously blow by caused by products of combustion leaking past pistons and forcing oil up dipstick/oil filler etc. this will usually cause smoke at the exhaust though which isn't mentioned.
Bring water into the equation and something more serious like a blown head gasket or cracked cylinder head or barrel might be the problem.

You need to get someone to advise who you can be sure has specific experience and knowledge with these particular engines. People have been known to put their vans into workshops with inadequate relevant experience and pay for a lot of unnecessary or poorly targeted work.
Hope it isn't too bad.

I have nothing useful to add about your problem, but £900 on what ???? How on earth have they got to this amount???

If you have paid the garage money to fix the oil problem, then you should take it back to allow them to fix it - unless you have doubts about their trustworthiness.

Do you know the results of your compression test, can you post them ?

If you want to investigate yourself, buy some brake cleaner & clean the engine off. Then start it, run for a couple of minutes on idle and look to see where it is coming from.

I had a small oil leak on my AutoSleeper. Did the cleaning off a few times and worked my way up to the problem (gravity brings the oil down). It was an installation problem on the "high" oil pressure switch.

"high" oil pressure switch is near the fan pulley.

I should have known better really, in my experience if you take a unknown problem to a garage without the exact fix your just asking for lots of labour hours without fully fixing issue. Anyway.... I'm not going to use them.

Compression

1- 135
2-105
3- 145
4-105


Oil doesn't leak on turnover even when bringing up to temperature and adding revs. Only leaks when running.

I cleaned out today, changed high pressure switch on the off chance it might be that as they can leak. Cleaned out checked breather etc.

quote="937carrera"]If you have paid the garage money to fix the oil problem, then you should take it back to allow them to fix it - unless you have doubts about their trustworthiness.

Do you know the results of your compression test, can you post them ?

If you want to investigate yourself, buy some brake cleaner & clean the engine off. Then start it, run for a couple of minutes on idle and look to see where it is coming from.

I had a small oil leak on my AutoSleeper. Did the cleaning off a few times and worked my way up to the problem (gravity brings the oil down). It was an installation problem on the "high" oil pressure switch.

"high" oil pressure switch is near the fan pulley.[/quote]

Compressions don't look great on number 2 and 4.

I think (someone please correct me if I am wrong) that the lower limit is something like 145 psi on a DJ, so none of them look good.

You could probably do with a leak down test to find the cause. If it's worn rings then combustion gases will be pressurising the crankcase, the pressure has to find a way out and the breather won't manage the volume

Sorry, it looks like bad news to me - provided the measurements were taken properly

How I new this would end up as a new engine needed ....

937carrera wrote:Compressions don't look great on number 2 and 4.

I think (someone please correct me if I am wrong) that the lower limit is something like 145 psi on a DJ, so none of them look good.

You could probably do with a leak down test to find the cause. If it's worn rings then combustion gases will be pressurising the crankcase, the pressure has to find a way out and the breather won't manage the volume

Sorry, it looks like bad news to me - provided the measurements were taken properly

Please don't just take my word on it - the measurements could just be wrong, long distance diagnosis isn't like being there, probably worthwhile getting them done again by someone you have faith in.

Let's see what other posters think about the issue, and suggestions for somewhere to go for another check

If it is a new engine what would you guys recommend?

I'm thinking refurb from TES.

937carrera wrote:Compressions don't look great on number 2 and 4.

I think (someone please correct me if I am wrong) that the lower limit is something like 145 psi on a DJ, so none of them look good.

You could probably do with a leak down test to find the cause. If it's worn rings then combustion gases will be pressurising the crankcase, the pressure has to find a way out and the breather won't manage the volume

Sorry, it looks like bad news to me - provided the measurements were taken properly

So I just want to explain my experience with a garage to make people aware of what happens so often with VW specialist garages. So basically I got a new engine. That's not before I took to this garage with my leaky oil problem. As explained before I took there with the diagnosis of my 2.1 dj was leaking oil but I couldn't tell where from as it was spraying. I could see that oil was leaking from oil refiller and dipstick and the breather which has already been checked for blockages. They did the compression which showed two cylinderss being low. Given that, and the obvious oil being pushed out of the engine they should have known what the problem was. Instead they serviced the engine, replaced the filler and then charged me 900 quid. After when I questioned it, as obviously it was still pissing with oil , offered for me to bring it back in. At which point I had no interest knowing that it was needing a new engine. It pisses me off how this can happen. To me it's day light robbery and I'm angry that I even think to trust these people. I share this in the how it doesn't happen to anyone else.

sternal wrote:I have nothing useful to add about your problem, but £900 on what ???? How on earth have they got to this amount???