87 Losing/Burning Oil

[e_nough]

my 87 burns/loses 1 quart of oil per 1000miles. is this normal?

also the underside of the engine is gunked up with tons of engine oil. i had the car inspected two weeks ago and the tech said that the only leak was coming from some sensor located just below the oil filter. what is that filter (two wires coming out the back, brass colored cylynder with big threads/nut screwed into the engine block)

what is that sensor thing?

oil pressure is fine at idle (1.5bar with warm engine, and 4.5bars at >4000rpm)

no black, white, or blue smoke from exhaust.

thanks, mike

[cyclemike]

What do your spark-plugs look like? How about your balance shaft housing. This is the usual culprit.

[Lawrence Coppari]

It's the oil pressure sender.

Balance shaft housings are a good place to look for an oil leak. Also, the area where the filter housing is attached to the block is another good place for a leak. Don't know but do your balance shaft housings have that little bobbin like thing to cover the hole in the end. The o ring on both of mine wore out and leaked there. Had to remove the turbo to get the top housing off to replace a 40 cent o-ring....

[sugimotoma]

I have 87 924s, which used leak a lot of oil too. In my case, that oil pressure sender was leaking some oil from the black plastic base that holds two leads. Major leak was found from the oil cooler housing which is right next to the oil filter housing. I could see oil dripping from there if I look under side of the car while the engine is running. It was very hard to replace the gaskets because the cooler is in the tight spot.
You should spray degreaser around the oil cooler and pressure sender area to clean up that gunk stuff. And then check for leak while engine is running to see where is the leak spot.
Good luck !!

Mark Sugimoto

[lm6y]

Are you syre that "gunk" is engine oil that has leaked out? or is it the factory protectant that is sprayed on called Cosmoline? The factory sprays this tar like substance on the underside of the engine compartment, and the skid plate to protect the metal like an undercoating, and to reduce the noise of rocks hitting the skid plate. At least it's there on the early cars I've seen. When they replaced my timing and balance shaft belts they showed me the skid plate and told me I had a serious oil leak. They wouldn't let me out in the shop to look under the car while it was on the lift, but when I got it home I took the plate off and found the underside of the engine to be completely clean and dry. It seems they thought I was another Porsche owner that was afraid to do the maintainence myself, and wanted another $100 from my wallet to replace seals that were fine. Needless to say, they've not seen my car again.

[hoff944]

I cleaned my whole skid plate off. I might have removed the Cosmoline you were talking about. Mine is shiney now so I can tell if I have an oil leak. I don't guess this will hurt anything.