coolant in the oil, what did I do wrong?

[GreenWater]

Okay, this is what happened. I have been getting oil in my coolant for about a week and I learned that is could be from the internal oil cooler o-ring. I got all the gaskets and o-rings to fix it and worked on it last night. I followed the guide from clarks-garage. It took a while but now I have coolant in the oil. My oil looks like a milkshake and my coolant is gone. What did I do wrong? Why has my problem only gotten worse? Did I not put it together right, or did one of the o-rings break? Please help me, this is my only form of transportation currently.


Thanks

[2Tight]

Originally Posted by GreenWater

Okay, this is what happened. I have been getting oil in my coolant for about a week and I learned that is could be from the internal oil cooler o-ring. I got all the gaskets and o-rings to fix it and worked on it last night. I followed the guide from clarks-garage. It took a while but now I have coolant in the oil. My oil looks like a milkshake and my coolant is gone. What did I do wrong? Why has my problem only gotten worse? Did I not put it together right, or did one of the o-rings break? Please help me, this is my only form of transportation currently.


Thanks

I suggest a compression test to make sure your head gasket wasn't the problem. The only other thing I can think of is your oil-cooler and you feel you made those repairs correctly. Did you drain all your oil and coolant completely before adding more of both? Hopefully you are just seeing residual oil that didn't drain out. I would still do the compression test or at the least pull your plugs and see if any of them at wet.

[87924gt]

I agree with 2Tight with regards to you doing a compression test. You might also do several oil changes. Buy cheap oil and filters and bring the temps up. Repeat until the oil is clean, then do a final oil change with your oil of choice and a quality filter.
Steve Ed

[dogslovetrucks]

Comp test is a good idea. Did the engine have any running issues prior to your discovery? When it's warmed up, were bubbles blowing up into the tank? May be the gasket in oil/water exchanger. Common failure and not too expensive but potentially very bad if it's been run that way for ANY period of time. Ethylene glycol (aka antifreeze) does not mix well with your bearings and tends to destroy them. Also, recommend checking your oil sending unit as antifreeze tends to not agree with it very much either. Swap your cooler gasket, change your oil and change it again. I believe there is some anti moisture additive that would help displace the water. Worse case- 944 motors are not that expensive.

[xupkid2]

When you put the new seals on the oil cooler did you make sure to align everything correctly and to use the oil pressure relief valve alignment tool. If things are off and the seals dont get seated properly you will have a mixing problem. You need to also make sure you use the little plastic spacers to space out the cooler correctly. When doing this with the engine in the car still things are tight and its tough to make sure everything is seated properly. Just because the mounting bolts torqued does not necessairly mean the seals seated properly.

The Comp test is also a good check but since you just messed with the oil cooler I would guess that is the more likely cause.

The cooler on these 44's is a good design when its together correcly but can cause many problems.

[dogslovetrucks]

"The Comp test is also a good check but since you just messed with the oil cooler I would guess that is the more likely cause."


If I'm understanding his post, he messed with it because there was a problem. If you took your time in putting it back together, then the o-ring is not the problem.

[2Tight]

Originally Posted by dogslovetrucks

"The Comp test is also a good check but since you just messed with the oil cooler I would guess that is the more likely cause."


If I'm understanding his post, he messed with it because there was a problem. If you took your time in putting it back together, then the o-ring is not the problem.

Agreed, I read it the same way. He was having a mixing problem 'before' he did the cooler reseal and again after. Even if he hadn't used the guide tool the cooler should still seal if he did the spacers right. The guide tool is for fine alignment of the OPRV, not for insuring a good seal on the cooler housing. IMO only 3 things could be happening. He installed the spacers wrong, overtigthened the cover, or has a failing HG. Before I would do the cooler again I would try the compression test; it's easy and takes about 5 minutes compared to 3 hours to R&R the cooler. If compression looks good it's the cooler. Hopefully it's not a corrosion failure of the HG between a water and oil passage that doesn't show up on a compression test , thankfully that's very uncommon though.

[Slam]

Another thing - if the cooler's installed incorrectly, oil tends to get forced into the cooling system first. You'll see it in the overflow tank before you get coolant in the oil. I'd check HG too.