I haven't driven the FD for several weeks now due to the poor weather. But I noticed last night when I was cleaning the floor (the Volvo keeps tracking in snow and mud) that there was a rather large oil leak under the FD.
This is a new engine with less than 8K miles on it.
I plan on going out and jacking it up, taking off the undertray and seeing what I can see.
I'm wondering if it is a turbo oil line gasket or the pan or...what else?

 

dont touch it, take it back to the shop that did the work

 

If its that much, it would most likely be either a turbo return line gasket or the oil pan. I wouldn't rule out the oil filter pedestal or oil filter connection, but I would bet on one of the other two.

 

lol.....well... I did the installation, of a motor I'd had built to the short-block level.

 

Im betting the oil pan, because that is what they do.

 

my friend had a pretty big oil leak on his FD. The metal pipe that goes to the oil pressure sensor had cracked in half.

 

Dont rule out seals. Rear and front main seals leak too...

 

It appears to be pan related. Some of the 10mm bolts were moderately loose, but...I doubt that is the cause of the leak.
Sigh.
I friggin' HATE oil leaks! My garage floor has this ~6" diameter spot on it now. I cleaned it up but I can likely expect more of the same.
To top it all off, my damned Volvo has a leaky oil return line on one of the turbos, so IT leaves a bit of a mess too.

 

put some wood under your car to catch the oil until you determine the cause of the leak and fix it.

 

I have purchased some of those little pad thingies that absorb oil and am using those now under BOTH cars. If the pan truly is leaking, we all know how difficult a permanent 'fix' is. I just don't get it. I gooped the **** out of that pan with The Right Stuff and a new gasket, it looked PERFECT when I installed it.

 

Leave the cover off the under tray and put large card board under it and locate were its dripping from. Or atleast some idea.

 

I have a leak coming from the turbo areas also. If it were the return line gasket, how difficult of a task would it be to replace it? Would the turbos need to be removed/dismantled?

 

It's not a fun job. If you haven't worked on the car much, it's going to be a heck of a job.

If you remove the turbos, you can replace all 4 return line gaskets at once. If you have one of them leaking, I would recommend replacing them all as it will most likely just be a matter of time before another one leaks.

If you haven't done much work on the car, you can estimate to spend about 4-5 hours getting the turbos out for the first time. Even longer if you have some seized up bolts.

 

That's your problem. The stock paper oil pan gasket is garbage. I don't use them.

Btw, I was laughing my *** off about a quote of yours about black friday that I saw in someone's sig

 

PB Blaster FTW.

 

lol...well i guess you can rule out getting a refund

 

It is definitely rear of the undertray. Passenger side. Definitely the pan, leaking is evident from about the 3rd most rearward 10mm bolt and on back, I really think it is coming from the large bolts that penetrate the pan that the engine mounts use.

Dammit, I took the time in the two+ years my car was down to thoroughly clean the underside of the car....it was SO nice and clean and non-oily. Looked new....

 

Bajaman,

You've probably seen this thread before, but in case you haven't, it may be useful.

https://www.rx7club.com/showthread.p...easier+oil+pan

Dave

 

Well don't panic.

Oh, and pick up one of those large shallow steel pans from Autozone for $10. I use these regularly and they've saved a lot of messes.

Dave

 

As everyone else has said - the gasket, itself, is the problem. It takes a set, particularly under the engine mounts, and, once it has compressed, a gap forms, and it leaks. that's why ALMOST everyone recommends not using the gasket.

Dave

 

Get one of the Pineapple deep pans that is sealed with an o-ring and you will never have to worry about pan leakage again.

 

Yeah but....I really don't want to pull the pan/engine/sub-frame right at the moment...lol!
I think I will just deal with a spot-leak for now.

 

Maybe it'd still be too much work for your timeframe, but in the link I referenced, the oil pan can be sealed properly w/o either pulling the engine or dropping the subframe. IIRC, it took me about eight hours of actual work to carefully do it this way. It did take me longer than that, over all, because I took extra time figuring out some extra steps to do it to my satisfaction.

Dave

 

Good link, Dave. I appreciate this help. Maybe with the shitty weather I can find some time to do this during the Christmas break.

 

Hmmm I can't really figure this out. I have an oil leak as well but I have barely driven my car and it's been leaking oil since it came out of Gotham. It's most active on shut down (hopefully) I can't really see when I'm driving around.

1 Gotham Racing Oil Pan Brace for FD3S
1 Oil Pan Brace Hardware Kit
1 3rd Gen Rear Main Seal
1 Real Seal O-Ring
------------
Re-Seal Oil Pan
Replace Rear Main Seal & O-Rings


^^^Are these basically the main oil leaking points that I'd have to replace? I just took the car to Gotham and asked for matinence/tune up. I wound up walking out with just about everything. They said that one of my turbos was going out and didn't know how much longer it would last. Could a turbo going out be a reason for oil burning quickly? I watch my oil levels continually drop lately. If it's the turbos then that would be a relief otherwise I'm dropping a significant amount of oil in a short amount of time.