427 FE sideoiler - Oil Consumption

[patrickt]

MD427 -- on the off chance that you have never pulled a spark plug, or never removed a valve cover, that's fine (most of us here have never delivered a baby either). Just ignore every post on this thread but mine and pull the hose off the PCV. Plug the hose with something, anything so long as it's kinda air tight, and cover up the outlet to the PCV valve with something. Stuffing a little paper towel in the PCV opening and wrapping some duct tape around it to hold it in would be fine. Then run your car for a tankful and report back.

[MD427]

To address a few questions and offer a little context to the situation...

Both valve covers are baffled, the driver side bank by the breather, passanger side by the PCV.
I have pulled both covers off off recently (new gaskets) and replaced the spark plugs at that time. For the record old set of plugs came out looking pretty 'good'.

The car/motor is nearly 30 years old by now. It has many miles on on it, probably over 10000. No idea what break in procedure was followed. (I was busy playing with Matchbox cars back then. )
But it hadn't been run or maintained at all for the aforementioned 15 years or so. So last winter went through and drained old fuel and oil. (Fresh gas, new filter, and Valvoline w ZDDP modifier) Disassembled and rebuilt Holley carb - all new gaskets. New plugs, and valve cover gaskets. Replaced a few old brittle hoses, cleaned some grounds and had some other essential chassis maintenance performed then as well.
With all that she now seems to start and run just as well as she ever has. The oil consumption just came as a bit of a surprise.

Next time weather and free time line up I'll plug the PCV and put some miles on it. Hopefully later this week.

[sunman]

Check/replace your valve stem seals
You are replacing the motors brittle rubber rite

Party On
Wyatt

[Gaz64]

The engine had not been run for 15 years?

I dare say the ring package to bore surface finish is the cause of oil consumption.

Gary

[RUFdriver]

Originally Posted by MD427

To address a few questions and offer a little context to the situation...

Both valve covers are baffled, the driver side bank by the breather, passanger side by the PCV.
I have pulled both covers off off recently (new gaskets) and replaced the spark plugs at that time. For the record old set of plugs came out looking pretty 'good'.

The car/motor is nearly 30 years old by now. It has many miles on on it, probably over 10000. No idea what break in procedure was followed. (I was busy playing with Matchbox cars back then. )
But it hadn't been run or maintained at all for the aforementioned 15 years or so. So last winter went through and drained old fuel and oil. (Fresh gas, new filter, and Valvoline w ZDDP modifier) Disassembled and rebuilt Holley carb - all new gaskets. New plugs, and valve cover gaskets. Replaced a few old brittle hoses, cleaned some grounds and had some other essential chassis maintenance performed then as well.
With all that she now seems to start and run just as well as she ever has. The oil consumption just came as a bit of a surprise.

Next time weather and free time line up I'll plug the PCV and put some miles on it. Hopefully later this week.

My mistake, when I first saw your post I thought it only had a couple hundred miles on it. In the old days we would just pour a can of STP oil treatment into the motor, that stuff worked like a charm, not even sure they still make it. Good luck on whatever you find.

[sunman]

The 1973 390 in my bus was rebuilt 35 years and had about 10K miles put on it than was parked in front of restaurants for 25 years
I just pulled the heads, (C4AE-6090s !!) , the cylinders look great, the pistons move sideways in the bore and show no signs of rings being stuck
The valves look new and are tight in the new guides
The rubber umbrella valve stem seals are loose and hard as rocks
It’s a clean up and new gaskets
With only 10K on your motor maybe you have the same thing going on

[patrickt]

Originally Posted by Gaz64

I dare say the ring package to bore surface finish is the cause of oil consumption.

Well that's just great, Gary. Now you've jinxed him.