oily stain from inlet manifold

[helen&tony]

Hi
I have an oily stain on the offside front of the block, and i have to clean it off soon, and i'm a little curious as to its origin....The fact that it does 5-6 thousand kilometers to a pint of oil indicates it's not oil, and it appears to come from the bottom of the front inlet port on the manifold, and a lesser one at the rear inlet port leads me to think it's a small diesel leak, but no indication of smell.
1/. would diesel look like old glazed oil on the block
2/. could it be gunk from when I blanked the EGR a couple of years back oozing out?
Picture here:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v381/ ... 001-14.jpg
Any thoughts appreciated
Cheers
Helen

[dave_aber]

Hopefully, that is just EGR gunk.

I say hopefully, since that's exactly what mine's like, and I've put it down to EGR gunk. I have blanked it off, both ends, but not got round to cleaning the block.

[missfixit70]

Egr gunk & I suspect a certain amount of oil coming through from the rocker cover breather which feeds into the air inlet pipe as it comes around the rear of the engine. Just about every diesel bongo has the same oily stain

[haydn callow]

Yep...EGR gunge....they "all" have it'

[Doone]

The photo looks like there's oil residue under the inlet manifold. The oil from the breather and turbo etc condenses in the intercooler and can cause this to happen... oil vapour... it gets sucked through from time to time and goes into the manifold etc. I guess the manifold gasket wears, you could check the manifold bolts are tight. If you clean the intercooler it should stop for a while, but is likely to come back. I don't think it's due to a fault with the intercooler, it's just one of those things they do... Landrovers, Pajeros etc can get the same thing happening. But I could be wrong.

[missfixit70]

Sounds about right to me

[Doone]

Good... that proves that some of what he mentions stays in my head (although most falls out through the holes). And it's pretty common on Pajeros.

[missfixit70]

It's only supposed to be an air tight seal, not oil tight, so I guess it seeps through? (the oil, not the info )

[Doone]

Both my memory and the gasket leak! I do remember that in the handbook on some vehicles, it mentions periodically cleaning the intercooler...we've had Landies and Pajeros with the oily seepage problem, and I've seen it on Bongos.

[missfixit70]

Mine was oily, couple of others I've spoken to have had the same.

[helen&tony]

Hi
Thanks folks...I thought it might be as I said in "Thought No. 2"... ...but I guessed I had better check...My knowledge of diesels is not expansive, as my speciality is petrol....I just know how the diesel works, not it's idiosyncrasies ....and most of the diesels I have collected photos of are in barges....BIG ones...and , perhaps, they have been a little more cared for on the outside, and they are all live-aboard.
Truth to tell, I favour engine maintenance where needed, but cleaning the outside means chemically removing / washing manky residue down the yard....which ends up in the ground , so I generally only clean the moving bits
Thanks for puttiing my mind at rest....and I'll be doing the intercooler later...(Tony will....don't tell him)
Cheers
Helen

[Doone]

Yes, leave the muckiest jobs to those who like it best, as a treat. It's not from blanking the EGR, so it's another interesting job for him.

[Allans]

Years ago I had a VW camper, the engine was 'breathing heavy' There was a lot of oil vapour residue (breather pipe into manifold). I didn't want to take anything apart. So I fitted a'bugpack' breather box system. (SEE THIS LINK) It didn't increase HP. It did catch the excess oil vapour. I cleaned the filter as needed. If the residue is causing problems, you could try something similar.

[missfixit70]

That's good to know Allan, a couple of us were looking at this one - http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll? ... 078wt_681b - I guess they all pretty much do the same job?

[Northern Bongolow]

the vapour is pulled through the system and burnt by vacuum,if this vacuum fails, ie a leak,the oil/ air flow will stall and condense and gather, imo.