Burning Oil???

[Bernie Benz]

The same, years old problem, huh, Derek,

Max. intake manifold vacuum occurs at idle and when using engine braking.
Sounds like your condition, if you have the same results going down a long
hill and then accelerating at the bottom. Bad intake valve stem seals thus
will pass the most oil during these high vacuum conditions, to be burned
when you open the throttle. Your valve guides may not be in terrible shape,
not needing replacement, as they won¹t wear much with all that lube passing
by.

So on the cheap (knowing Derek), first just change the valve stem seals,
which can be done with the head in place. You must pressurize the cyl that
you are working on to keep the valves from dropping into the cylinder.
Convert an old spark plug into a pressure supply. You will need to make (or
borrow from me, I made one several years ago & never used yet) a valve
spring compressor tool that attaches to the cam bearing cap bolt holes. When
you get the valve spring off the valve you can measure the valveŒs side play
within the guide, thus checking for wear.

A good little DIY job for you!

Regards, Bernie

> From: "Derek Pulvino" <dbpulvino at hotmail.com>
> Date: Mon, 02 Oct 2006 11:58:09 -0700
> To: 200q20v at audifans.com
> Subject: Burning Oil???
> 
> Gang,
> 
> Here's the newest skinny.  For a while I've suspected I need to replace the
> valve guides and seals as I'm seeing higher than normal oil consumption (500
> miles/quart) and get puffs of oil smoke on start up.  The other thing I've
> found is in those situations where I get stuck in traffic and wind up
> idleing with very little movement (ie never move faster than 1st gear idle)
> for upwards up 15-minutes or so, when I finally do start moving the car
> burns oil....very badly, embarassingly badly.  In fact, at those times, so
> bad is the smoke that the untrained eye may actually mistake the 200 for an
> 80's vintage Dodge Caravan.
> 
> I've seen this situation (idle for long periods of time then drive with bad,
> bad, smoke) happen three times.  Talking to my local shop this morning they
> mentioned that if the seals/guides are bad, when you sit and idle for that
> long, excessive oil can accumulate within the combustion chamber leading to
> exactly what I've seen...lots of oil smoke out the back on acceleration, or
> more and more white smoke coming out the tailpipe the longer you idle.
> Today after idleing and moving less than a 1/4-mile in a half hour, the car
> was burning oil while idleing, and then really burning oil once I got on the
> freeway, however once the oil cloud went away (about 3-miles later), it
> didn't come back under any condition (heavy acceleration, idleing, crusing
> with or without foot on gas).
> 
> Has anybody else heard of/experienced this situation?  Any other suspects?
> To my knowledge, the head gasket is fine.  No oil in the coolant reservoir,
> no moisture or foam on dipstick/filler cap.
> 
> At this point I'm on the knifes edge between biting the bullet and getting
> the head redone, or biting the other bullet and getting a different car.
> Reservations on head rebuild is the mileage of the vehicle (235k) with the
> potential for block/ring and/or turbo seal issues in the future, and of
> course all the other oddities that plague the 200 (windows, lights, fuel
> injectors, bomb, exhaust system...)
> 
> Input/ideas?
> 
> Derek P
> 
> 
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