Oil leaks

This is not strictly feature Mustang related but I’m sure many of you can relate as our cars get older and/or usage of them decreases. There is a faithful reader of this site named Ron who sends me lots of good stuff via email and we have lots of good discussions over it. This is one of those topics we have discussed and a recent email from him on the topic prompted me to relay my experiences with oil leaks and rear main seals, in particular.

I have owned my car for five years and in that time I have had the rear main seal replaced three times. The first time was in the first month of ownership since it was leaking from day one and the remaining two times occurred over the five year period since. On one occasion the shop manager indicated the problem might be clogging of the metal mesh breather that sits underneath the PCV valve. If the pressure that needs to vent through there cannot due to the clog it has to vent somewhere and that somewhere is often through seals and gaskets. It was not in my case but Ron found that it was in his case (his leaked through the oil pan gasket) and I agree with him that many people might not be aware of it and, like me, have numerous service visits to try and fix the problem. I have seen this discussed in various places like stangnet and rec.autos.makers.ford.mustang but not too many others. Hopefully one more mention of this cannot hurt.

My own experience with my most recent leak is somewhat different. I noticed mine leaking again when I was putting my car away last winter (’06). I did nothing until spring. Barry, the guy who had his red feature car next to me at Carlisle and who has owned many fox-bodied Mustangs told me that he has had many rear main seal leaks and most occurred after/during storage and were cured as the car was returned to use. So, in the spring my approach was to…do nothing. Except, I switched away from the synthetic Mobil 1 I was using back to dino oil and I drove 600+ miles to/from Carlisle. Since then, I have had no leaks. Now, I am going to find some wood to knock on.

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