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Oil leak


JDPower
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Noticed twice now in the past couple of weeks my oil level has dropped (no more than about half a litre in total I think). There's no oil patch under the car, but the underside is looking oily towards right rear of engine, so if it's leaking it only seems to be doing so when running, not stationary.

Are there any common leak causes on an 02 Focus 1.6 petrol? (before I book it into the garage). I can really do without an expensive repair job right now and my last car with an oil leak was a head gasket :sad:

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Cam cover gasket? I've seen quite a few leaky ones lol. 

The 1.6 engine does have a bit of a habit of drinking oil - the very reason I got rid of my 2001 focus. I put it down to a cracked piston ring or something along those lines as it would go through a litre a week. 

If you google it you will see you are not alone.

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First thing I'd do is rule out the Head Gasket, check the coolant tank for oil etc

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12 hours ago, stef123 said:

Cam cover gasket? I've seen quite a few leaky ones lol. 

The 1.6 engine does have a bit of a habit of drinking oil - the very reason I got rid of my 2001 focus. I put it down to a cracked piston ring or something along those lines as it would go through a litre a week. 

If you google it you will see you are not alone.

Mine's been fine since I got it a couple of years ago, I've never had to top it up. Then a couple of weeks ago after a run to London I noticed it had dropped about half a litre, then no change till a long drive again at the weekend and it's dropped probably a quarter of a litre again. Have had cardboard under it while parked to try to be certain it's not leaking when parked and there seems to be the sum total of a single drip. Even left it running for nearly an hour this afternoon while I was working on something else and it never lost a single drop. So I can only assume it's only losing it at speed or when hot.

 

11 hours ago, Jon84 said:

First thing I'd do is rule out the Head Gasket, check the coolant tank for oil etc

I did that straight away, no oil in coolant, and oil filler cap and inside the engine looks completely clean of the typical mayo gunk.

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Mine does the same, but only ever on long journeys, I can drive as many short journeys as I want and she won't lose a drop.

Drive to Scotland and she'll drink a litre per tank of petrol however. I suppose it's to be expected, she does have 140k miles on the clock and only cost a couple of hundred quid.

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Gonna book it in to get looked at this week, fingers crossed nothing expensive. Will update when I know (for the sake of future forum searchers)

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  • 2 weeks later...

Well garage couldn't find any sign of ENGINE oil leaking (so none the wiser in regards the vanishing oil), but the oily underside of the car was actually coming from the gearbox and is suspected driveshaft seal. So in the grand scheme of things I guess I'm lucky the engine did decide to suddenly/randomly drink a chunk of oil as it made me look for, and spot, the oily underside before the gearbox started to run dry.

Just gotta cross my fingers the oil consumption was a one off :mellow:

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