I have an 85 190E that is shooting oil out the hose from the top of the engine into the air filter. The car runs ok otherwise but it does seem to have lost a little power. Its not worth fixing the engine to stop this but I'm wondering if I can just remove the hose an plug up the hole or will this cause additional engine or driveablility problems?
Thanks, Bill
The hose is the valve cover vent and is designed to allow excess pressure in the valve cover area to be vented into the air cleaner. There is a baffle designed in the valve cover "roof" that is there to minimize the amount of oil that gets sent through the tubes to the air filter (where it's safe in small amounts). If you're getting a lot of oil into the air cleaner, it could be a symptom of "blow-by" in the head, or that there's a valve seal that's allowing the airspace around the camshaft to be "compressed."
So, don't ignore the symptoms, it would be like putting a piece of black tape over a warning light, fix the problem.
I think it's even worse than that, isn't it? If you plug it up, the blowby gas has nowhere to go and isn't it going to blow a seal somewhere in the engine?
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