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Oil leak additive effectiveness and related question

My 1986 Camry had been burning about a quart of oil every 500 miles. Last Monday, I filled it with oil at least up to the oil dipstick full mark, probably past it.

The next day, about noon, after having driven it about 300 miles, I noticed that oil was leaking off the engine somewhere, quite likely at the camshaft's oil seal. While it's possible the leak is coming from the oil pan gasket, it probably isn't. It's hard for me to tell because I can't easily prop up the car, and it's been cold and wet here. The leak seemed to develop fairly suddenly.

If the camshaft oil seal IS leaking, it looks to me like this would be quite an expensive, labor-intensive repair.

I've seen that auto parts stores sell additives that can be added to motor oil that supposedly stop or slow oil leaks through seals. I'm interested in feedback about the effectiveness of these additives - or the lack thereof. And does anyone have any particular brand(s) or these additives to recommend - or warn me away from?

A related question - can anyone think of a scenario where overfilling the oil level might lead to an oil leak. For example, by increasing the oil pump pressure enough to cause a leak at a weakening point in a seal?

Thanks. Any help would be much appreciated.

Mike

Reply to
M. Hamill
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Those oil-leak additives have chemicals in them that cause seals to swell and hopefully fill in the empty space where your oil is escaping. I doubt its effectiveness on the kind of oil leak you're describing. The only scenario that I can imagine a front-engine oil leak evolving from an overfilled crankcase would be the clogging of the PCV system due to the excess vapors from blowby and oil foaming, I guess. I've seen more than a few cars have sudden and severe front engine seal failure from clogged PCV systems; don't know if it was a result of over filling, though.

Reply to
qslim

ck the price might not be as expensive as you think I replace all the seals when changing the timing belt I think I spent around $50 for a special tool to install the cam seal parts pricing for all the seals was minimal most common leak area is the valve cover gasket - try checking that first. If you have no money - try tightening the nuts that hold the valve cover first - but, of course, much better to replace the gasket, tightening would at best slow the leak, not stop it. Assuming 4 cyl. since you didn't specify

Reply to
Daniel

Replace all the seals on the timing belt side of the motor. There is a large seal behind the oil pump that most people forget about and it will crack and really leak oil. Replace that too, replace the valve cover gasket too. switch to a high mileage type oil to help swell the other seals you cant easily replace like the rear main seal.

Reply to
Rob

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