Head gasket replacement/oil leak

bazster

thescouselander wrote: »

I'd be surprised if that much oil was escaping from the rocker gasket - it would be dripping all over the floor quite noticeably. Likewise, I'd be surprised if the oil was escaping into the coolant as, at that rate, the cooling system would quickly overflow.

He said this earlier: "The strange thing is there is no oil leaking when it's parked".

Leaving aside that this wouldn't be strange at all for a rocker cover gasket, it does suggest the escaping oil is visible.

bazster

facade wrote: »

BMW think 1000 miles to a litre is brilliant. 600-800 is typical, and you will be able to google a fair few cases where people have been trying to get BMW to do something about it, but without a gold plated BMW service history they won't.

Trouble is, the sump only holds 4 litres, and the service intervals are about 10,000 miles.

Quite a few are run until they get hard to start, by which time the sump is virtually dry. (I know of 2 that have been)

I certainly will not be buying one of those then! In more than 30 years' driving I've never owned a car which required top-ups between services and I'm not going to start in the 21st century! How can manufacturers keep a straight face while making such lemons?

thescouselander

bazster wrote: »

He said this earlier: "The strange thing is there is no oil leaking when it's parked".

Leaving aside that this wouldn't be strange at all for a rocker cover gasket, it does suggest the escaping oil is visible.

I see what you're saying and it's not uncommon to have oil seals weep a bit but the quantity of oil being lost seems too high to not result in puddles forming under the car.

Perhaps, before committing to any work, the op should clean up the engine to remove the old spill and wait to see if/how quickly any fresh oil reappears.

bazster

thescouselander wrote: »

I see what you're saying and it's not uncommon to have oil seals weep a bit but the quantity of oil being lost seems too high to not result in puddles forming under the car.

Perhaps, before committing to any work, the op should clean up the engine to remove the old spill and wait to see if/how quickly any fresh oil reappears.

He did say that the rocker cover seems to have been bodged with some kind of sealant so the oil probably is running down the engine! I did suggest a considerable number of posts ago attacking it with brushes and Gunk so as to see exactly where it's coming from.