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[MonzaGSE]

Hi. My 2.0 16v has lately developed the classic symptoms of cam cover failure. Misfire on idle and smell of burning oil. Checked and all plug holes were full of oil. Also oil drips down on the exhaust heat shield. Disconnected the smaller breather hose and thats got a good suction in the hose. What i dont get is that the pressure seems to be high in the cam cover? Removing the oil filler lid with the engine running reveals alot of pressure coming from the filler hole. Dont know what kind of pressure should be there but this seems excessive and i can easily see this helping blowing the oil out every which way. Dont feel any pressure being released through the small pipe where the smaller breather line connects. But AS said. This line has good suction when disconnected.
Any ideas whats causing this pressure in the cam cover?

[terry paget]

Internal combustion engines mix fuel with air, burn it, and the increase in pressure is used to force down pistons, etc. etc. Some gases slip past the piston rings into the sump. On earlier cars this pressure was released by a vertical vent pipe topped with a canister full of steel wool; worked well. Recently governments required cars to clean up their atmospheric emissions by reburning sump gases in the engine. This has led to all sorts of problems.

On your 2.0 the cam cover space is connected to the sump by the camshaft oil drain and the pipe on the passenger side. It should always be maintained below atmospheric pressure by the breather system, sadly not always the case as you observe. At idle, the small breather pipe, connected to a small hole between throttle and inlet manifold, does the job; at other engine speeds the large breather pipe, connected between air cleaner and throttle, does it.

Then the car gets old, pipes get bunged up, the pressure rises under the cam cover, oil is blown out, and we wonder why.

[MonzaGSE]

Finally sorted this i hope. Checked and cleaned breathers and changed cam cover gasket yesterday. The old gasket and o rings where rock hard and broke to pieces upon removal. No doubt been there since -97 as the car/engine had just done 65.000 km in those years. Seems to be holding the oil in now. At least the smoke and smell of burnt oil from the exhaust manifold has cleared up. Runs good under any throttle but a slight misfire at idle. Will check and clean spark plugs/leads today to see if that cures it.