Hi,

Changed oil 400 miles ago and allready the oil is brown. I just used Valvoline 10/30 conventional since I have a front seal leak I want to deal with soon and I used a Mann filter. Coolant is good , no loss. I think I have a small headgasket leak, some oil is coming out from under the intake manifold. The leak is minor since I only topped it off once during last 3000 miles. Any thoughts and tips?

Thanks!

How brown is it?
Oil is amber in the container but is always turns a shade of brown in the engine after mixing with remnants of the old. It all matter of degrees, black is bad.

That oil usage is minimal, I would just keep an eyeball on it.
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David Hunter

Jack Daniels brown it is maybe a little darker. As you said it was amber when I put it in so I thought it was a big change in color.

if it's not foamy you are probably okay ... foamy means air is backing up from a clogged flame trap and increasing block pressure ... not good.

If the engine starts and runs smoothly, gets decent fuel economy and isn't showing blue smoke, I wouldn't worry much about the oil colour. You could try changing it (and filter!) at 1000mi intervals a couple of times to see if it "browns" less quickly. Then just do the changes about every 5000mi and don't worry.
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Bob: son's 81-GL, dtr's '94-940, my 83-DL, 89-745(V8) and 98-S90. Also 77-MGB and some old motorcycles.

Well I have rough idle but no blue smoke. I'll just do a few oil changes and see what happens, maybe I'll check compression just in case.

Thanks!

If you have not owned the car for long the oil may not have been changed often enough. You could try changing it a couple more times at short mileage and see if it cleans up the inside of the engine.

Contamination either by another fluid or combustion products. You might want to check the compression.

If the engine ever sat a long time, the iron parts inside may have some slight surface rust. An oil filter stored where it got wet will rust internally. Try looking into the oil filler opening with a small light and see if there is any rust on the camshaft.

The oil could be light brown if the engine is dirty, it's doing its job. I'm not sure how oil is getting into you intake manifold to leak out. Check the oil separator, it could be clogged causing crankcase pressure to build forcing oil places it shouldn't.

I ment oil is leaking from headgasket underneath the intake manifold. When I look down the oil filler opening it is a little dirty in there. I also checked oil sep. box when I had the manifold off. I guess I'll just start with an other oil change...or could I replace just the filter?

The oil will turn brown just from engine heat let alone from cleaning up excess sludge.

The valve cover seal at the rear could be leaking and running around on top of the block/gasket. That was happening to me once just before it blew out. I made a plate like IPD sells to help prevent the blow out of that rear seal.

Make sure your flame trap is in good working as suggested.


Phil