dreamer

The Caterham has a breather for the engine oil, it usually breathes about an inch or so over a day's racing.

It is a dry sumped system with a scavenger pump on a 1600 K Series.

Recently it had some engine work done; we took the inlet manifold off and taped it up, and the manifold was replaced about a week or two later. It also had a new exhaust manifold and throttle body.

Took it out afterwards and it spat about 1.5L into the catch tank, and the conclusion was that it had been overfilled (which is weird because it had 4.5L put in it which is what it normally takes but the possibility is that it already had some residual oil in the dry sump tower or something).

Next time I took it out the weather was freezing (probably sub zero) at Silverstone. We only managd about 15-20 laps all day due to our visors icing over, fog, and icy track. It spat about 1-2cm's of creamy liquid into the catch tank Looked like milky coffee.

It's also leaking a bit of oil into the engine bay from somewhere but I don't think that is relevant.

The oil on the dipstick looks fine (this goes into the dry sump tower not the main resevoir so you have to check the oil within seconds of turning the engine off).

Coolant hasn't dropped and the oil level also looks fine.

One theory is that the engine formed some condensation inside while the inlet manifold was off, and this was causing the milky stuff.

Is there any way to tell whether it's more serious (without having the engine pressure tested)? Planning to track it at Snetterton in the next few weeks....

Jonsey Boy!

K series - headgasket??????

My brothers elise did something similar after a trackday, HG failure, replaced with a freelader uprated gasket.

MarkB

Could be HG, but as you say, condensation might have worked it's way into the system also.

I wouldn't discount an oil leak that wasn't there before either.

Does the coolant smell of exhaust fumes?

dreamer

The oil leak was there, but had only just developed. I *think* it's coming from the top of the tower - the top of it has 2 "caps" which screw on. One has the breather pipe coming from it and it doesn't actually screw tight (isn't designed to) and the other smaller cap has the dip stick on it. I think it might be coming from there. We've tried running the engine comes out (visibly). It isn't a large leak but obviously I'd like to know where it's coming from.

Haven't checked coolant smell, good point. HG was my first thought, but that would be real coincidence... is there any way to eliminate that or to prove condensation? (I will sniff coolant next time it's out! Will running it to warm in the garage be sufficient to do that?)

MarkB

Frankly, I very much doubt HG failure.

I've had rebuilt engines spew out all sorts of crap, including white gunk, when first started.
With the cold, damp weather we've been having, condensation will form on any and all cold surfaces, even taping over gaps often isn't enough to stop it.

Best thing to do would be to run the engine under a light load for a while, then look for more crap in the catch tank - if it's there, HG failure is a possibility, if not - crap from having the manifold off.

ge2

Mine's done this Jo, it did give me a scare and my brother (a confirmed K-Series hater) was sure it was HG until we (he) had a good look at it.

I also get oil leaking from the dry sump tower, there's a an o-ring kit you can get from Caterham which helps but it still spits out a bit.

I've noticed some other dry sumped Ks with a different cap on the tower and was wondering whether it's some sort of fix for the problem.

rralston

Aye - if the head gasket has gone it should deteriorate really quickly.

Some engines do suffer from the white crap in winter - usually the older big capacity ones (ie more space for condensation to build up) although it sounds the the K series does too.

I'd rag the living daylights out of it just to make sure

lower

A garage can do a test on the coolant to see if there's any evidence of combustion gases in the coolant, but then it might be a leak between an oilway and a coolant passageway.

Sounds like its just the mayonnaise in the catch tank that's worrying you and that could well just be condensation mixing the oil. Getting the engine properly up to temperature for a while will drive that off and if its just condensation the problem will go away.

dreamer

Thanks for the input guys - I'm also sceptical of HG failure.... Fingers crossed it is just condensation then - it didn't do it first time out but the weather was warmer. I think I'll probably take it to the track, run it lightly for a few laps, check it, then take RR's advice and just keep a close eye on it....

Graham - the oil seems mostly on the passenger side of the engine bay - is that where you get yours? And do you have a link to the O'Ring thing !

ge2

[quote name='dreamer' date='Jan 22 2009, 01:52 PM'] Thanks for the input guys - I'm also sceptical of HG failure.... Fingers crossed it is just condensation then - it didn't do it first time out but the weather was warmer.