After moving the car out of the garage today I found a few drops of oil on the floor... First, the mind goes to "oh sh*t, maybe I got on it too much too early today and I F'ed something up", then it goes to reason after I start looking under the car... First I notice that the oil isn't particularly comming from anywhere around the engine so I reach up and look as much as I could without jacking up the car and what I'm assuming is the pipe IN to the intercooler has a good layer of oil around the connection to the intercooler...

I'm new to all this, but I did a few weeks of a ton of reading up on the srt4 and I'm assuming this is the reason a catch can is a must...So did I answer my own concern here? It seems like I did, but it'd be nice to hear from first hand knowledge to confirm!

And if I am correct about this, is there anything I should do besides put on a catch can ASAP? I don't recal ever reading about anyone else leaking oil from that connection, is that "normal"? Will the catch can take care of it?

 

alright alright... I just did some more searching and found plenty of people with the exact same thing. What a "noob" [8D]

Guess I should have took care of the catch can earlier this week.

 

Yup yup catch cans are your friend

 

Question: I have a 2004 w/9000 miles on it and not one drop of oil anywhere. (I just bought the car and its all stock) I am hearing allot of people with oil and the need for a catch can is evident...but what causes this? hard driving ? a certain amount of miles of wear? Why not mine? Any ideas?

 

By the way I have had it for over two months now. I dont drive it much just for fun but when I do I'm hitting it hard ..maybe for at most an hour or so.... could my lake of use and the low miles be the case ..

 

Its basically blowby. It comes from the PCV valve of the left side of your valve cover (if your looking directly at the engine) travels through the emissions hose, into the throttle body and drips its way down the cold side pipe into the intercooler, where for the most part, it kinda stays.

I had a catch can on mine for awhile, but there was never anything in my intercooler at all. Before, during, or after I removed the thing. My friend Rick had his car for 46,000 miles...46 VERY HARD thousand miles, and has not one DROP of oil in his intercooler.

I drive my car very easy, get on it getting on the highway, and I had no oil issues. Rick drives his car like its the last day the thing will ever run, and had no oil either. I dont know if it depends on the car or what....but both of our IC's are bone dry.

 

Thats interesting... Does oil build up in your catch can?

 

The catch can does grasp the blow by, and if you do the $20 one, then it builds up in there quite a bit. But it gets to a point that if you dont empty it, it wont refill itself until it knows theres room to be refilled. Though my catch can did have oil in it, before and after the catch cans short lived little life, I never had anything in the IC.

My car....is weird. I think that about sums it up in the simplest statement yet.

 

Important note: Do not let oil build up like that in a catch can. If it is almost full and it looks like nothing is changing, the oil is: a) bypassing the catch can, and b) splashing up in hard turns and burping excess surges of oil into the manifold.

It is important not to forget to empty a catch can. If you use a 20$ can like I do, and have a blow by condition, it needs to be checked like every 400 miles at least. Better yet - do it at every other fill up. I dupm a full can quite regularly.

Crystalmarie---I think you are right---your car...is wierd. How is the turbo sounding? Any resolution to that - was there a valve issue????

 

Personally, I think it is a valvetrain issue.....but Im just gonna wait until it blows up on me instead of dealing with dealers every single week of my life.

Maybe thats why I have no blowby. LMAO