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Hi there,

Can anyone give me some hints as to possible sources of water in the oil in a flat head motor? Is the head gasket the only path? Aside from a cracked block of course?

My brother has been restoring a 56 DJ-3A with a flat head motor and now that he is almost done and using it a bit, there is suddenly water in the oil. This jeep belonged to a family member for many years but sat in a field for the last 4 or 5 years before my brother got it. We know it ran fine before it was parked and during the restoration the engine was not opened up. Just a lot of work on the drive train and axles, steering, brakes and body work.

Can loosening a head bolt and retightening it cause a leak? During the clean up he did take out a couple of the head bolts.

Assuming we are pulling the head off, what is the best head gasket to use?

Thanks in advance for any help.

Russell

Are you getting moisture in the oil from condensation and not running the jeep long enough to get her up to normal operating temp so the water gets cooked off?

Or are you finding yellow/green coolant in the oil pan?

Removing one or two head bolts will normally only result in a leak under the head of the bolt if you do not seal the threads with Permatex #1 or equivalent.

Thanks for the answer,

The inside of the oil filler, dip stick tube is heavily coated with white gunk and when we pull the dip stick, the oil on it has white streaks in it. We only found it today and haven't drained the oil yet. It did have the pcv valve closed off but that is only a recent thing. It has probably only been driven 2 or 3 miles since that happened. This engine originally had an open vent on the crankcase and did not have a pcv system. We installed a pcv valve during the restoration.

My own M-38 has been driven in a similar manner in the same area for 30+ years and I've never seen any hint of water in the oil.

Well the F134 and L134 can behave differently depending on climatic conditions or degree of blowby. White foam has been a clear cut condensation evidence issue for many years. You should be running antifreeze so if the oil doesn't have yellow/green coolant in it and the radiator is not displaying a drop in coolant level then my money says you have a condensation issue.

Clean the pipe up, change the oil, fill the coolant up and drive the jeep for at least 1 hour at 40 or more miles an hour. If you haven't lost any coolant and the oil is clean the condensation was the issue.

We have new coolant in the system and the level looks ok, so we'll drain the oil and see what that looks like. Condensation sounds better than tearing the engine apart.

Thanks for the advice.