Any Pinto 2.0L Gurus?

I have a question about crankcase ventilation. I recently replaced the rear main seal and the oil pan gasket, which were leaking like sieves. I want to prevent these leaks from re-ocurring, and I think they might have been related to crankcase ventilation.

I race in F-Production, and have a dry sump. So my aluminum valve cover has an open vent to the dry sump tank. The only other vent is in the driver's side of the block, down low. One of my old books refers to this as being where the "oil separator" is attached. When I bought the car, this vent was plumbed to a catch can, which was sealed.

My theory (assuming proper seal and gasket installation) is that the sealed catch can didn't allow the crankcase to breathe, so it blew out the seal and the oil pan gasket. If I re-plumb this block vent to a vented catch can, in conjunction with the valve cover vent, will that be adequate ventilation? Or is there something else I should do?

Thanks for any help,
Tobey

Tobey--With a drysump, I would imagine many of us on this board would be lost. However, in general, any dump tank must have the ability to "breathe", so I would think you may have discovered an issue.

I know that once my vent hose froze with ice during an ice racing session and oil actually blew out of the dip stick tube. Such blockage, left uncorrectd can reverse your crank seals!

This will make them leak like crazy.

However, the motor also ran like absolute crap during that experience. Is your motor running rough too?

Actually, it ran quite strong. But it would lose about a quart of oil in a 30 minute race. I haven't raced since correcting these problems, so I'll see what happens in a few weeks.

There are two Internet forums you might want to visit. Both Sports 2000 and Formula Ford 2000 use the 2L Pinto engine in dry-sumped form. You may find some knowledgable folks there.

http://go.ezboard.com/bs2racing
http://f2000.com

I've been running the Pinto 2L in IT with wet sump for 5 years now w/o any leaking seal issues. Well, oil pan leaks but that is due to my poor welding when repairing damage caused by an errant rod - another story.

The breather on the drivers side used to have a little metal can that was used to capture oil vapor and a PCV valve connected to it which was plumbed to the intake. On my motor, I've directly plumbed the valve cover breather and block breather to my windshield washer bottle which has many hole to allow it to breath. It's adequate for my 6500rpm IT motor and should work for your motor unless you are getting a lot more blow by which is entirely possible.

My best motor lasted me 2 full seasons and I finally retired it when it started burning a quart of oil every 30 minutes. It didn't leak it, it burned it.

You need to go to http:www.coloradoscca.org/prodcar/index.php and talk to the production boys as they all run dry sumps.

You also might try to shoot an e-mail to some of the big time F2000 engine builders like Steve Knapp at Elite, Sandy at Quicksilver, Loyning, etc. F2000 and S2000 engines are dry sumped.

Thanks for the leads. I'll check out these other sites.

From my experience in the '70s with this motor, there was no problem using the lower "separator can" access hole for the second vent. I took both upper and lower vent hoses to a one quart can on the fender well. The engine incidentally, was constantly in the 6000 to 8500 RPM range with no output from the breathers. It was a "wet sump", 2.0 Liter Pinto in BS.

I might suggest that since you are losing oil from the rear seal, you might check the crank sealing surface for imperfections, such as grooves, or an eroded surface. These will "walk" the oil to the outside after damaging the seal, assisted by the constant internal pressure...lower due to the venting, but there none the less.

If the crank is grooved, you might be able to reset the seal deeper, or more shallow on the crank to avoid the imperfection. Otherwise, there are some repair sleeves from engine parts sources that can be fitted over the crank providing a "fresh" surface for the seal.

Good racing.

Bill