Oil seep

Hello again, TW. Zach here in an '01 3.4L 4WD Tacoma.

I have a small oil leak as pictured below. In the first pic, from March 3, I've cleaned the area best I could. (Couldn't really get at the bit towards the left of the picture.) The second pic is yesterday. So, in five weeks, it seeped about that much.

Background--I did just replace valve cover gaskets, re-seal half-moons, etc about three months ago; so, it "could" be residual from those having leaked oil in the past...

Thoughts/experiences appreciated.

 

Crank seal.

 

Precisely what I didn't want to hear!

So, live with it, then?

 

no dude, fix that shit WTF.

 

Hmm. Crank seal repair sounds like it could exceed my garage skills and/or tools.

 

than prepare to buy a bunch of oil when it gets worse.

/thread

 

When is the timing belt due? That's when most change it.
Are you racking up miles or will it take many years to get to that point?


I'd wash it again and watch closely to if it comes back in the same place.

 

I've only run 20K miles since the timing belt/water pump job was accomplished. I only have 136K on a 17-year old truck, so I dunno if I'll ever get to needing that job again.

I'll just have to wash and watch, I think.

 

On a vehicle this old, it's prob. best to replace any rubber you run across while doing any type of PM work.
i.e when you do the clutch, replace the rear seal and if you have to go back in the front, do the cam seals also.

 

Agreed. I sort of wish the guy that did the water pump/timing belt might have offered "crank seal" as something he could do while he was in there. (I had it done before I started following TW, and working under the hood myself.)

And, looking harder around the general area of the seep, it's not just leaking at the one spot. Although he wasn't all that nice as to how he put it, I think Nick above is correct that I should go ahead and do the crank seal fix. I have a friend who has done the job on a Mazda; he has volunteered to help me do it here at home.

 

So, a young friend assisted me with the crank seal replacement. Which was all well and good. Additionally, the passenger side camshaft seal was leaking, so we undertook to replace both those seals. We got the driver's side one out easy enough. But, in removing the passenger side camshaft seal, we broke the camshaft bearing cap!!!

If anyone could quote what Toyota part number this piece might be, I would appreciate it. It doesn't seem to be a part that aftermarket people sell. (Which is not surprising; who the heck breaks one of these?!) Thanks.

Pic of broken part:

 

I may be wrong but I don't think that's a replacement part. It's supposed to be a set of a head.

That being said I don't know how weird it would wear just to put one from another head on.

 

You are correct, sir! Not sold separately.

I wonder if JB Weld would hold it?

 

Update: I was just talking to a mechanic. (An airplane mechanic, but whatever.) He said the reason (probably) that those caps aren't sold separately, is as you say--the shaft might wear improperly. Apparently, they install the caps and then bore through them so that they're "really" aligned prior to putting camshafts in them.

 

yes.

The JBWeld is prob. the best shot of a temp. repair being just fine.

 

Okay, the valve cover is off. Here we can see that it just has the front inboard corner broken clean off. There appears to be no break through the bolt hole.

 

Far as I can tell, the broken piece only touches the seal, not the cam.

 

yea, OP is right, he's safe from cam shaking it loose.

They do make better products than JBWeld if you really want to fix this without worries.

They're not cheap. Add to that you'll be wasting most of the batch unless you have some other cast stuff to fix.

EDIT: BelZona is by far the best but is hard to mix unless exactly as instructions say and it's sold for 1 time use.

 

I'm not opposed at all to buying something better than JB Weld. But, this Belzona seems a bit uncommon and incredibly expensive. Any alternatives?

 

New rebuilt head is like 400$