308 pukes engine oil when I park

I bought my 1977 308 GTB about ten years ago. Back then the car had all of the obvious oil leaks (cam shafts and such). Once the 60K maintenance was done, except for a few small drips now and then, no leaks.

About a year ago, after I drove the car and parked, I noticed that a puddle was starting to appear on the floor. The oil was gear oil. I have a car lift and raised the car and noticed that the leak was coming from the clutch housing. I pulled the clutch housing and changed out the three "O" rings and wiped everything down to remove the oil everywhere. This did stop the trany fluid leak.

But now I have a smaller puddle but now its engine oil. I put the car back up on the lift and cannot find the source of leakage. It does not leak oil on the lift but if I drive it and stop it starts dripping oil and leaves a small puddle about three inches diameter. The oil is somehow being sprayed everywhere and is dripping off of the driver side frame and the front of the engine bay/starter motor and header are all wet with engine oil (none of the cam seals are wet). It appears that it could be venting from the clutch housing but doesn’t appear to vent when parked. I again have wiped the whole engine area, no leaks sitting still, but once I drove the car and parked, oil everywhere and dripping a puddle.

Other than this leak the car has been really dry of oil leaks. What kind of oil leak would spray oil everywhere like this and is it possible that I disturbed something when I made the "O" ring repair?

 

Both are dry and not leaking. Thanks for your reply

 

I rechecked the cam cover gasket, its dry and I checked the oil cooler lines also dry. thanks for your reply.

 

When I pulled the bell housing to replace the three "O" rings, the inside of the bell housing was oily. At that time I figured that it was gear oil (since it was thick and smelled like gear oil). The amount that I found was not excessive and just cleaned out the inside of the bell housing (I did not pull the clutch and could not clean behind it).

Since it should be clean inside, I will re-inspect it for oil. If it is the rear seal leaking, where is all this oil collecting and being sprayed from?

The vent canister that you mention. Is this the crankcase vapor canister located just above the bell housing and has a hose that goes to the air cleaner and the other hose goes to the front of the engine just below the starter?

Thanks for your reply...Greg

 

That was the first thing we did. Thats what makes it so hard to find. I cleaned everything up and ran (reved the motor up to 2000rpm and down for at least 20 minutes) it on the lift, looking from above and below and could not get the car to leak anything. As soon as we take it out for a drive and come back (and not for a very long drive) it starts its leaking.

Maybe the higher rpms during shifting and driving is causing the leak appear?

 

Yes I did and it is not leaking. Thanks for replying

 

UPDATE ON MARCH 3, 2010

First I want to thank every one, you all have been very helpful in me finding my oil leak.

Through a lot of persistence and by accident I found the oil leak and confirmed it without taking the car apart.

I had the car up on the lift with the engine running and my son behind the wheel. I had him revving the motor while I searched. One of you suggested that the leak might be from the shift linkage going into the front of the engine, I had my son rev the motor while shifting gears, even though I did not have a leak there what I did notice was that when he would push in the clutch, the lever directly under the clutch housing (lever #4 where the vertical clevis pin is located) would move and expose this little weep hole in the bottom of the clutch case. I never noticed it before since this clutch linkage is only about 3/8" below the housing and covered the hole perfectly and out of site.

Oil was slowly dripping out of this hole. What I did was clean the area, placed some duct tape over this little hole and went for a short drive. Upon return I put the car back up on the lift and noticed immediately that everything was dry and when I pulled the tape off to reveal the hole, oil just puked out like crazy.

The location of this weep hole is perfect to make the mess that this leak was creating. It would drip rearward onto the rear axle and throw oil all the way up onto the oil cooler and the bottom of the engine hood, onto the bottom of both distributors, onto the drivers rear cam shaft seal and the clutch/flywheel would vent the rest of the oil forward onto the starter and header (and of course the driver under side of the engine was wet with oil). This little leak made so many things appear leaking, that weren’t, what made finding this leak frustrating.

I do not know if you all already knew about this or not, so if you don’t, I included a picture of the vent hole for your reference.

The first picture shows how small the weep hole is and the second picture shows the location (just to the left of the long stud). The last picture is what a BMW Isetta looks next to a Ferrari.

Thanks again to everyone...Greg
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