Quote:
Originally Posted by Jim Salchenberg
My 89 560sel runs great but has consistently been increasingly using more and more oil.  I religiously change oil every 1,500 miles however the engine is up to 1 quart every 250-300 miles. The car has 214,000 miles. The engine may need a rebuild however I have been told that it may be just the valves blowing by oil. I checked the compression and all cylinders are at about 175 psi and each are within 5 psi of each other. Is there a way I can check to see if it is valves? Thanks in advance! I love this forum.  |
If its burning a lot of oil you should be seeing smoke out the tail pipe, either all the time or just when starting or accelerating. Or maybe you just have a bad leak. First you need to figure out which is the cause. If it smokes out the tail pipe all the time then you could have sticking oil rings, then there is something you can do that doesn't involve a lot of money or disassembly. Go buy a quart of Marvel Mystery Oil and dump half in the gas tank and half in the oil. Go drive it for 15 minutes or so, then shut it off over night. If the rings are sticking this will free them up. If it just smokes when starting or accelerating, then you probably need valve stem seals. The Mystery Oil will soften them up and they make start sealing again if you get lucky. If its a bad leak, then thats a whole different story.