Your right about the freeze plugs, they go into the valve area and are only under crankcase pressure.

Well, being that the oil is coming from no other location that the exhaust manifold, How does it get there or is it risidual oil from your cleaning of components. Did you use anything on the inside of the exhaust manifold? Maybe what you are seeing is goo that formed when you cleaned the manifold and it is oozing out. Does it feel and smell like oil? I think you are going to have to take the exhasut manifold off to fix the leak and have your manifold decked. It will not get any better and it will only get worse. At that time you can inspect the mating surface and see if the head casting could have had an inclusion or other adnormality. Let me know how it works out.

Henry

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