I've heard that piston rings gummed up by lots of city driving can produce blowby/oil consumption symptoms similar to those of a worn-out engine. In other words, some hard driving can sometimes bring a sickly engine back to life. Any opinions on that theorem?

My '82 coupe just turned 200K miles. It's had a blowby problem for the 70K miles I've driven it. On a couple occasions the crankcase pressure has pushed the dipstick far enough out of the tube to permit some serious oil expulsion. It also consumes about a quart of oil every 1200 miles -- 70 mph freeway miles, mostly.

On the other hand, it has very decent acceleration and a clean exhaust. Driveability is very good, and it idles well. I've done the epoxy fix on the valve cover baffle and installed the one-piece vent hose

It's a southern California car, with plenty of rotten rubber replaced. Makes me wonder if it would be of benefit to replace the valve stem seals. Again, any opinions on that?

Thanks for any thoughts.

Russ M.