Behaving badly
 

Not me ...for a change. Rocky decided today was the day to act up. After a 30 minute drive to my daughters school to drop her badge off something happened. Not sure what yet. There is a section where I pass the backside of an airport and come up to a school zone. I always just put it in neutral and coast past the school letting my speed bleed down from the 50's to the 20MPH school zone limit. I coast all the way through a little neighborhood and once at the stop sign at the bottom of the hill I shift back into gear.

Today when I shifted back into gear I could smell burning oil and see lots of smoke. My idle got wicked rough and I could hear exhaust popping on the drivers side. As I pulled onto my street my oil light came on and I could hear what sounds like an exhaust leak. I thought AOS - which I recently replaced. Got home pulled the cover and no oil on top of the engine at all. Once I cool down and Rocky cools down I will get the jack and stands out and crawl underneath. Without getting under it I'm guessing oil return seals.

Ugggg!!!

I'll be following your findings.
I bought a new AOS last summer before a long trip to have as a spare.
I was planning on putting it in even though I have absolutely no indication the current is bad (Preventative maintenance thinking)
EXCEPT I keep hearing of horror stories of replacing AOS and the troubles that start afterwards


Good luck be with you

I just replaced my AOS as preventive maintenance as well...
Will be following up on this one too.
Thanks.

My rear main seal starting leaking once I replaced my aos... Had the ims and clutch done while replacing rear main...

Yup - spark plug tube seals.
http://986forum.com/forums/uploads01...1434124236.jpg

So it looks like 1,3&5 (drivers side are the odd cylinders correct?) have been leaking slightly for a while now. 3 & 5 finally gave up today. Ordering them now and will do all 6. No sense in tempting fate. Never a dull moment!

Bin there done that. Nice clean motor now with no oil smell after every drive
This will give you a chance to prove your inventiveness for creating a tool to remove and install tubes

While this does account for smell and smoke sort of (If leaking oil was getting on exhaust)
it doesn't account for bad engine behavior

Got under it and cleaned everything up and oil is seeping out of those two tubes. Super bad seals ordered them from Pelican hope they get here soon. Had the wife come out and fire it up while I peered underneath. The rough idle is being caused by the rear most coil pack. Seems like the oil ate at it and it spitting and sparking like crazy. Time to order a couple of coil packs....

Uh oh
 

So what causes a spark plug tube and coil to do this:http://986forum.com/forums/uploads01...1434155588.jpg

I just don't get that. We hear so many stories about people getting bad AOS's right out of the box, or new ones that fail after a month or so. Why on earth would anyone replace one that is functioning perfectly and has done for many miles? I wish I had money to waste like that.

The broken tube could have been when someone's socket slipped off the spark plug and broke the plastic.
Now the problem is to ascertain where the broken plastic bits & O rings are. I bet they are laying in the cambox or have been chewed up by the camshafts......

FYI - cylinder orientation:
front of car
cylinder 4 ..... 1
cylinder 5 ..... 2
cylinder 6 ..... 3

Thanks Steve, I need to print out the orientation and tape it to my tool box. So its 5&6 that are leaking. I'll pull the tube for 5 this afternoon and use a dental mirror and some angled forceps and see if I can fish the bits out. I did see a rather large chunk of the coil plug boot sticking out of the oil passage that is up and to the rear of 6.

Hmm now question of the day... That indicates to me that the oil flows towards the rear of the engine in the passages . Is 6 the last passage set before heading to the sump? If so I may have gotten lucky and will just have to drop the sump and fish any extra bits out. I know I know wishful thinking....

That's the purpose of preventive maintenance, trying to anticipate issues.
If I do apply your theory, I'd have to wait for something to break, cause damage and then fix it, for a higher cost and more trouble.
There are risks both ways... Choose your side.

*update*
Using a dental mirror I was unable to find any of the bits from 6's tube. The section of the coil boot that was stuck in the oil passage fell down into cam cover. And... When removed the spark plug I discovered the male end that the coil attaches to is missing. Probably in the cam cover as well.

Question:
If I remove the sump and pump oil into the cam covers will it flush everything out to the sump to be caught in a bucket? (Trying to avoid removing cam covers in the driveway)

It looks to me like you have something much more serious than just leaking spark plug tubes. Looks like something let go in the head that broke the tube and the coil.

I would pull the sump plate and check for metal in the sump and filter, then turn the motor over by hand and feel for any obvious mechanical damage.

Answer: No, any loose debris in the valvetrain area will eventually fall to the bottom of the head, which is shaped like a ramp to direct oil to the mini sump at the bottom of the "ramp". From here the scavenge pump sucks the oil etc thru a small passage into the main oil sump area where it goes thru the "swirl-pot" to the bottom of the sump. Any solid particles going into these passages will impede oil flow.

Hmmm
 

There are some chunks of the tube missing but its mostly melted. Almost like the spark plug loosened up and was arcing in the tube and melted it. The top electrode from the plug is missing as is half of the coil boot. I'm going to use a borescope on it this weekend and see if I can grab the pieces without pulling the cam cover.

Anyone have a template so I can make a cam lock if needed?

Good luck with that - there's little space in the tube orifice to get a boroscope in let alone angled tweezers as well. I suspect there is no other option to removing the cam cover to clean out all the debris, though dropping the sump will give you a good idea how much plastic has been chopped up by the camshaft and oil pump and how much is still left in the cam cover.

Check out the 'Flaps10 tool' in posts #62, 63

Need a temporary garage or cover? I keep my parts car under one of these now. Lots of similar options, some enclosed and pretty inexpensive.
http://986forum.com/forums/uploads01...1435185840.jpg

What I *need* to do is clean out the garage and get it in there. But that would involve getting the wife to cooperate and "downsizing" crap stored in the garage. To be honest my garage is just barely larger then a good sized shed and the Boxster would fill it...