jimmy154

There is oil coming from what I think is a seal between the oil cooler and the part it mounts to, Oil Cooler Filter Housing. Do I just have a bad seal or is the oil cooler bad too? Maybe I need to take it off to find out. Does anyone know or know of a write-up online that might take me through it. The area circled in the picture below is where the oil is coming from.

Found a link that goes through it: http://www.audizine.com/forum/showth...Oil-Cooler-DIY

mtroxel

Yea you have to take it off to find out for sure. But if it was me, I'd buy that gasket before I took it apart.

I changed that gasket once. Instead of draining the coolant and taking those coolant hoses off the oil cooler, just take off the oil filter, then the nut on the pipe going into through the oil cooler, then you can just unscrew that pipe. Then the oil cooler is still attached to the water hoses but can be pulled away from the oil pan so you can change that gasket.

jimmy154

That's great advice, thanks. I thought maybe I would take the cooler off to see if it was okay, but I'm not sure if that's necessary and I don't know what I would be able to see, if anything, anyway.

I took a coolant hose off already, but put it back on when I realized that it was a coolant hose. It looked like it might have some oil in it. I think it was browner than normal. I'm going to change the oil and coolant.

mtroxel

Brown coolant - very bad. You might want to take it to a shop and have them test for oil in the coolant. If that oil cooler went **** on you, it can trade oil and coolant. At the least, take a good look at the oil you drain out to see if there is water in it.

jimmy154

I changed the gasket, but I could only tighten the oil cooler jam nut to about 10-15 ft/lbs. I'm not sure if that's enough.

mtroxel

'sposed to be 22 ft/lbs. You should be able to get a big socket over it. If you don't have a metric socket that size, I believe there's an American socket that fits perfectly if I recall right. You can get it again at the next oil change.

turbo510

Install your oil filter and run it. If no leaks, it's tight enough.

jimmy154

Yes, 1 inch socket is suppose to fit, but mine doesn't maybe because it's one of those sockets with waves in it (don't know what they are called, even after searching the net), rather the a hexagonal socket bit.

xsrfsno225x

i don't know if it applies here but today i read a thread on vortex about using an oil filter gasket inside the oil cooler

turbo510

In a pinch maybe, but the cooler seal is an O-ring, not flat like a filter gasket, so I wouldn't trust it.