My oil breather hose just dead ends in my cooling "well". What a decent, affordable (like $50 or less) breather box that I can just vent into the atmosphere of the engine bay, pulling off the oil and not throwing it into my engine?
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Why spend any money at all? Next time you change the oil just save one bottle to route the hose into.

(yes, I am being sarcastic)

you can get little empi breathers for not much, look at vw places. I'll see if I have a pic of mine...

here's the best pic I could find, I have the head venst and the vent for the oil breather going into it, on the firewall(though I will probably move it to the back wall of the engine bay)


here's a similar one:
http://www.vwparts.net/mm5/merchant.mvc?Sc...amp;range_high=

Why would you want to move it to the back wall?
By head vents, are you talking about vented valve covers?

Its less obtrusive when located at the back.



On some engines, there are 1/2" dia. vent tubes on the heads, next to the intake ports.
The stock location is the best place to add them if your engine doesn't already have them, but it is a bit of work, especially when done with the engine installed.
Sometimes vents are added to the valve covers but they are below the tin so hose routing is a challenge.

Gotcha...thanks. Guess my engine has no vent tubes. Hey.....did you clean all the baked beans outta that can before you started welding on it?

my reason for moving it to the back is so I can put new insulation on the firewall. pretty simple.

My "baked beans" make Tangerine Racing Breather Cans more efficient at separating oil from the crankcase vapors, and returning them to the engine automatically, than any other product on the market.


You should seriously consider adding vents to the top of your cylinder heads.

I have no insulation on my firewall.

How do I do that while the engien is installed without getting shit in the engine?

you can vent the valve covers with fittings, which isn't quite as good, but I have seen it. other than that, you would have to drop the engine, pull the heads and have a machine shop put the fitting in the proper head spot.

I've drilled and tapped the heads with the engine assembled but not installed. You need to be careful when the drill drops thru not to hit the valve spring and to keep chips out of the engine.

Yeah? How does one pull that off?

What? You don't like my Gatorade bottle ???

BTDT Pull the motor. Pop the valve covers off. Drill the head. Insert tube or thread the hole for pipe thread and screw in a fitting. On mine the hole I drilled ended up being a just a little too large for a true press fit. I used a piece of 7/16 or 1/2" (I can't remember exactly now) stainless steel tube. Mixed up a little JB weld and spread on the tube where it fit into the hole and then formed a very small bead around the tube at the top of the head. Done.

With the valve covers off and the motor put of the car it's easy to keep crap out of the heads while drilling. But watch that valve spring. I had to replace one of those while I was at it because I hit one with the drill bit.

Looks better than that bean can.

Looks like you have your solution.
You'll have money left over for a wash and wax too.

I'm just gonna stick a filtered cigarette on the end of the hose.

Seriously...since my heads aren't vented, I'm just looking for for a catch-all for the end of my filler vent hose that will vent to the atmosphere. Is there a specific breather can that just has a single entry point or do I need to block off some? I;m guessing Ill wind up with an EMPI type breather can.

I think you'll have to block off some.

Chewing gum? Piece of potato?

sure, use a potato... rest of us would use a rubber port block off, or if you are really cheap, use a piece of rubber hose with a bolt in it, and a clamp.

If I can't find a suitable potato, I was going to put some kind of gasket (rubber?) inside the ports not used. Wouldn't a piece of rubber hose with a clamp be more expensive?

OK I'll ask the dumb question. What's the damage to vent only from the oil filler to the breather box, and not back into the heads (assuming there's no head vent)??? Thanks Bill

You probably have a small piece of hose laying around somewhere and maybe a 0.05 bolt too leaving another nickel clamp to rustle up or try "new" potatoes


Bill, I think it's good to vent out of the heads is the point.. Just another place to let pressure escape, that's my guess anyway

Not a dumb question at all.
Technically, you're not venting back into the heads, your venting the heads as well as the case.
But if you have no head vents, you're not in a BAD position, you're just not in the best condition. Venting the case is necessary, venting the heads is preferable. The older your motor (more blow-by) and/or the higher you're revving, the more venting you need.

And just to confuse you even more, at lower rpm, the head ports actually have negative pressure, thus sucking in air and oil from the breather.

The system needs to be open to the atmosphere somewhere, otherwise you're going to blow the main seals out of your engine.

The idea is simply to not have a mist of oil all over your engine compartment. On the factory FI, the oil vapors are routed back into the air-filter and burnt.

The breather boxes used with carbs are still open to the atmosphere, they're not closed. But they have a sponge inside to collect oil vapors which will condense and drain back into the engine when the motor is shut off or on idle.

Andy

Double post, damn phone

Where...where...?

Even though this is used on a six, it's still a single port tank. Got it at Summit Racing. One inlet, ball valve drain, filter, and mounting provision.

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Nice. That's what I had in mind, but ordered an Empi this morning.

I edited the 2nd post to say "double post" since we can't delete the posts. it was the post from last night again. when I opened up safari on my iphone it re-submitted the post

Another dumb question: why did the 75-76 cars not have the head vents drilled out like the early cars. They just vented the case ,maybe a money saving tactic ??

The EMPI arrangement may look better, but if you actually drive the car, the sponge can get saturated with moisture resulting in a misty film all over the engine. Tech inspectors LOVE to see that. BTDT

Chris's oil separator is the way to go.

http://www.tangerineracing.com/engine.htm#...0Breather%20Can

They don't have tech inspectors in my neighborhood.
In all seriousness, I'm not racing, and Chris' can was just too expensive for something I really don't need for my use of the car. Right now O have a bare hose sticking into my cooling well and just wanted something to catch the oil mist to keep my engine a little cleaner. I'll keep my sponge clean.

with the empi version you will STILL have to find a way for the oil that puddles under the piece of soft foam (that is in the breather box) to return to the engine or be prepared to sop it up on a regular basis. if you figure out a way to return the spent oil to the engine you have to mount the box high enough so the return lines all run down hill. chris's cannister style drains back to the fill tower base via a small line and a fitting tapped into the base. spending a little extra on the front end when solving a problem, eliminates bs hassles at the finish.

Where can I get a few of those? If not, whattaya think about siliconing in a coupla aluminum discs?

you can get those at FLAPS. or the piece of hose

But then again, that's exactly what the German 'Porsche specialists' did with my tube.

After reading through the entire thread I am of the opinion that blowby was the source of my original oil leak. I will need to get some shots of the set up that Boxter put in but I am definitely going to have to look into some of the solutions listed in this thread. Will post some pictures tomorrow for some educated input.

I mounted my breather on the rear wall of my engine compartment. I stood it off a bit with a couple of nuts for clearance purposes, so the engine lid would close with the rain tray still in place.

Anyone with pictures of drilled out valve covers showing how and where you mounted the pipe for the hose?

Nice, I like it, where'd you get the breather?

CB Performance...

http://www.cbperformance.com/catalog.asp?ProductID=238

Pretty sure all of the heads have the boss at the factory location. Just drill it there at an angle just like factory. That's what I did anyway. Working fine.

Why is it important to have 2 vents to the rocker covers? As long as the the breather box is mounted high enough so that the oil will drain back, why not just have one pipe to the main oil fill? Vent vapors up to the box while running, and return the condensed oil later!

Doesn't Chris make it simple to come to an easy and reasonable solution?

What happens is the rocker area of the heads gets pressurized, sometimes enough to unseat the cover just enough to give you a leak. That area is a bitch enough to keep sealed anyway. On a standard oil pump, it may not be as much of a problem, but the factory started venting these heads for a reason.... For a HD pump, you need to do this if it was not done factory.

Chris's solution is way pretty, but the EMPI box is way cheaper.

Zach

The CFR system is on the turbo 914, and quite simply, it is the best tool for the job. I considered the CB system, and made my own system with a bike bottle and some 3M pads inside, it kinda worked, but once I got the CFR breather, problem solved. Yes, its more than $50 bucks, and if thats all you have/want to spend, there are probably cheaper solutions, but there is not a better solution.

http://forums.aircooledtechnology.com/show...2819&page=4

Linky to some install photos.

Heads were not vented on '75-'76 engines for tighter emissions control.

You ought to spend some time in the library reading and you may find the reason crankcases / heads are vented, but since you haven't ....

1.) The spinning crankshaft assembly creates a hell of a storm inside the engine and whips up oil, entrains air with a wet sump system. For years, crank scrapers and windage screens have been used to quell the storm.

2.) Rings do not seal perfectly. There is always some blowby present pressurizing the case.

3.) Adding the Empi or whatever type breather or just a can has no provision to drain the oil back to the case where it belongs.

4.) The system that Chris makes appears to be somewhat modeled after a dry sump tank .... inlet at top, probably with baffles and a screen to break the air entrained in the oil out so that it drops to the bottom of the tank and dribbles back into the case.

5.) You can drill your heads in the car ... use heavy grease on the drill and tap and it will capture the shards. You can use a threaded hose barb in this manner.

5.5.) Vacuum to pull the oil vapors / droplets into the engine to be burned can be obtained by tapping the top or bottom of the carb air cleaner and routing the vent hoses to the air cleaners.

6.) If you decide to vent the valve covers, the vent mu be in the upper portion of the cover as the rocker box can run about 1/2 full of oil. You braze the fittings onto the cover unless you can find a bulkhead fitting that will work.