Hi All –

Received a call from an old family friend who broke down on his way back to California from Pennsylvania. I offered to try and help him get back moving. You cant imagine my surprise when he told us he was in a 914 he had just purchased.

Car is a 75 2.0 that has been carbed. The car developed an oil leak that created a small puddle on the engine tin just rear of the passenger side carb. There is lot going on in the engine bay. It has one of those finned aluminum Empi/Bug Pack oil breather boxes attached to the rear firewall (rear trunk side). It is plumbed in the usual fashion – line from the PCV to the box, and then two lines out, each going to one of the vents on the cylinder heads. Unfortunately the previous owner mounted the fuel pump and fuel pressure regulator to the lid of the breather box, making it nearly impossible to open without pulling a bunch of stuff apart and also severely crowding the engine compartment.

We finally found someone with small enough hands to get to the hose clamp for the breather line that went to the head vent by the oil puddle. Sure enough, the worm clamp had sliced the line. Replaced the entire hose and thought we should be all set.
Fired the car up and it ran very nicely. The area where the oil had puddled before remained totally dry after about 20 minutes of run time. Great! Then I noticed the puddle of oil on the floor. It was now coming out of the lower edge of the passenger side valve cover.

I am thinking we have a case pressure issue – once we closed off the leak on the breather line, the pressure built up and caused a valve cover gasket to let go.

Does this sound correct? Trying to help get these guys back on the road and really would appreciate any ideas/input.

My 2.0 didn’t have head vents and the pcv breather was simply vented to the atmosphere, so I am unfamiliar with how the head vents work.

On a side note, they drove the car 2000 miles without issues until this popped up.

Thanks in advance for any help!!

I don't think so...

You found and fixed the top leak. The bottom leak is very common. Case pressure leaks blow seals out front and rear.

A compression test is in his future.

High crankcase pressure means excessive blowby the rings, or a worn exhaust valve guide.

One other thing that could contribute is a highly restricted exhaust, but less likely.

Is the box connected to a functional pvc valve? Is the empi box like the cb one? The cb really isn't a sealed unit and with no real draw off source, like fi, the fumes make their way to the box, are collected by the foam, puddle and depend on gravity to make it back to the head vent tubes if the heads have them. One has to pay attention to the slope of the return hoses. I wonder if an excessive amount of oil was poured into the engine. I can't imagine why anyone in their right mind would put the fuel pump on top of the bb. It's a fire waiting to happen. Your friend is going have some rethinking of of the engine bay arrangement when he gets home.