I replaced my oil pan gasket on my 93 w/D16Z6 last year after rear main seal change. Now it's leaking like crazy from behind the crank pulley. I'm pretty sure it's the oil pan gasket and not the oil pump seal. I noticed the gasket is pushed out farther than the oil pan itself. It's maybe 1/8" past. The block is dry behind the crank sprocket.

Here's a pic, not sure of how it' supposed to look.

 

Did you torque the nuts to 9ft.lbs? Did you torque them in sequence according to the service manual?





eH?

 

Yes, 9 lb/ft, correct sequence, and hondabond in the corners.

 

If this leak is from the pan it will not be higher up at all.

So if there is any oil around or behind the crank pulley then that is more than likely the culprit. the only way to know is dig in and inspect

 

My D16Y8 recently had a leak like yours and it turned out to be from the upper right corner near the O-ring of the oil pump. Removed the oil pump, replaced the O-ring, carefully cleaned off the old gasket material, applied new HondaBond, and torqued the bolts to spec. She's now oil leak free.

 

Where did your leak show up at? Before I put everything back together I looked all around that area and didn't see any signs of a leak. I was almost 100% sure it was the oil pan gasket. I noticed today that a leak is back and is dripping off the left rear corner of the oil pan. It dripped two drops in the 15 minutes I was back home at lunch. Looks like I'll be working on this car 3 weekends in a row.

 

I noticed oil dripping from the weep-hole nub located at the very bottom of the lower timing belt cover. I thought the leak was from the oil pan gasket, so I replaced it, but the leaking continued. Next I thought oil might be leaking from the front crank seal or the cam seal so I removed the crank pulley and timing belt covers to inspect. To my surprise, both seals showed no signs of oil leakage. Upon further inspection, it was clear that oil was leaking from the upper right corner of the oil pump and was running down along the right edge of the oil pump and then along the right edge of the lower timing belt cover where it eventually dripped from the weep-hole nub at the bottom of the cover. In the end, I could have made this determination without removal of the crank pulley and timing belt covers because the source of the oil leak from the oil pump would have been visible had I looked carefully.

The D16Y7 in my 97 Civic DX appears to have the same oil leak, so an oil leak from the oil pump may be more common than I initially thought.

 

On my 93 del sol si D16z6 I chased oil leaks including the oil pan gasket.

The most recent one I had was detected by a Honda mechanic after I gave up. It was the oil pressure sending unit to the dashboard gauge. It's located low on the back of the block just above the oil filter. With the car on a lift remove the oil filter and you can see the sending unit. It can't be seen by jacking up the car and crawling under.

Note replace with a Honda OEM sending unit. We tried aftermarket units and the oil pressure light would come on at engine idle. This happened with 2 new aftermarket sending units.

This oil leak traveled along the edge of the oil pan and I thought it was my rear main seal

 

Here are a few more pictures.

First, taken as soon as I drove up on the ramps. Car has been driven 3 days since oil pan gasket was replaced.


2&3, after cleaning the area where the leak occured. That was the best I could do.



4&5 after a quick trip around the block, maybe 5 minutes of running time.



By the time I shot the 5th picture, it had already started to drip off the lower timing belt cover and oil pan. As you can see in the 5th pic, the oil had made it's way all the way down the side of the oil pump but hadn't made it quite to the edge of oil pan yet. I guess it's running just inside the timing cover as RonJ explains in his post.

 

Quite possibly a leaking oil pump. Any oil dripping from the weep-hole nub?

 

Here's a pic of where it drips from.



By the way, should my lower timing cover look like this? It's always stuck out, away from the oil pan like that.

 

The lower timing belt cover is not seated correctly.

Oil would drip from the below the weep hole of the lower cover if the crank or cam seal were leaking. This and the fact that oil is seen above the oil pan gasket points to an oil pump leak. My recommendation is that you remove the crank pulley and timing belt covers to confirm.

 

Would that be the same leak that you refer to in post #7? When I had the covers off last time there were no leaks from either the cam or crank seal.

 

Yes. In your case, oil may not drip from the weep hole due to the lower cover not being seated properly.

You'll need to remove the crank pulley and covers again to verify anyway.

 

Any idea what could be going on with the cover? It appears to be seated in the 1st picture I posted in post #9. Warped maybe?

 

Not sure, but you can figure it out during disassembly.

 

Seriously.........its leaking from behind a cover. That cover needs to be removed to identify the leak source. Playing guessing games is not going to help.

 

If you had to make an educated guess based on what I've posted, would you say oil pump leak? I don't want to have to take it apart, then put it back together, wait a week and do it all over again. It wasn't leaking from either the cam or crank seal 2 weeks ago when I replaced the oil pan gasket. Is there anywhere else for it to leak from on that side?

 

1) Oil pump (recently checked front seals tentatively ruled out)

2) Head gasket and valve cover gasket.

3) Cracked block or head.

 

In that area, the only thing I can think of is the oil pump seal unless its not oil but coolant leaking, but you're gonna have to let the car sit on jackstands until you locate that leak. That way you don't have to keep putting all back together multiple times.

This time when you take it off take pictures of where you think the leak is coming from and just hold off.