Elite Catch Can FULL of OIL at 2500km!!

[USMUCL]

Originally Posted by camaro500

I can speak for Camarodude because we are friends and I told him to change his valley cover.
He changed it this spring and now the catch can is pretty much empty after hundreds of miles driven.
Problem fixed. It was a faulty baffle in the Valley Cover.

I think the point of Camarotobe was only that, in the end, GM says 32 oz per 2000 miles is "normal." I know many don't believe them, but that does seem to be a standard in the industry.

So, the 4 oz or so in Camarodude's can in 1500 miles wasn't quite as shocking as it might have seemed by the pictures. Unless he's losing oil elsewhere. The dipstick is probably a better indicator of a problem, i.e. did he lose more than 3/4 qt (24 oz) over that 1500 miles?.

I'm glad he has fixed his concerns.

[Camaro Dude]

Originally Posted by camaro500

I can speak for Camarodude because we are friends and I told him to change his valley cover.
He changed it this spring and now the catch can is pretty much empty after hundreds of miles driven.
Problem fixed. It was a faulty baffle in the Valley Cover.

Indeed, you did always insist, and constantly pester me if I ordered and installed the new valley cover, and I did procrastinate, lol.

I always suspected it was faulty, but you drove it home to me.

Interesting, how we both have the same year Camaro, our mileage on the odometer has always been practically identical, almost like a mirror lol, we BOTH have ELITE catch cans, and you would not collect anything hardly, and I'd have to empty mine out!

Glad all is back to normal, let's meet when you install those new mags on!

Originally Posted by Camarotobeornottobe

Camaro Dude, how many ounces was that in your original post? Maybe 4 or 6?

While everyone wants to see little or no oil consumption, I get it. But, I'm not convinced you ever had a "problem." Think about it, GM is saying 1 qt (32 oz) in 2000 miles -- and that is if not driven hard and after the engine is sufficiently broken in.

So, you collected no more than a 1/4 qt (8 oz) in 1500 miles while running hard on a new engine, no? Unless you had to add 2 qts of oil in that time, i.e. you were losing oil via other routes than just the catch can, I'm not sure it was ever a real concern. You just need to empty your catch can more

A lil' analogy here if I may, to see if I can understand what some of you are trying to say here.

If the "accepted standard" for the average human being's white blood cell count is, 4.0-11.0 x10^9/L, and yours is say, right smack on the borderline, you may say to yourself, "cool I'm good!"

But someone like myself will dig in deeper, and discover say for example's sake, a small teeny tiny infection in the upper gum near the root, so small, but significant nonetheless, and thanks to a friend dentist, will confirm it, FIX THE PROBLEM and 1 month later, lo and behold, the white blood cell count drops right in the middle of that grid of "accepted norms", even if it was "normal" to begin with.

Now, tell me, if your valve cover gaskets are slightly sweating/leaking, oil filter gasket on too tight, hence leaking a bit as well, hell, even your valley cover is defective, throw that in the mix as a trio .... but your piston rings and seals are TIGHT, do you think that your oil consumption level will surpass the "acceptable numbers" that most of today's auto manufacturers abide by to the end user? OF COURSE NOT!!! Will you fix the sweating gaskets even if your oil consumption is still deemed OK???? I'll leave that answer up to the individual to answer for themselves.

Does this mean we should just turn a blind eye to everything, to all of those little problems I just listed, just because the end result conveniently fits neatly right in with what is deemed acceptable? C'mon now, please don't kill me, lol.

I think at the expense of insulting anyones intelligence, or what little of it seems to be around in this world as of late (I'm not including you, just sayin' ), I think that a little common sense goes a long way.

Ok, back to the initial question of how much oil you see in my first initial post on page 1. FORGET asking the question if it's 4 ounces or 6 or 5 or 7....the fact of the matter is, that can was FULL TO THE BRIM! Meaning, due to the nature of the design of that can, you will have half an inch of space on the top, it cannot get any more full than you see.

Based on my data of collection after the fact, I estimate that the catch can was full to the BRIM waaaaaay before the 2500km mark! In fact, I think the can was full at no more than 1500km!

Some of you ask, well what about the dipstick readings? Well for starters, today, as I type this, my car now has a total of 11000km's. Do the math, I don't log anywhere near enough mileage, over a short enough period of time that is, to be able to use the dipstick as a proper apparatus, to measure the oil consumption.

Secondly, as I stated already before, valley cover leaks will never constitute a significant enough oil loss, to measure on the stick, which leads me once again to the latter point, and will once again, drive the point home, and that is, let's not hide our heads in the sand, behind the numbers game, and be ignorant to things that may in fact be broken?

For all practical purposes, the valley cover was "broken", and now it was fixed. From constantly having to empty my can, literally almost after every drive out, now I never do. The catch can was collecting oil, even if I'd go out for a drive with cruise control on and not one WOT run! That would vary from 1 teaspoon per night out, to as much as 3 tablespoons per drive out, depending on usage style. Now, there is practically nothing collecting in the can.

Interestingly enough, before, all that oil in the can actually looked somewhat new! Now, the little bit that is collecting after the new valley cover installation, is thick and more black. Now this is what I want to see funny enough.

Trust me, the engine didn't suddenly say to itself, overnight, right after I swapped in the new cam and valley cover, "ok dude, I'm now broken in now " with an evil laughter to boot towards me.

A final note I'd like to make clear here, to anyone reading this, is that installed the catch can when that engine was almost bone cold brand new. It's not like oil collection was sliiiiightly reducing itself over time, as I approached todays 11000km mark figure on the odometer. In fact, dare I say, it got worse!

All is good now with the new valley cover in. I hope this entire thread helps someone else out, I'm convinced there are a few bad batches of valley covers out there. IF you want the "normal oil consumption numbers" to mask and overshadow something that is broken, aside from the fact that I fail to see what one has to do with the other, this is entirely up to the end user to decide for themselves.

As for GM stepping up to the plate, I won't rant, this_is_not_a_rant, I'm way beyond that now .

[Camarotobeornottobe]

I'm glad you're happy. You're a good dude, and I have enjoyed our PM chats in the past.

[Camaro Dude]

Originally Posted by Camarotobeornottobe

I'm glad you're happy. You're a good dude, and I have enjoyed our PM chats in the past.

Same here, cheers

I will be updating your transmission fluid thread HOPEFULLY this coming weekend. My bottles of MTL are still sitting here. I've been having problems finding someone to drain and re-fill the tranny, as my mechanic near my place was gone for a a few weeks. He is back now, hopefully he won't be too backed up with work.

I need closure with that as well

[JacekPSUr1]

Bringing this thread back from the dead.... I think I might be experiencing a similar issue with my '13 Camaro SS 6 speed manual, but my Rx Catch can isn't catching as much oil as the OP, and I now have a little over 20k miles on the clock, so the engine is already broken in. My issue is that my oil dipstick is showing my car is burning around 1qt of oil every 2K miles. Per Chevy, is this normally the case on just new engines, or already broken in engines? I installed my catch can around 500 miles or so and there wasn't much oil in the can at first. I don't remember exactly at what milage....had to be at least around maybe 7k-10k miles that I've noticed my oil level has been going down and the catch can has been catching more oil. Could anyone chime in on this and let me know if I should be worried? I know some cars are not using a drop of oil, but it seems mine is going through quite a bit. I bought the car with around 370 miles on the clock, so I'm not sure exactly how the engine was broken in :( Car is my daily driver used mostly around town and to commute to and from work with some hwy usage. I don't drive it very aggressively, but I do step on it every once in a while.

Photo of oil collected after 1,000 miles. Dipstick oil level is reading half way, so that's about half quart of oil.



Photo of the Throttle body at around 20K miles on the clock: All cleaned now.



Two photos of the inside of the intake manifold...doesn't look like there is any oil pooling in there: