Oil leak down front of front bank

[Beastlee]

Took the car out for a fill-up earlier and after an odd little skip in the otherwise smooth running Heidi noticed some wisps of smoke from under the bonnet. A quick look revealed that the smoke was from a couuple of runs of oil that had hit the exhaust. it looks like it's been slowly seeping for a while now as there's some older congealed oil there but it's obviously never got this much before. It appears to be coming from the centre rocker cover bolt and/or the seal at that point and it's not enough to drip from the bottom of the car so I'd like to stop it now before it gets worse. I have a couple of Qs:

1. anyone else got a similar leak?
2. Will I need to remove the rocker cover and replace the gasket and bolts or could I tighten up the bolt to close it up a little more?
3. Should I be worried?

If it's not one thing it's another but I'm being pramatic as it's a 14y.o car. If I need to spend more money on this then I'll have to pass up another opportunity
for a good part at a good price, which I'm not too happy about.

as always for your help
Lee

[Davezj]

first thing would be just tighten the bolt next to the leak, if that doesn't work then try the following:-

just remember the rocker cover bolts next to the coil packs.
rocker cover gaskets and spark plug gaskets are reusable.
take rocker cover off, clean off all oil (petrol good for this) from gaskets, rocker cover, top of head, so it is squeaky clean and then reassemble, should seal nicely. The key bit is clean mating surfaces

[Beastlee]

Thanks Dave, I'm just glad it's the front as I don't want to be getting that back one off just now!

[Davezj]

the back rocker is a pain in the arse!

[elnevio]

I'd give the rocker cover bolts a tweak. The factory torque figure for those bolts is ridiculously low and as the rubber washers perish, the bolts can end up not even being finger tight. Give the area a clean so you can see if any fresh oil appears.


EDIT: LOL! Took me 15 mins to post that, as I got distracted!

[Beastlee]

LOL, thanks Nev

[The Vee]

Yep nip them down a tad, but do them all the same amount. It's almost a floating cover (sits on the rubber seal) and we don't want a cracked cover!

[Beastlee]

Will do it tomorrow and see how we get on, another job added to the list.

[swinks]

Mine suffer the same leak, first was rear bank, now front one started leak. Also camshaft rings contribute to messy look. Especially from underneath.
Ordered new gaskets and o-rings along with new cambelt set. Gonna be done at once with big service.

[Beastlee]

Well as Nev said the bolts were less than finger tight! I've nipped them all up a little and cleaned up the front so I can see how we go.