ok, so today i was at school and i took my car in to put winter tires on and change the coolent. i recently had a severe leak in the rad, and i ran some of the leak sealer stuff through it and that took care of it. The seal stuff said to mix with water, so i had just water in the rad while that was fixing the leak... Anyways, as i was pulling the car out of the shop, i noticed it was burning quite a bit of oil, so i popped the hood and and went to check the spark plugs/caps, and of course they would be all covered in oil and sludge.. however the spark plugs weren't fouled, at least the plugs on the front bank, but they all had a lot of oil on the outside of them, could that be from a valve seal? and could the burning oil be from a piston ring?

 

Well does it burn oil all the time or just after startup. If it burns oil only at startup but then quits after a bit, its probably the valve seals. I would lean towards that, ive seen quite a few LQ1s that burn oil at startup because of bad valve seals, including mine.

 

one day like a month ago it burned oil quite a bit for like 10 mins, then quit but it was already warmed up, and today it did it on startup after we changed the coolant, and quit by the time i got home, and tonight it didn't notice any cause it was dark, but it probably did because the engine was cold..

also, a few months ago we had bad valve seal problems, and we ordered new valve seal, but the order didn't come through or w/e so we made our own, no problems since then...

and how much should my spark plugs be gapped, cause right now they seem like they have wayyyy to big of a gap at like ~80 thousands, should probably replace them, and gap them correctly xD

 

The emissions sticker says .060" but when I did mine, it wouldnt run right with that gap. Had to gap them to .045" to get the car to run right.

 

a GOOD set of platinum tip plugs last at least 40k. I ran one set on a new car to 80k and they were shot at .080". If there is oil on the outside of the plugs and wire boots, the valve covers gaskets need replacing. They do weep oil. Check the oil level and oil color. If it is over filled it will burn oil. The color will tell a story whether you are getting coolant in the oil or not. I would not advocate the use of these so called radiator sealants, unless you are in stuck the middle of the desert or something drastic. Those radiators are pretty fragile so to speak.

 

X2 on not using those radiator sealers. You are asking for trouble. The repairs to fix the problems that crap can cause will be way more costly than a new radiator.

 

x3 on the rad fix stuff but guilty of doing it..... but if it does it on start up i'd say valve seals.. if you want to you can always do a leak down test on they cyl and see if it's the rings