Oil coming from up-pipe??? :-(

[cummin]

Well one of our trucks started smoking real bad and seemed to lose power. Originally thought it was more than likely a turbo problem. Got the turbo pulled and now we have found that there is oil in the up-pipe coming from the passenger side bank.... any ideas on what could cause this? We suspect it is either bad rings or a bad injector...

2004 6.0, stock, 150k, auto.

[Clay Henry]

Welcome to the ORG.
Sorry to hear yer bad luck, some of them smart guys will chime in soon.

[cummin]

well we got the valve cover pulled, guess we're screwed... there is antifreeze gummed up all over the inside of the cover and the whole head reeks of it... couldn't see it in the oil but now that we knew what to look for you can smell it... so have antifreeze in the oil, oil in the turbo and exhaust... i am thinking that this is probably going to be bad....

[seattlepsdtech]

Sounds like head gasket time, very common on 6.0s. I have probably done 25 pair so far. Oil coming from up pipe though? do you mean the filler neck? have you ever had head gaskets done? is this a work truck?

[cummin]

No the the "intake" on the turbo is what I am referring too, the pipe that feeds from the passenger side has fresh oil in it (the pipe is a Y and one side comes from the drivers side and the other from the passenger side,and connects to the left side of the turbo while facing the front of the truck)

There has been no gaskets done, yeah its a work truck, has about 150k on it, regular oil changes. The operator said that he filled the reservoir twice and there is no antifreeze on the ground, but we drained the oil and even though you can smell antifreeze, there is none visible anywhere except the inside of the valve cover...

[seattlepsdtech]

Oil in the intake tubes is normal. If you are using coolant but not leaking it..head gasket time. Also make sure when they do the head gaskets they replaced the egr cooler too. Every tech who has done head gaskets has gotten burned by not replacing the egr cooler also at some point. It's not cheap but good insurance. It is a spendy repair 25 hours labor or so and probably a grand at least in parts. To bad you aren't in seattle I have done a couple on the side already. Good luck.