can anybody help me please?

[2ndmouse]

how does it get that way? time... crud....ect. it happens. I dont think the thin oil had much to do with it. its like sludge in your drain pipes in the house.... if the scum builds up long enough the drains slow down and one day, you have a stoppped up sink.

this is a good heads up if you look at it right, there could be other plufgged oil passages that will kill the engine. once the drains are clear, use the engine flush, cheap oil and filters, and do this flush/oil changed every week for about a month, to clean out the rest of the crudded up oil passages.

like miami man said, when I took the valve covers off my old ford V8, oil gushed all over the place. oil is suppose to drip thru the valvetrain not "fill it". you should be able to run the car with the valve pan off to watch the oil drip flow.
this might not apply to a 1.3 festiva engine, I dunno fer sure... old V8's its ok to do. I had a subaru that was so dependant on oil pressure if you took the oil filler cap off, it stalled out.

so far the festivas we have owned dont do that..

good luck cleaning the engine out!

[ajb999]

well, she made it back. been there for a couple days and when i started her up, it smoked some for a couple minutes then went away. i decided to try and make it home so i can do some work on her and she made it no problem. almost seems to be running better. my imagination and wishful thinking i'm sure. only problem, some %@#*!& shot out my back window. hopefully i can find one cheap. btw, anyone know of any festivas for sale in montana? or close. anyway, thanks for all the help. this weekend i'll be doing some troubleshooting.

[ajb999]

also, i'm thinking it was a mix of a couple problems. valve pan is somewhat clogged and a little to much oil. but i guess i'll find out for sure soon.