oil leaking

[miami man]

my car leaks a half a quart of oil one way to work but i drive my other one because of this.

[nattyphysicist]

One thing you can do to diagnose a leak is to clean everything up as best you can and then do a visual inspection while the engine is running.

I wouldn't reccomend using high pressure water in your engine bay. Use a biodegradable degreaser and a brush and use low pressure water to rinse it away.

[ajb999]

i'm curious why you say not to use high pressure water. i've used it before and all i had to do was cover the distributor or take it off and dry it afterwards and have not had any problems

[packrat427]

I am sure what he means is , if it is leaking oil that bad ,and you were to use high pressure ,then the water is most likely to find it's way inside the engine also .
I always used Castrol Super clean, it is very aggressive , wear gloves !!
Autozone brand works and Walmart brand , it's just the generic Castrol stuff.I think they call it Purple stuff ??
I used Simple green last time , I sprayed it all over ,let it soak in , sprayed one more time agitated it with a brush ,and rinsed with water pressure from the outside hose here at home , looked great .

[Tim]

My Festiva had the same problem when I first bought it - the engine dripped oil and the bay was (still is) filthy.

A new valve cover gasket fixed the problem.