went to top up the oil and found this on the oil cap...

Water levels are fine and havent needed to be topped up, just frightened the hell out of me when I first saw this as I have never had a car do this before. Is it normal ?

Have you been doing short journeys recently? this can happen when it gets abit colder outside and not using the car for a long run, just keep an eye on the water level mate and check to see if the water is oil free.

Will keep an eye on it, the car does town driving mainly taking kids to school and general running about, it gets a good motorway run one a month. The water is oil free and hasnt gone down, again it got me in a bit of a panic when I saw it.

I have cleaned it all off now and keep checking it.

It looks OK to me going by the low ambient tems of late, and the type of driving

the car is doing

I had this the other week in mine - I think you have a 1.6 similar to me. I cleaned mine up - no change in levels at all over the past fortnight. I have been doing a lot of short runs as well. One thing you might notice if you remove the engine cover, is that the oil cap is raised above the engine and screws onto a plastic housing with pipes going into it, this leads to more condensation, so I have been told.

As long as the coolant hasn't dropped, don't worry.

This is a really common issue with the 1.6 SR engine, don't worry!

Thanks for the re-assurance on this...much more calmer noe lol

Just to reiterate what's already been said. Many people panic and think they have a head gasket problem when they see this, when in fact this occurrence is far more often than not due to the engine always being cool because of continuous short journeys, or an engine running too cool possibly due to a faulty thermostat. Try to use the car for longer runs if you can, and change the oil and filter at least once a year regardless of mileage.....