Hello all. I am hoping one of you may know the answer or a workable solution to the problem I have .  The car is a Skoda Fabia mk2 ,  it is a 1.2 3 cylinder petrol 70 bhp 51kw BZG Engine. 
 

The issue that it has developed is to do with oil in one of the spark plug wells.  I have ordered a new pvc valve in case that was the original cause but can not track down where to get the replacement seal to stop the oil leaking into the spark plug well. 
I have been to the Skoda dealership but reception gave me a lovely print out of the rocker /valve cover with a price just shy of £500 .  All I want is the seal for the spark plug well. Does any one know where to find them or if it is possible to get an alternative in there to stop oil seeping in again . Car drives lovely ,no loss of power, but have lost oil. 
Thank you  in advance for any solutions 

There isn't a seal, the cover is sealed with RTV silicon sealant, I doubt the joint is leaking, are you sure it isn't spillage from top ups and oil changes?

Thanks for the reply. No not spillage from a top up cleaned out the well where spark plug sits and rechecked it a little while later after a few drives ,and oil was in there again , I also had the red oil light come on the other day as almost all the oil in the car had gone from being fine a week earlier 

You must have an enormous leak if you're losing that much oil in a week!

 

Are you sure it's not burning it? Remove the offending spark plug and check it's not oil travelling up the thread from the cylinder.

Hope that’s not the case  ,because that sounds expensive and scary and a lot of work . If it stops raining long enough I will get out there and pull it out again. 

The sealing is done with RTV silicone, but unfortunately I think it's a pretty big job to get the cam carrier off in order to re-do this sealing.

I believe it would entail removing the timing chain cover, the chain, then the cam carrier, then cleaning everything up, reapplying the sealant and putting everything back together.

It might well be worth renewing chain and chain tensioner at the same time as this would add little to the (extensive, I'm afraid) labour time, and could future-proof the engine a little.

Sealant is shown here as item 8.

 

 

 

I wonder if it's worth trying to bodge some sealant in via the spark plug orifices? Maybe worth a try to save hundreds, but would require some ingenuity to even attempt in a meaningful way I think.

 

I would think there must be another way oil is getting consumed, as said above.

 

Edited 6 August, 20232 yr by Breezy_Pete

22 minutes ago, Breezy_Pete said:

 

I wonder if it's worth trying to bodge some sealant in via the spark plug orifices?

 

I'm chuckling at the thought of the consequences of some inexperienced DIY'er taking that literally!

 

I speak as someone who patiently filled up the compression volume of 4 cylinders on his Triumph Stag with Polyfilla extruded in using a bakers piping bag.

 

It achieved my aims in spectacular fashion but with a couple of unconsidered consequences, can you guess why I did it?

 

Thread drift aside if the volume of oil being lost is as the OP says then the whole central area of the camcover would be overflowing with oil not just one spark plug well, sadly I think Sepulchrave is correct again.

Edited 5 August, 20232 yr by J.R.

6 hours ago, J.R. said:

...can you guess why I did it?

 

So you could replace the valve stem seals on one cylinder bank without removing the head?

To remove the heads after some of the studs had sheared off flush while trying to replace the head gaskets, 100% common problem back in the day before the modified moly coated bolts.

 

Only other solution back then was send engine away and have the heads machined off the studs scrapping them, I had managed to move them a tickle using gearbox oil down the bores and cranking but only enough for it to shoot out the head/block joint, I needed something solid to lift the heads just enough for me to get in with a cut off hacksaw blade.

 

I think that I must have removed the cams and buckets so that all valves were closed, I would do that today but this was 44 years ago, I chose Polyfilla because it would harden, or so I thought, it had different ideas and I was too short of time needing the car for work.

 

It lifted the heads enough for me to cut through the studs but shot out everywhere like a cartoon in a cake factory and also filled every internal gallery it could find its way into.

 

25 years later my pal who had always lusted after a Stag after me having one at such a young age bought one and had the same problem, by then a company in Cranleigh had made a hydraulic jig to jack the heads up but they did not cut the studs through, they left that to him, someone that should not be let loose with a hacksaw near aluminium cylinder heads!

Edited 5 August, 20232 yr by J.R.

I wonder if the red oil light reported was an oil pressure warning, in fact I think it must have been.

Level sensor (if even fitted) only gives yellow warnings, I think?

Now the oil pressure could be low if there really was a hell of a lot of oil loss, but probably more likely to be a false alarm caused by a failing pressure switch.

Classic symptom is oil inside the electrical connector of the pressure switch.  This is mounted on the front of the engine just near the items 1a, 1b, 1c in the diagram above, green plastic body, single wire connection. Disconnect this and see if oil weeps out from within.

If unfamiliar with releasing such connectors, watch this: How to undo VW wiring connectors. - YouTube

 

Edited 5 August, 20232 yr by Breezy_Pete

Thanks for the replies so far . I Have decided best thing to do for now is to get the new new pcv valve on it as soon as it arrives and also to  take valve cover off completely clean up the oil and put it all back to see if it happens again .if it does then I know I have a bigger problem .  On this car do I need a special tool to undo and remove the valve /rocker cover can’t find any info in the Haynes book for it 

The valve/rocker cover is not something you can remove easily, as I told you above. In fact, it's a huge job on this engine. So it's not the best thing to do at all.

 

Instead, you need to find out if there is lots of oil leaking or going elsewhere, and why you got that red warning light. I think your assumption that it was because 'almost all the oil was gone' might be wrong.

Please check the oil pressure switch as also described above, 

Edited 6 August, 20232 yr by Breezy_Pete