My Felicia 1.3 has oil dripping from beneath the dash and is forming two pools in the foot well. It is clean oil. Could it be from the headlight adjuster? Any ideas? And how could it be rectified without removing the dash? Thanks.

Oil under the dashboard inside the car?

Are you sure it is oil, sorry to ask but if it's anti-freeze that could be from the heater matrix. If it is oil i have to say I have no idea where any oil would come from inside a car as I would have thought all the internal adjusters are electronic are they not?

The only thing i can possibly think is maybe something comming from the steering column, but that a bit of a guess.

Your gearbox breather is blocked. I expect that the oil smells likes cats pee and as you say is clean. What happens is the gearbox breather gets blocked or stuck and the pressure forces the oil up through the speedometer cable. Unfortunatley it saturates all the under dash foam and is time consuming to clean up.

Locate the breather on top of the gearbox and make sure its cap moves freely, you may have to replenish the lost oil which you do by removing the speedometer drive and filling it through there.

Ohh i learn something every day, never heard of that before

Me neither. Very interesting.

I have come across this on two occasions, on the first we wasted time trying to cure the symptom by replacing the speedometer drive oil seals, after a bit of logical reasoning we worked it out. On the second we we went straight to the breather and sorted it first time.

Aye after speaking to a wise technician from the Bedford area I nailed one of these a while ago.

Your gearbox breather is blocked. I expect that the oil smells likes cats pee and as you say is clean. What happens is the gearbox breather gets blocked or stuck and the pressure forces the oil up through the speedometer cable. Unfortunatley it saturates all the under dash foam and is time consuming to clean up.

Locate the breather on top of the gearbox and make sure its cap moves freely' date=' you may have to replenish the lost oil which you do by removing the speedometer drive and filling it through there.[/quote']

Thanks for that Fordfan. A bizarre explanation but makes sense after a little thought. I have had a look and think I may have located the breather under the clutch arm. I have got the cap to move. Will the cap come off if prised, or is that not the thing to do? I just want to be sure that there isn't any muck within. Is that were the breather is?Do I have to remove the speedometer drive by undoing the small bolt next to the cable entry or will I have to undo the collar? Any further assistance will be appreciated. Thanks again.

Sounds like you have found it, I think as long as it moves freely it should be OK, don't go prising it off. To remove the speedo drive undo the bolt (10mm) I think. You may well need to consult a manual with regard to the oil level, type and if you decide to drain and re-fill the capacity. Due to the capacity of the sound proofing and the current temperatures we are experiencing you may well find that oil is still dripping.