So I pulled my valve cover today.

[Jakecallun20]

And I was SHOCKED. It was completely the opposite of what I expected. I expected to see something like this.



But...I was so happy to find this:



Yeah, I had to change my valve cover gasket due to a couple of drops I wasn't happy about. (Nothin' bad but they made the front of my block look bad), but besides the motor has 148k on it.

Heres a few pics.









After hearing all that you guys have said about the 1MZ's oil sludge issues...I was impressed to say the least. I'm running AMSoil now and not going back to anything else. I now run it in my J30A1 Accord...I highly recommend it.

[Eye8Pussies]

good to see....but what would make you think that your engine would be all sludged up anyway? are you showing symptoms of sludge otherwise?


no engine is prone to sludge, per se, as long as proper oil changes are done.

My car's at 200K miles and it's even cleaner under the valve covers than your engine it's all about proper maintenance (and I thank my parents for that before I bought it off of them)

[Gangis]

Oh gawd, lol... when I saw the first picture, my heart skipped a beat. That was what mine looked like when I had it checked for sludge. Toyota covered everything so all is well now.

You lucked out!

[Jakecallun20]

Well, I originally thought sludge because of what I could see when I took the oil cap off, now I know how the valve cover is designed with the PVC breather system. So, the sludge there is normal. After I switched to Amsoil, I noticed some oil from the front of my motor, so I picked up some fel-pro gaskets to fix that. On top of the fact that I was just curious as to how bad it would be. To be honest, I bought this car from my parents too and I know my mother didn't take care of it very well, Castrol 5w-30 conventional since new, all up to 130k. When I got it, the spark plugs were original as well as the fuel filter, the brake rotors were original and so on so forth, since buying it I've changed my fuel filter, rotors, plugs, wires, etc. So theres a few reasons why I started to think about sludge.

[TRDSleeper]

I think I'll need to pull my front valve cover too. The gasket has been leaking black tar stuff around the edges. Do you just simple unbolt the cover? No other trick?

[Jakecallun20]

yeah. just remove the stuff around the cover, coils, harness, upper rad hose, etc then pop the bolts lose and remove. Pm me if you have questions

[Potato]

Our cars are so old that if they have not sludged up by now its probably not going to happen, but it is a fear that I'm sure most of us have
We'll be purchasing a new car soon, but I'll probably still keep the solara in the family since it has been such a great car

[akora12]

The first couple of pics remind me of those smoking commercials where they show a lung full of cancer. I'm glad you're healthy!

[TLMNICK]

Wow, that makes me wanna open mine up and see whats under there. I have no leaks or anything...so is there anything else i should look for that could make me suspect sludge?

My car is already put away for the winter, but maybe in the spring I'll get a chance to take a peak.

[Jakecallun20]

Yeah, Theres not really many signs of sludge to look for, just some black looking stuff on/around the edge of valve cover or maybe on sides of cylinder heads. It takes 25 minutes, and about 10 bucks for a good gasket. I opened mine up originally just because I was curious about my sludge. However, do NOT take your valve cover off if you do not intend to replace the gasket. If you remove the cover, but don't replace the gasket I can promise you, that you'll start leaking.

[rewmomi]

sorryy dont mean to be a total noob!!! but could you like unscrew the valves to like get that grit off or not?

[Jakecallun20]

^Unless you know what your doing, I wouldn't remove the lifters. or the main caps. Use a wet vac to suck some of the sludge out, but be sure to plug your oil drain holes so nothing falls into the motor.

[Jai_Jai_Binks]

looking clean,

[rewmomi]

Thanks but I am guess the enviornment your working in wouold have to be that of a paint shop or something is bound to get in the I am guessing its best to do an oil change after that. Oh and whats a wet vaccum?

[SleeperSolara]

That's good man.
I need to cange both valve cover gaskets...
How hard is it??
Looks pretty easy to me....