White stuff was on my oil cap when I put in more oil

[Keego]

It was on the inside, looked like grease from bacon or something, kind of foamy, kind of greasy, it was yellowish-white. Any ideas what it is?

 

[johneetrash]

Originally posted by: Keego
It was on the inside, looked like grease from bacon or something, kind of foamy, kind of greasy, it was yellowish-white. Any ideas what it is?

by any chance did you find a porno mag somewhere near your engine bay?

 

[Evadman]

How did your oil look? If it looks like ( forgive the term ) Baby sh!t then your head gasket is gone and is allowing water to mix with the oil.

 

[Eli]

Originally posted by: Evadman
How did your oil look? If it looks like ( forgive the term ) Baby sh!t then your head gasket is gone and is allowing water to mix with the oil.

Which would be a very, very bad thing.

 

[Colt45]

water in the oil.

 

[911paramedic]

Teflon grease? That is white/yellow. Pretty common on bolts or things you do not want to seize.

 

[Tominator]

When water and oil are whipped as in a motor, you will get that white milky look.

It can be caused by anything from a blown headgasket to condensation.

How much white stuff are we talking about?

 

[The Stigenator]

did your car overheat recently ona long idle.

well you have blown a gasket, most likely the head gasket..

check your coolant cause your burning that.. top it off and then fix your car up.

The white stuff is your coolant in oil, you got some major work on your car due.

by the way what car is it?

 

[etech]

Frequent short trips can do that also. The car doesn't get hot enough to burn the water out of the oil.

The ventilation of the crankcase should also be checked. A sticking PCV valve will keep the moisture trapped in the crankcase.

 

[MrPhelps]

Make sure your pcv valve is ok. If it can't venilate it can cause condensation.

 

[stev0]

Originally posted by: 911paramedic
Teflon grease? That is white/yellow. Pretty common on bolts or things you do not want to seize.

exactly what i was going to say.

edit: i wasen't going to call it teflon grease though

 

[911paramedic]

Originally posted by: etech
Frequent short trips can do that also. The car doesn't get hot enough to burn the water out of the oil.

The ventilation of the crankcase should also be checked. A sticking PCV valve will keep the moisture trapped in the crankcase.

That is also why people that drive short distances rust out their exhaust systems too. The byproduct of cobustion is water so it tends to settle in the exhaust system, rusting it out.

 

[Vette73]

Originally posted by: Keego
It was on the inside, looked like grease from bacon or something, kind of foamy, kind of greasy, it was yellowish-white. Any ideas what it is?

What is the year, make, model, and engine size? When was your last oil chnage and how often does it get changed?

 

[Nutdotnet]

Originally posted by: The_good_guy
did your car overheat recently ona long idle.

well you have blown a gasket, most likely the head gasket..

check your coolant cause your burning that.. top it off and then fix your car up.

The white stuff is your coolant in oil, you got some major work on your car due.

by the way what car is it?

The white stuff isn't necessarily (sp?) coolant. It could just be water from condensation. Best thing to do is to check the dipstick, see if it is the same milky consistency, or better yet, do an oil change and see how the oil looks. I had an old truck that would had the same milky crap on my oil-filler cap, was nothing more than condensation.

 

[Keego]

Dipstick has regular oil

It's a '76 chevy pickup, 400 engine, oil gets topped off about once every two weeks (leaks a lil)

We are planning to replace the gaskets around the pistons (head gasket?) during thanksgiving. I didn't notice this about a month ago.

I don't drive more than 20 minutes when I drive it.

 

[JC]

400 small block...hmmm....the 400s had siamesed cylinder walls, tended to get hot between the cylinders. There are steam holes in the head gaskets between the cylinders, those get clogged after many miles. This leads to hot spots, and warped heads/ blown gaskets.

JC