My 96 legacy wagon started gushing out oil today, and it looked like it was coming out the bottom of the timing belt cover. Maybe my oil pump? It hasn't lost any coolant. This is my only car to get around with, any help would be great!

Could be the crankshaft seal, or a  cam seal, although the latter wouldn't likely be a "gush. An one of those leaking would definitely wind up coming out the timing belt cover. It would be pretty easy to drop the fans and undo all the 10mm bolts for the cover and find out what it is, although you would have to take off the cam pulley to fully remove the cover. I would just flex the cover back a bit and rotate it lightly to take a peak back the with a bright light. 

Edited November 19, 201411 yr by Blusc13

Any recent maintenance in the area?

Oil pressure sw up top will leak down into the TB cover.  PS pump can do the same.

the oil pump is right there behind the timing cover.

 

The crank shaft runs right thru the oil pump.   It powers the pump.

 

IMO  something failed there... the seal,,,, or maybe inside the pump.

 

I recently had mine apart,,   Inside the pump there are screws in a ring ,,,, they back out on their own!    I have a 96 legacy wagon, 2.2 also..   I put blue thread locker on my screws and re tightend them down and put on new crank seal as well as the o ring inside the pump.  I got the felpro gasket kit from Rock auto..

it doesn't really matter - either way it's the same cost/repair/job and you should replace all the seals as once not just one seal - timing belt has to be removed to replace the seal that's leaking.

 

1.centrally located leak - it's the crank seal.  this means the oil pump needs resealed

2. if it's on the drivers side or passengers side then one of the cam seals is leaking.

 

in a sense it doesn't matter because you should replace all of it:

crank seal, cam seals, cam cap orings, reseal the oil pump (sealant and oring and tighten backing plate screws). 

 

it would be silly to pay $400 to replace one seal and not the others while you're in there.  $7 now or $400 again later....take your pick.

 

A.  labor to get to ANY of the possible leaks is like $400

B.  labor to replace the $7 is negligible, very easy.

 

does that make sense - so if you only replace one seal and another starts leaknig next year - you gotta go through A again and another $400...

 

also get a $100 Gates kit off amazon for all new timing belt and pulleys.

 

do that and you've got a great 100,000 mile vehicle.

Edited November 19, 201411 yr by grossgary

I was able to get to my car today (which is stranded in a snowy parking lot in the woods in WA state) and get a better look. I removed the radiator/fans, crankshaft pulley, and TB cover. It looks like the cam seal failed and the leak appears to be isolated to the passenger side. I'm just going to replace the cam seal for now to get my car out of the woods and worry about the rest on a warmer day when I'm not working on it in the snow in the middle of nowhere lol!!

Those years liked to have the screws on the oil pump backing plate loosen up. Supposedly if they got loose enough it could leak oil along the crank and push the crank seal right out. Otherwise it's possible one of your cam seals let go. Provided the leak is originating from inside the timing belt cover and not as mentioned from say the oil pressure switch.

I'm going to try to get to my car today and replace a leaky cam seal. The heater in my car also started barely working right before I noticed the massive oil leak. Seems kinda strange, any ideas on why? Also any tips for removing and replacing one cam seal? Of course I'll be working on it in not only snow, but the added bonus of freezing rain:/

here is my idea..  hypothesis.. the oil leak coated your timing belt,, and stopped turning your smooth idler on  your water pump.... 

 

shot in the dark,, im no mechanic.

remove timing belt - remove cam pulley - replace cam seal.  those cam pulley bolts are a bear - have a rubber strap wrench handy for holding the cam wheel.

 

if it's an automatic then it has the EJ25 - those are notorious for headgasket issues and the classic symptom for 96-99 EJ25's like yours is the heater quits working when it first starts to overheat.

 

hopefully it's just low on coolant, needs burped, or the heater core is clogged (just pull the heater core hoses and flush it out), but most likely is headgasket.  these engines are sneaky - they can go months between overheating episodes before they eventually get worse.  that's why so many people have headgasket issues a couple weeks/months after buying one - it already had the symptoms/signs and someone dumped it ASAP. 

 

if you have overheating and recently bought an EJ25....there's a good chance you bought it with existing issues.

 

nice try connecting those dots but it's not the water pump.  that brings up a good point though - if significant oil got on the timing belt you'll want to replace it immediately - they will break within a matter of months if they get saturated with oil, i've seen it happen before on brand new timing belts. 

My old man's 98 forester just started to do this a month ago; losing oil from what appears to be the oil pump of front seal and a cam seal. 10w30 mobil super high mileage.

 

once we fix it we would install 0w40 oil for winter and year round.

 

What oil weigh are you using. A 10w may be too heavy at start up for 0 degree weather if it is that cold by you yet. Consider a 5w or 0w oil once you fix it. This would be a routine repair along with the timing belt. Ours is oil saturated, so a new belt will go with the repair.

so I got the cam seal replaced and fluids filled back up and the car is running great! When I took off the cam pulley I was surprised to see that the old cam seal was pushed all the way out! What could cause this? It kinda seemed like someone had done this job before and maybe didn't get the seal pushed in all of the way?

 

I've owned this car for a year and a half and put over 30,000 miles on it. It hasn't overheated on me once. This is the first automatic I've owned and have to admit I'm not super keen on the auto tranny. It is a 96 legacy l wagon 2.2 that's the ej22 right not the ej25? The heater seems to be working great now, but I'm still a little nervous about the head gaskets.

 

The other issue I have had going on since I bought the car is it sometimes it spits gear oil out of the overflow and it pools up in the little dish thing, then drips on my exhaust and smells horrible. Seems to me like an unrelated issue, but thought I'd throw that out there too. The pcv valve looks quite rusty and I'll probably try replacing that tomorrow... Thanks all

With the seal being pushed out, a faulty install compounded with a clogged PCV can lend to this. Too much crankcase pressure can force oil out. 

 

In my example, we did replace the PCV before the oil leaks. 

 

For 96 legacy L it would be an ej22. Look for the stamping just below the alternator on the engine block. This car is rock solid just dont forget cooling system maintenance and coolant flush.

Miles Fox, that is strange, about a week before this happened I changed my oil and used Mobil 1 super high mileage 10w 30. It has been really cold lately in the teens and twenties all week.

seal probably was mis-installed at some point.

 

you're right - it's an EJ22, i was thinking it was an OBW.

 

fans not coming on, air in system, low on coolant are simple overheat causes.

10w should be good for some -14 degrees, but 5w30 would be better for winter ingf you are doing the high mileage flavor. By mobil 1 high mileage i take it you mean full synthetic vs the Mobil Super high mileage (semi syn)i