A client came to my shop and had me look at his car. He informed me that a previous shop replaced the valve cover gasket for an oil leak a few months earlier. We were confused since it looked as though no oil leaks had been repaired and the typical valve cover gasket and oil filter housing gasket were leaking. We agreed that the oil filter housing gasket was leaking since there was oil leaking from a specific location and could only come from that. We determined the best course of action was to replace the oil filter housing gasket and skip the valve cover gasket, clean the top and lower engine compartment, and add engine oil dye to be able to determine if there are any other leaks after a week or so of driving.
One of the things that is important during a “leak” repair is that the resulting mess from that leak be cleaned up. It can take quite a bit of time, and a lot of brake clean, but it’s very important to me. If the client see’s that I took the time to clean up the mess that’s great, but if they don’t at least I know I made it look like a German car again.
