I had my heads resurfaced (96 disco- 185,000 mi) The motor never had oil issues, but now seems to burn a qt. every 50 miles. It looked like about 20,000ths was milled. Would the extra compresion cause this? My concern is the mech. had the motor open for a few weeks, and we did have some rain. Just curious, thanks for any opinion.

 

I would suggest you get it back to your mechanic Are you blowing any blue or black exhaust?.

 

For what it is worth, the mill limit for resurface is 20 thousandths (0.020) inch, so they are on the money there.

 

The coolant washing down a cylinder could have caused a ring to wear or break. Even overheating can cause ring damage. I don't know that I buy the stories about extra compression causing smoking, but I used to hear people say it all the time. The old Chrysler 2.2 and I think maybe the 2.5 that was in all their little cars and even the Caravan would blow head gaskets and then start burning oil. I've even seen the 1.5 and 1.6 Honda Civic engines from 88-95 start burning oil after a head gasket failure. I still think the damage was done before the repair... not because of it.


Is your oil separator installed in the valve cover?

 

I would say at the very least a compression check is in order. Improperly installed valve seals can lead to increased oil consumption, but 1 quart every 50 miles is way too much for it to be valve seals. That's 2-stroke territory. Does the engine run fine otherwise? You should be fouling plugs like crazy.

 

o what about dark exhaust smoke????????????

 

At 60 mph, I can smell burned oil in the cabin. When accelerating from 60 there is a steady stream of blue smoke visible from the tailpipe. I will do a compresion test, but I didn't do one before the gasket blew, so what numbers should I expect on a motor with this many miles? I have a feeling all the cylinders will be more or less the same- plus or minus 10 or so, but I will post the results. Thanks for your concern and any help. I just hope it's not d.o.a. after surgery, as I have a lot tied up in my "desert disco limo" Thanks again

 

Did the cylinder walls look OK when the head was off ? Did you look at them ?
If you have a bad ring you probably could have seen it at that time...
A compression check and most likely just a look at the plugs is going to give you the bad cylinder.. It can't somke that much and not be fouling the hell out of a plug..

Good Luck with the bottom end overhaul...

John