Oil Leak dripping off of the bell housing and gearbox oil sump

Hello, i have recently purchased a 2003 Citroen C3 1.4 HDI 16V SX and i am loving it so far, unfortunately as it was bought from a used car dealer there are a few problems which i was not informed of. first off there is an oil leak which is dripping off of the bell housing and gearbox oil sump, this leak spans from a few drips after a short trip (10 Miles) to a considerable puddle after a long run
(40 miles +) this would say the leak is coming from a seal where the oil becomes warmer and thinner after a journey however i have taken the top engine cover off to show the injectors and i can see oil over them, i have taken some pictures, but these are from when the car has been stood overnight, when the car has just been used there is a larger puddle around them, according to the service history the injector seals were done last year so it shouldn't be the injectors. after going through the entire service history i found that the leak was discovered in early 2013 and in December of that year the previous owner took it into a different garage and had them check for leaks, they found that the nearside driveshaft oil seal was perished and needed replacing and that the valve cover gasket was worn and was seeping oil so both parts were replaced and the gear oil was topped up however when the car had its MOT in a different garage in august 2014 an Oil leak was one of the two advisories, the owner went back to the same garage in November 2014 for an oil top up and new front brakes and they wrote down as an advisory that there was an oil leak coming from the rocker cover gasket (does this mean it wasn't done in December 2013?) there is also other paperwork from other garages suggesting that the leak may be coming from the turbo but i cant see any oil on the heat shielding or coming from any of the turbo pipes. i wouldn't think the valve cover gasket could leak so much oil but i am not an expert mechanic. where do you guys think its coming from?

Another thing although im not sure if its normal or not is if i switch the car off after a trip and then put the ignition back on (engine not started) there is a weird buzzing sound coming from somewhere in the engine bay here i have uploaded a video of the sound
I really like this car and hope there is nothing serious wrong with it, any help will be greatly appreciated, thanks

samstagmoonyham wrote:i have taken the top engine cover off to show the injectors and i can see oil over them, i have taken some pictures, but these are from when the car has been stood overnight, when the car has just been used there is a larger puddle around them,

I can't see the injectors or the oil around them in the photos.

Make sure its engine oil and not diesel oil that is evident as a leak.

samstagmoonyham wrote:according to the service history the injector seals were done last year so it shouldn't be the injectors.

Not correct. It could well be the injectors leaking fuel if they have been disturbed when new fire seals were fitted. The injector seals are not what you think they are

https://citroenc3owners.com/diesel-c3-ti ... l-t12.html


Clean up the area with some spray solvent cleaner. Top and bottom of the engine, so you can run it and see fresh leaking oil, rather that trying to diagnose this from old oil evidence.




It looks like you have the wrong purge pump fitted and associated pipework and clips. It suggest there is also fuel work done that you didn't mention in the list of work done.

samstagmoonyham wrote:i wouldn't think the valve cover gasket could leak so much oil but i am not an expert mechanic. where do you guys think its coming from?

Check for leaking injectors if its diesel. Otherwise, why not the cam cover leaking? There is not much else at the top of the engine left to leak.

That is loud and not right. They do make a sound, but not that loud. It won't be difficult to identify the part with two people working. One to turn the key, the other to feel and listen for the sounds location.

hi thanks for the reply, i have just been though the service history again and found that the on the 11/12/13 a fuel pump primer was fitted by the same garage who replaced the driveshaft oil seal and cam cover gasket 9 days before, yes its definitely the wrong primer, its the same as the one in my dads 2002 1.4 hdi 8v. Will this cause a problem? and i will clean my engine up and look again, but im pretty sure it was oil on around the bottoms of 4 gold pipes which i thought was the top of the injectors, it was black and certainly smelled oily, the injector seals were done in November 2012, what i meant about not thinking the cam cover gasket would be the issue is that i thought the oil was at a very low pressure when it reached the top of the engine and that when the cam cover gasket leaks its generally just a gradual seepage.

Also that buzzing noise is only occasionally there and it seems like it only happens after the engine has been on for some time, next time it happens ill feel around the engine bay until i pinpoint the noise.

samstagmoonyham wrote:yes its definitely the wrong primer, its the same as the one in my dads 2002 1.4 hdi 8v. Will this cause a problem?

I have no idea if its a problem. I don't know why citroen fitted 2 different types. Its obviously been ok but just looks like some one has had a go at it. Maybe the 8v ones are cheaper?

samstagmoonyham wrote:but im pretty sure it was oil on around the bottoms of 4 gold pipes which i thought was the top of the injectors, it was black and certainly smelled oily,

Maybe it was oil then. There is not much to leak around the injectors other than diesel or oil from the cam cover seal.

samstagmoonyham wrote:what i meant about not thinking the cam cover gasket would be the issue is that i thought the oil was at a very low pressure when it reached the top of the engine and that when the cam cover gasket leaks its generally just a gradual seepage.

The oil is under pressure at the cam shaft and I suppose it would depend how bad the seal for the cam coveris would depend on how quickly the oil would escape.

ok, yeah its probably cheaper, we all know what these garages can be like haha, yeah ill clean it up and give it a run and see where this leak is coming from and report back

i havent updated this for a while as i was just making sure that the oil problem had gone away and i think it has (fingers crossed), it seemed to have been caused by several factors, number 1 a moron dealer who overfilled the car with oil and the the rocker cover gasket which was supposed to have been replaced just 2 years ago clearly was not, all the garage had done was tighten up the gasket so it squished down to form a temporary seal, i cant believe a garage would be this scabby over what is a £10 gasket.

i still have no idea what causes the buzzing noise and have seen that at least 3 other people have the same noise, ill keep looking any hopefully will solve it.

anyway i just thought i would post an update here just incase it helps somebody else out in the future.

samstagmoonyham wrote:anyway i just thought i would post an update here just incase it helps somebody else out in the future.

Thank you for the update !!

This problem has come back, it does actually smell like fuel, there is also a diesel smell coming through the cabin somewhere, the fuel seems to be pooling up around the injectors only, so it must be dripping at a low pressure, so is it more likely to be the gold injector pipes than the actual copper seals on the injectors?

samstagmoonyham wrote:so is it more likely to be the gold injector pipes than the actual copper seals on the injectors?

The copper injector seals don't really seal any fuel as such. They seal the combustion chamber, which admittedly contains some fuel, its mostly air or exhaust gasses.

The gold pipes seal only diesel fuel under very high pressure. Citroen say new pipes should be fitted each time they are removed (don't reuse the pipe). Why? The pipe seals to the shape of the injector mating face and it can be tricky to get it to seal twice. In practice everyone will re-use the pipe unless it leaks, then they change them

The nuts on the gold pipe have a specified torque which can be tricky to measure without the right tools (crows foot) and maths to do the crows foot conversion. You could check they are torqued correctly?