Hello all I'm Mike. I have a 2007 Impreza 2.5i 114k miles. I have been losing about 1/4 quart of oil every 1000 miles. Runs and drives perfect coolant level stays full no white smoke from tail pipe no residue on oil cap and coolant has no exhaust bubbles. The only place I can find oil leaking on the engine after degreasing is directly under the copper pipe in the photos right where there appears to be some sort of yellow tag??? Anyone have any idea if this is the head gasket leaking oil? If so should I get it fixed asap? On a side note about the coolant level I have noticed when the car is cold the coolant level is lower than when the engine has warmed up. Is this normal? Thanks for any help!
Have you noticed your water temp level being abnormally high? Any issues with interior heating? Any funky smells? Not too uncommon for boxers to burn a little. At least with higher milage. How do your valve cover gaskets look? I swapped mine out on a 2.2 NA last winter. There was oil in all manner of places!
Has never over heated yet. Interior heat is hot as usual. Yes, it smells like burning oil. Valve covers appear to be dry and they were replaced at 100k along with the spark plug gaskets.
Get under there and look around. Some fairly common places to look are a leak at the half moon seals (these get redone wrong often enough to check) or maybe from the pan/filter/plug dripping onto the exhaust manifold. Hard to tell from the pics but if the trouble area is where I think it is (the sludge on the crossmember), could be from the steering rack. Might be slung from the inner axle boot too, so check that for rips. re: coolant level, if you're talking about the overflow tank, yes that normal. It's there to catch any overflow as the coolant temp rises.
Maybe this photo will help me explain better. The yellow line represents the copper pipe you see in the photographs. Directly below In the red boxed area is where what I believe (90% sure) is oil leaking from....???? If it was valve cover it would be leaking in the green lined area correct?
Most head gaskets are changed for an overheating problem. If oil is dripping from the red box area it is most likely leaking from somewhere else and running down there. Look for signs of leakage around the oil pump or cam seals. If oil leaks from crank or cam seals it will run down there. also some may hit the exhaust. If it is just leaking there it wouldn't drip on the exhaust and create the aromas you smell
