Oil pouring from engine top

Hi
Thanks for all your help and replies with my electrics, I got her started yesterday after replacing coils and a good clean, carbs wiring connectors etc, (An it scared the shit outta me when it fired up, felt like an idiot but my heart was racing pmsl.
I'll get to the point, oil was pouring from the top, of the engine do you think it's just the rocker cover gasket? Fingers crossed I could do that but any lower I'd need help.
Thanks unzie. It's a 1980 kz750 e. Four cylinder

It could be the cam cover (there are no rockers in these engines), or it could be the tachometer drive, or the cam end plugs, or something lower.

If by looking you cannot tell for sure, one way to identify the leak is to clean all the oil off the engine. Once it is dry, lightly apply talcum or baby powder to the suspect areas, then start the engine. When the oil begins to leak, the powder will make it more obvious.

Reclean the engine and repair the leak.

If you can post some pictures, somebody here my be able to narrow the search a bit.

Texas has covered the areas where oil leaks occur at the top of the motor. It shouldn't be anything serious, in fact it's a good sign the oil is getting to the top of the engine. The cam end plugs and tach drive all have rubber parts that shrink and harden with old age causing leaks. The valve covers themselves are often pretty lose, I think perhaps the gaskets shrink or something if the bike sits and no oil gets on them, it's not unusual to find some of the bolts are finger tight. You can try retorquing it to the correct figure, but unless it's really loose it sounds like you need new gaskets and seals.

Yes pics. Is it really pouring or is it seeping?
Steve

For the valve cover the bolts should be torqued in INCH-lbs (not foot-lbs). probably around 69 INCH-lbs.
Be sure to use an INCH-lbs torque wrench & tighten the bolts to the correct spec.

martin_csr wrote: For the valve cover the bolts should be torqued in INCH-lbs (not foot-lbs). probably around 69 INCH-lbs.
Be sure to use an INCH-lbs torque wrench & tighten the bolts to the correct spec.

Had a neighbor at my previous home who had a blown the head gasket on his car. I helped him fix it, guiding him through the process as far as fitting and timing the new timing belt when the head was back on - he cut the old one off without thinking about how to fit the new one. Having done the "technical bit" I left him to bolt the various ancillary parts back on. Due to his work he was doing that over the course of a few days. He came over and asked me if I he could borrow my torque wrench, he returned a bit later really annoyed with himself, while he was dutifully torquing down various things to spec. he decided to check the tightness of the valve cover that had already been fitted and did just that read inch pounds as ft lbs and cracked the alloy cover really badly before reaching the 60 ft lbs or whatever the setting was. Inexperience didn't make him question that 60 ft lbs was a bit much for a 8mm bolt on a valve cover.

Yeah definitely pouring, probably 200ml in the short time I had it running,saw the leak an shut down.
I can put some pics up tomorrow but till then,
If sat on it it's the right side, pretty sure it's the seem for the cam cover very top of engine.
I thought it was rings or something else had gone at first because of the amount of smoke coming from exhaust manifold , but the oil was running from above the exhaust pipes.
Like one of you said at least I know it's pumping oil , haha

I'm really concerned about that volume. Really almost a cup in a few seconds? Pull the valve cover off and make sure the oil is actually draining back into the crankcase. If when you pull the cover off the oil is overflowing the gasket then you have a return problem. Hard to believe since the return holes are pretty big but still could be clogged. Please post pics of the leak and what you find inside the valve cover.

Tell us how you go about checking the oil level. Some folks do it wrong and have problems. Ed

650ed wrote: Tell us how you go about checking the oil level. Some folks do it wrong and have problems. Ed

The PO of my bike didn't realize there was a window to check the oil level and decided to top it up with a couple of quarts, which then had oil coming out of the breather etc. It helped me get it cheap though and no damage was done.

I agree with Jdvorchak about the volume of oil, I don't know if there's a way the oil can not return on the KZ's but I've heard of such an issue on the old Triumphs where you get a massive oil leak because the oil isn't returning to the sump as it should.

Thanks for replying, fingers crossed it's not too bad

Looks like the tach gear is missing.

Since you need to check the valve adjustment regardless I'd start by pulling the valve cover. You will need a new valve cover gasket of course. Maybe new cam half moon seals too. And of course figure out what happened to the tach gear assembly.