86 GMC Sierra Classic 2500 questions

[gmcnoob]

Originally Posted by Liberty

My suggestion would be to wipe the oil off and run the engine with the hood up.
Try and see if you can see where the oil is coming from. If the valve covers were leaking there would very likely be smoke coming off the exhaust manifolds.
I'm suspecting that breather up top, but I'm not seeing oil on top of the valve cover so thats probably not it.

I will take your advice on that heater hose. So just to be clear if it appears that there is oil coming out of those intake manifold bolts am I going to have to completely remove the intake manifold and redo the gaskets? Or could it be as simple as pulling the leaky bolts out and putting some kind of thread sealant on there and tightening them down again? This leak has been more frustrating than my electrical gremlins were. I'm fairly certain that the mechanic did a good job sealing up those valve covers but there's still some oil from when it was previously leaking that is still burning off so I am currently getting a little bit of smoke. Also can you tell me what a normal oil pressure reading would be? After the guy fixed the valve cover problem it's running between 50 and 60 which is much higher than it was when the valve cover was gushing oil. Of course it lowers to about 30 or so when I'm stopped.

Thanks for your advice by the way. I'm learning a lot from you guys.