Background:

Ok so my fellow 4runner buddy calls me up and says his 1998 2wd 3.4L 4runner will not turn over. He goes through the basics and makes his way to the starter. He tapped on his starter and then was able to turn over the engine and start it up just fine. But he replaced the starter just 4 months ago. So he asking has the starter gone bad already or is it something else. He drives straight to my house and we get to work. I automatically believe that it is a bad solenoid just sticking. He bought some advance autoparts starter and not OEM. So here I am thinking he should have bought a Toyota part, etc... I get under his car and find everything is covered in oil, dripping, dirt's collected on it, I mean its bad. The top of the motor, valve covers, engine bay area is clean but everything under the motor is soaked in oil. I also find that the starter is missing the top bolt, completely gone, and the bottom bolt is loose. I could move the starter around like it was a loose goose.

Work Performed:
1)We tried to find the source of the oil. Checked the brake fluid, engine oil, transmission fluid, power steering fluid, and none of those were low. He just had an oil change were they "topped off all the fluids"... I checked the oil pan plug, oil filter. The fluid dripping down I believe to have the consistency of engine oil but its everywhere and can not determine the source.
2)Replaced the starter and the motor starts up just fine now.


Next:
1)Going to seriously clean the bottom of the engine bay and try to find the source of the oil.

Questions???
1)With the starter being very loose is it possible that oil was leaking out and that is the source of all that oil?
2)Where is the oil coming from??????????

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Engine bay area just showing no evidence of oil on the top half of engine.

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Subscribed, because I have a similar, less severe leak on my runner. Hoping it's not the rear main.

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Did you check the contacts inside the solenoid? Worn out? then simply replace those. Don't get rid of the OEM starter. Aftermarket starters can fail at any point for unknown reasons, but the OEM fails only at the contacts and it is $23 at the dealer.

Yes, clean the oil pan area and then continue to monitor. Could be the oil pan gasket.

Unfortunately when he replaced the starter 4 months ago he got rid of his OEM starter.

I would say the start that is in it has worn out Contacts if it was an OEM one that someone took out for the same reason take it to a place and have them rebuilt it


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Replaced the starter and now the motor starts up just fine. But that was not my question.

Where do people think the oil is coming from?

That is a lot of oil. Did you reach behind the valve covers and see if there is oil back there? The half moon/cam seals are known to leak not just the valve cover. That leak is pretty bad and I'm not sure if I've ever seen them leak to that extent.

I would buy a bunch of engine de-greaser and clean it all up the best you can then look for the leak to develop again. With that amount of oil everywhere, it will be hard to pin point until it gets cleaned up.

PS. Your buddy should have just kept the original starter and put new contacts in it. The aftermarket starters for these trucks are garbage..

Half moons at back of valve covers are common, but I would also bank on rear main seal. What others said, clean it up, and if oil starts coming from underneath that vertical black plate infront of the tranny pan, i'd bet on rear main.

Not difficult to replace...after you drop the transmission..

rear main is what id assume by looking at the pics. guess on a positive note all that oil will keep it from rusting.

The last time I had a vehicle with an oil leak like that, it was the rear main seal.

Ok so we went to one of those do it yourself car wash places, sprayed two cans of some serious degreaser, and then pressure washed the whole under side of his car. Once we got back to my place, we drove it up onto some ramps I have and dried everything pretty good considering how bad it was.

We drank beers and with his car running, sat under the car for an hour looking for oil to drip down from a location... nothing.

Parked his car for the night and laid down paper towels. The next morning no oil had dripped down onto the paper towels. I am stumped.

I am attaching pictures of where the oil should be coming if it was a rear main seal.

Also check out how high the oil is on the motor near the rear where his valve covers are. Could it be a valve cover leak that was just over looked for a very long time?

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It absolutely could have been the valve cover gaskets leaking for a long, long time. I've worked on several people's 3rd Gens now and they all either have leaking valve cover gaskets or they replaced the valve cover gaskets and are now relatively leak free. My truck was leaking a fair amount of oil, but after the valve cover gasket replacement, the under side of my truck is not oily anymore.

If you decide to do the valve cover gasket job, this video might help you out:

You may need to drive it at speed for an extended time for an appreciable quantity of oil to come out.

We are going to try the dye and uv light method to find the leak.