Customs 1934 Ford ton and a half truck

Hey guys. My boss has this old truck that used to be his dad's. We got it running and driving great. We have an oil leak comming from the front passenger side of the oil pan where there is an approximately 1/4" slit up the pan. There is like a separate can, if you will, where it leaks. View attachment 5793995 View attachment 5793996 What's the purpose of this and how do we go about fixing it? Thanks

 

Your pictures did not get added.

Oil pan breather on V-8 60 horse.

https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum...an-dingus-and-why-is-it-dripping-oil.1031232/

 

Your pics don,t work but thats more than likely the crankcase ventilation. edit, Pete types faster

 

As a guess, Odds are your engine is wore out and your valves are allowing oil into the blowby.
I’d also guess he’s having issues with oil soak spark plugs.
The only real fix is to rebuild it.

 

Reply 10 makes it clear.

 

Define “1/4" slit up the pan”. What does “up” mean? To me that would be a “vertical” split.

 

Irregardless,
Do a compression test.
A Stuck valve could also cause this.
Sounds to me like it needs to RUN.
Throw some Marvel Mystery Oil in both the fuel and oil and drive it for 300 miles.

 

Now that the pictures are up, that looks to be part of the crankcase breather system that is broken out. It will push oil out of there, not a ton, but it will make a mess. The bigger concern would be getting road debris into the crankcase since that is a rather large opening. Best to drop the pan and get that repaired. A competent fabricator should be able to patch that up with a bit of sheet metal and a welder.

Is it the stock 1934 21 stud truck motor, or has it been swapped at some point in time, most likely with a later model flathead? Some one will correct me if I am wrong, but IIRC, the early 21 stud flatties didn't have the breather through the front passenger side of the oil pan, which leads me to believe this may be a "newer" motor.

 

We believe it's a swapped motor. The date stamped on the motor when we had it apart is coded to a 1935 21 stud. I had such a hard time locating parts for this truck due to its ratity. We would have to yank the motor to drop the pan off it since it's got exhaust in the way.

Would there be some kind of putty to put in there that would harden and seal it?

 

Wouldn’t you have to disconnect the exhaust to pull the engine? What step are saving?

 

it does appear like the breather was damaged.
Anything other than removing the pan and repairing or replacing it is futile.
I have a 34 pickup. Over the years I’ve had the pan off 3 times while the engine was setting in place. Removing the exhaust isn’t that difficult.
They don’t make a putty that’ll get you out of doing it correctly.
I’d still do a compression check.

 

Drop the pan and get it fixed right, or replace it. Probably looking at a 2 or 3 hr job for a good fab / welder, based on what we can see in the images. Couple hundred bucks give or take unless other issues arise, and assuming you pull the pan and reinstall it.

Where is the truck located? Telling us the location would help, is it still in Belview, MN? Someone could probably point you towards someone who could fix it.

 

That is a stock 37 to 48 pan. I googled ford oil pan pictures and 37 to about 48 pans all have that breather slit in them.