My new 360 smokes like a freight train, burning oil. No misfire, no lack of power, just rolling out the smoke, especially when I'm getting on it. It takes a minute to start burning oil when it's first started. I'm getting ready to tear into the upper end, but I'd like to confer with some of the FE knowledgeable people here.
The engine has just over 100k on it, but was probably idled a lot. The truck had a PTO winch on it, and some of the details on it tell me it might have been a railroad owned truck at one point. It also hadn't been registered since 86.
At any rate, I ran a can of engine flush through it to try and clean the rings in case that's it, but the thing started smoking at idle while the flush was running. I also noticed what looked like oil running down the outside of one of the tailpipes, coming out of a joint in the pipe.
So, what are my chances it's a valve seal issue, rather than a ring issue? I know these engines get a ton of oil in the heads, but does it sound right that it smokes more under power than at idle?
I'm going to be doing a compression check on it tomorrow as a final check before dropping on the new intake and 4BBL, and I will be doing valve seals when I have the covers off and pushrods out anyways, but it would be nice to hear some alternate opinions on this.

 

A drain back problem in the heads will cause this. There is so much oil under the valve cover that can't get back into the valley and then the pan that the valve seal can't handle it. Old crusty caked up oil in the drain holes will cause it. Pull the valve cover to check the drain oils at each end of the heads.

 

BIG FKN NO NO... now the **** that could have been gradually released by frequent oil changes at the start of it life with the new owner, has been promptly introduced to the bearings. If it starts knocking you'll know who's home and yes he's toting several axes. When getting a vehicle home usually the first thing is to get the valve covers off for a look at how things were treated prior, clean out any/as much crap from in there manually, scrub the drain backs while it's still hot and drain the oil just after. Letting the color of the oil determine the next change period. Even if it smokes........

 

Nothing was introduced to the bearings. The oil that was in it for the flush was fresh, and about maple syrup colored, with new oil filter.
Oil was drained hot, no chunks seen but it had turned quite dark, and another new filter was installed. I run only Motorcraft filters.
I know the proper use of an engine flush. This was mostly an experiment anyways, since the intake is coming off Saturday to put the 4BBL on, along with all new valve seals and oil restrictors.
BTW, is there a size of jets that are usually recommended to restrict the rocker oiling, or do I need to drill some out to a larger size?

 

Well, it's almost done, I did find a couple plugs on one bank that were a little dark, and both valve covers had oil in them, but otherwise everything looked decent. The returns were cooked up pretty good, and I keep finding evidence of moisture making more gunk. No loss of coolant, and no signs of coolant, just looks like tons of condensation.

 

Some brands of oil will pull moisture out of the air.