I knew better, but lost track of time, especially since I had swapped vehicles with my oldest son while I was making trips to help with my Dad every weekend (his Jetta TDI gets WAY better mileage than my F250).

Anyway, on one of my son's weekend trips home several weeks ago, he commented about how the truck was smoking lots more than normal. I had bigger things to worry about with all my business travels and weekend trips to Mobile. After thinking about it off and on for several days, I called him and asked him to drain my monster CCV trap just in case it had gotten full and was putting back pressure on the crank case.

Sure enough... he drained out nearly a full quart of condensed oil, and within two days of normal driving.... almost no more smoke again. I had even tried changing the 6637 filter, which was due anyway, and thought that the filter was simply dirty.

The air filter change made no difference, but draining the CCV trap took care of the whole issue. Mileage is back up a little on the truck, too.

Bottom line... if you're running your CCV reroute with a trap, be sure to check and drain it often.

EDIT: If your trap is anywhere near full now, with ambient temps beginning to drop, there will be increasing condensation rates in the coming weeks/months.

 

how long has it been since it was drained?

I still need to do this mod..find time dangit!!

 

It had been at least 4 or 5 months since the last drain. I would check my notes in my book to confirm the last drain date, but it's in my truck with my son. I had not expected it to be building up that quickly in the hot summer months, but maybe it was just that it was too long. (A negative side of havinga large trap that can hold a lot is that you don't have to drain it very often, and can end up forgetting about it - especially when it's 100-200 miles away).

 

thanks for the reminder Pete..good info for this time of year for sure...thats what i like about mine..it can't over fill..it just spills out if it gets that full..i made one for Justin (jdecker88) as well..last i talked to him he was pretty happy with it..
click on the pic to see more of it

 

At least you caught it before it blew any seals.

 

I am still loving mine it works well form what I have seen and like Ron said you never have to worry about over flow. Hey Pete whats the best way to go about washing these prefilters?

 

Good catch Pete! While we're on the topic, I have two CCVs, just for this very reason. Here is a pic of my passenger side CCV:

 

Woa, I have never done that. Where is this trap at and how do I drain it. Have an 01 with 65000 on it.

 

No drain trap, its open to atmosphere. I have a gradual downward angle on my hoses so it doesn't collect oil.

 

Thank you, I was worried.

 

i just have a 3/4 inch hose no filter on the end. slope down so it does collect oil

 

I drain my CCV trap every couple of weeks. Never more than a couple of teaspoons full drain out.

 

Locopower, I don't think you have any thing to worry about if you haven't done the CCV mod and added a trap to it.

In case you are wondering what the CCV mod is.....in the stock formation the oil vapors from the crank case are vented into the intake, the CCV mod is when you reroute said vapors from your intake to the atmosphere. The reason for this is soley to clean up the intercooler tubes, the oil vapor tends to seap out the boots. It makes for dirty boots and diry boot are more likely to blow off.

 

After reading I was wondering if anyone has ever checked their intercooler for any oil residue?

 

All ICs will contain some residue until they are cleaned after doing the CCV mod. I have had a CCV mod hose since about 2002 on my truck. It has never even left a drop of oil on my driveway. I don't have a trap, it exits at the rear axle. If it were to fill, I would expect it to blow out the residue prior to blowing a seal in the engine except in the most severe freezing conditions. Even then, if you think about it, I would hope it blew the dipstick tube up before blowing a seal. Think this one over for a few moments.