7.3 leaking lots of oil
 

Well maybe not THAT much but it's still quite a bit. Went on a 400 mile round trip last weekend to haul a small tractor home, when I got home I found oil speckled all over the front of the trailer and my tailgate, as well as along the sides of the truck and of course the whole underside had oil on it. While it's great rustproofing I'd like to not have to add any oil to this thing. When I checked the oil level after I discovered the leak it was about halfway down the checkered mark, seems like quite a bit of oil for 400 miles. So now I gotta figure out where the heck it's coming from. I have a buddy with a hot water pressure washer, but he can't do it for another week, so until then I might as well ask the 7.3 experts on what it could be. The valley is relatively dry, I just did a turbo rebuild and EBPV delete, and the valley looks the exact same as when I left it. Also, the gap between oil pan and tranny looks drier than the bottom of the pan so I don't believe it's a rear main or valley leak. The whole oil pan is wet, from front to back, so I'm guessing it's up front. Checked the HPOP reservoir and from the top it looks clean and dry. The oil pan seal itself LOOKS to be the culprit, but that's a lotta oil to be coming from the pan gasket. Most places I look it's relatively dry above the pan gasket, and wet below it. Is there anything else that could cause this much of a leak? I want to get out and do more checking but currently it's raining and I haven't had a chance to look yet.

Oil cooler is my guess... can't see it from here.

That is one thing I don't think I checked, I will definitely look harder at that...

How 'bout the dipstick where it enters the pan? That seems to be a fairly frequent problem.

It is leaking from there, but it doesn't look like it was gushing out

Good gosh that's a leak, maybe tomorrow if I find time I'll just sit under it while it's running and watch some more.

No kidding you were lucky! You wouldn't have made it far with it flowing like that. Did you have to pull the pan off to fix it?
Is there an aftermarket setup that takes care of the dipstick leak? Seems to be a real common problem...

Here's a link to a current thread on the subject, there have been many over the years.
Dipstick oil leak

Dipstick tube leaks are usually pretty obvious. I actually had a leaking dip stick tube and replaced the insert at the same time. That isn't the easiest job. The monkey and football comes to mind.

One thing I would recommend before taking anything apart on the oil pan regarding the dip stick insert.... make sure the internal parts are secure before you begin. The male threads on my original part were badly corroded and when I began to loosen the large nut, it just fell apart. In other words.... remove the dip stick tube insert first and secure the internal parts before trying to loosen anything.

My understanding is that you DO NOT want something there to fall into the pan but I don't know what part it is.

I was thinking more like the flange you don't want to loose but an O ring in there wouldn't help any either.