Oil in spark plug tubes
 

I had oil in the spark plug tubes of my '89 SV21, and I hear it happens often with all engines designed this way. I researched it and had a go at fixing it. I read a lot of posts describing the procedure but there were very few actual photos. So here are some I took. Hope they help you if you are attempting this job on their own. It's not too hard.
A 30mm socket is required to remove the four nuts holding the rocker cover on. Vice grips worked unscrewing the tubes.
You want to clean the thread and re-seal the bottom of the tubes with a high temp sealant, and replace the seals at the top of the tubes. A set of these was $25 at Repco.
Kind regards, rubber.

Great job, thanks for the post and photos!

Great photos; makes perfect sense now, Thanks so much.

Great, so it was worth posting the pictures! Glad to help. Might put up the pictures of my CV boot change next...

except that there's likely 2nd set of seals in the middle of rocker arms assembly towers and they will still leak, if not replaced. At least, Hondas do for the years, and best I know, they are all made based on same philosophy for the period, so Honda had it - most likely, Toyota did too.
and if I'm wrong - amen and great post.

Thanks ukrkoz, ta for the info!

rubber

I just viewed the Honda video mentioned in previous post. The Camry spark plug towers can actually be screwed out of the engine. They are threaded tubes (see photos in first post) and it is the thread which caused my leak. The Camry doesn't have the second set of seals like the Honda.

Cheers, rubber

Great. But I am not talking about spark plug tubes, I am talking about engine head "towers" that have rocker arm assembly on them.
But hey, don't have it - amen, one less headache.
So, what exactly seals those spark plug tubes where they screw into the engine head? Threads leak oil very easy.

High temp sealant. : )

ahhhh.. I see.. sneaky, hugh? you hope. been there. it holds only yey long. should have used plumber tape on them. or, even regular thread, soaked in grease, or waxed thread, in-between the threads.

Plumber's tape. You're kidding, right?

nope. dead serious. they do have oil and petrol resistant tapes. gas resistant(yellow). I use regular teflon tape on my cars oil drain plugs. Never had an issue.
I, also, use red and blue sealant routinely, and am quite familiar with it. It is not designed to seal threads, only more or less flat surfaces. You can use bronze one too, on engines, for head gaskets. Still - it's surfaces, not threads. By the time you screw anything with it on in, it's basically gone off threads. For what it is, Loktite would have been better choice, as it's liquid.
Also, keep in mind, that if that sealant cakes, you will have heck of fun removing those tubes next time.

I didn't know about the petrol resistant tapes. Are they suitable for high temperatures?

well, engine head does not really get that hot... if cooling is working.

PTFE Teflon Tape products, buy PTFE Teflon Tape products from alibaba.com

Product Name :PTFE Teflon Tape
Temperature Range: --170 to 260 Celsius degree
Fluid sealing: 200(kgf/cm2)
Gas sealing: 140(kgf/cm2)
Color: white or colorful
Packing Details:10pcs/box ,500pcs/ctn
Usage :Widely applied in construction machinery, chemical industry and other areas, especially in pipe linking systems such as buildings . in addition it is also used to seal pipe threads being joined together for plumbing purpose.