Engine oil leaking from rear of engine

[Emjayex]

Ok, long story short, oil is leaking from the rear of my engine and is leaking onto 1st cat/headers area. Its burning, causing quite a bit of smoke. 

Full story, I was driving home from a road trip. Stopped to rest, stretch my legs. And a bunch of smoke comes into the cabin, and through my hood scoop. I freak out because I hope its not on fire or nothing. (Car did not overheat, temps were normal) I let it cool, everyone is looking at me like Im a fool. And Im seeing smoke coming from said cat/header area. 

I do have a power steering pump leak that does burn just a little and has a very small amount of smoke come out here and there. But nothing like this. 

I checked oil levels, and it did go down, just a bit. Nothing concerning. So I topped it off with a bit more oil just to be safe and drove the rest of the way home. 

Its still smokes a bit, not nearly as much as the first time, oil levels are still good and there is some small drips on the driveway. Attatched are some pics of what the underside looks like, and where some leaking can kind of be seen. 

(Car used to leak a ton of oil before I changed headgaskets, valve cover gaskets and almost all the other seals/gaskets you could think of. So there is still a bunch of residue I never bothered cleaning )

 

[silverton]

The underside of your car is well lubricated buddy.

With these pictures it's impossible to say what's leaking. If it's not the head gaskets, valve covers or the steering rack itself, there are three potential leak points on the back side of the engine; rear main seal, the separator plate, and piston pin access cover.

You can either remove the transmission, or pull the engine again.  If you pull the engine I recommend cleaning up all that mess so the next time something leaks it's easier to identify.

Edited April 24 by silverton

[Emjayex]

1 hour ago, silverton said:

The underside of your car is well lubricated buddy.

With these pictures it's impossible to say what's leaking. If it's not the head gaskets, valve covers or the steering rack itself, there are three potential leak points on the back side of the engine; rear main seal, the separator plate, and piston pin access cover.

You can either remove the transmission, or pull the engine again.  If you pull the engine I recommend cleaning up all that mess so the next time something leaks it's easier to identify.

Ahh crap. Thats kinda not what I wanted to hear

We did change out the rear main seal as well, so it must be one of the other two (which Ive never heard anything about until now). And Im assuming to replace the separator plate or the piston pin access cover, that means the engine would have to be out anyways? 

Thanks for the input though, Ill look more into that

[KZJonny]

1 hour ago, Emjayex said:

And Im assuming to replace the separator plate or the piston pin access cover, that means the engine would have to be out anyways? 

Or the trans. Depends on which is easier for you to do. Job to do the separator/piston pic cover would be slightly easier with the engine out, but not by a mile, since an engine stand will have the arms kind of in the way.....

If you happen to have a plastic separator cover plate (unlikely) there are metal replacements that are less likely to leak. I'm not super familiar with the late 90's Legacies, but I think they're in the same boat... that some had plastic covers.

[silverton]

Just because it's new, doesn't mean it's good, and if it wasn't installed correctly it will leak.  Doing sep plate reseal and piston pin access is basically the same as doing the rear main seal.  the piston pin access cover uses a small o-ring, the sep plate is glued on.  being an old engine you likely also have the old plastic sep plate, there is an updated part WITH bolts, be sure to get the new bolts too.