Some oil in Coolant... possibilities?

92Patrol5.0

Founding Member
Sep 20, 1999
1,076
1
38
Cedar Rapids, Iowa
I have noticed a little bit of oil in my coolant when I take off the radiator cap. I don't notice any bubbling when I take the cap off. I also don't have any coolant in my oil that I noticed over the last 2 oil changes. I haven't noticed any smoke when I get on it. The engine doesn't run hot either, unless I'm in stop and go city traffic. However, this may be due to a bad fan clutch as I have never replaced it and I think it has gone bad. On the highway it runs at a normal temp. Other than a cracked head or bad gasket, I had a thought about my oil cooler. Could it be possible that the seal in my oil cooler has gone bad and is leaking and allowing oil to sneak into coolant? I know the oil cooler is connected where the oil filter screws on, and then I use a shorter oil filter to screw onto the cooler to avoid hitting the stabilizer bar. I don't know a whole lot about how the oil coolers are set up, as far as seals and stuff, and thought that there could be a possibilty that it's leaking at that point. What are my options are far as testing to check for a bad head or head gasket? It's not a tremendous amount of oil. It's a small little stream as I take off the radiator cap.
 
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I didnt notice any oil in the coolant until after I replaced the timing chain over the winter months. Is it possible for an oil leak with the timing chain cover that allows the oil to leak into the coolant passages? Or is that not a possibility?