JimiJak
Active Member
- Joined
- January 31, 2014
- Messages
- 75
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- City, State
- Grand Rapids, MI
- Year, Model & Trim Level
- 2014 Ford Explorer Sport
For those that are unfamiliar lets talk about what an Oil Catch Can (OCC) is. If you already know, feel free to skip below to my point. 
An OCC is a hollow canister that you would plumb in line with your PCV valve to catch oil and debris.
Every engine during the normal combustion process, has blow-by. Engine Blow-by is excess combustion gases that leak by the piston rings and escape into the engine crankcase. During each compression or power stroke of a normal engine cycle, a very small amount of gases leak by the piston rings. This happens because the piston rings do not create a perfect seal. This Blow-by of gases is very small, but the higher the RPM and the more pistons, the more the blow-by starts to create pressure in the crank.
This pressure needs to be released, and is done so by crank case vents. Because manufactures have to keep environmental issues in mind, these gases can’t just be vented to atmosphere. So the OEM’s vent these gases back to the intake system to be re-burned. This all sounds good, but Blow by is nasty stuff!
Engine blow-by contains gases and oil from the crankcase. The gases aren’t really a problem, but the oil is. This oily mess coats everything in its path as it makes it way back to the combustion chamber. This nasty oil mess gets into the turbo, then boost tubes,then intercooler, into the intake manifold, and finally back into the engine. As the oil creeps in between couplers and boost tubes, it can cause the connection pop off under boost. This oil then gets into the intercooler, coating all the cooling fins. This greatly effects the ability of the intercooler to cool, and the efficiency of it will drop! This will cause a huge loss in power and can cause detonation. The last place this oily mess sees before the combustion chamber is the intake valves. Because of the temp differences and the oil impacting them, the oil will start to build up and form sludge. This adds up over time, and can cause many other problems, and hurt performance.
From this you can see, blow-by is bad, and it needs to be dealt with.
Long story short (too late!), there are aftermarket kits available for a bunch of different applications or you could custom build your own fairly simply. I've scoured the interwebs and I can't find really anyone that's running them on their explorers...and even more surprisingly their turbocharged Sports. So I'm wondering if I'm missing something like the Explorer has a different type of PCV setup that makes this type of mod obsolete, or what?? Our Sport should be here any day and I plan on adding one, but thought I better find out what I'm missing first.
THANKS!!
An OCC is a hollow canister that you would plumb in line with your PCV valve to catch oil and debris.
Every engine during the normal combustion process, has blow-by. Engine Blow-by is excess combustion gases that leak by the piston rings and escape into the engine crankcase. During each compression or power stroke of a normal engine cycle, a very small amount of gases leak by the piston rings. This happens because the piston rings do not create a perfect seal. This Blow-by of gases is very small, but the higher the RPM and the more pistons, the more the blow-by starts to create pressure in the crank.
This pressure needs to be released, and is done so by crank case vents. Because manufactures have to keep environmental issues in mind, these gases can’t just be vented to atmosphere. So the OEM’s vent these gases back to the intake system to be re-burned. This all sounds good, but Blow by is nasty stuff!
Engine blow-by contains gases and oil from the crankcase. The gases aren’t really a problem, but the oil is. This oily mess coats everything in its path as it makes it way back to the combustion chamber. This nasty oil mess gets into the turbo, then boost tubes,then intercooler, into the intake manifold, and finally back into the engine. As the oil creeps in between couplers and boost tubes, it can cause the connection pop off under boost. This oil then gets into the intercooler, coating all the cooling fins. This greatly effects the ability of the intercooler to cool, and the efficiency of it will drop! This will cause a huge loss in power and can cause detonation. The last place this oily mess sees before the combustion chamber is the intake valves. Because of the temp differences and the oil impacting them, the oil will start to build up and form sludge. This adds up over time, and can cause many other problems, and hurt performance.
From this you can see, blow-by is bad, and it needs to be dealt with.
Long story short (too late!), there are aftermarket kits available for a bunch of different applications or you could custom build your own fairly simply. I've scoured the interwebs and I can't find really anyone that's running them on their explorers...and even more surprisingly their turbocharged Sports. So I'm wondering if I'm missing something like the Explorer has a different type of PCV setup that makes this type of mod obsolete, or what?? Our Sport should be here any day and I plan on adding one, but thought I better find out what I'm missing first.
THANKS!!
