oil escaping from oil filler cap????

So as part of my new ownership activities I *OF COURSE* changed the oil. Thankfully. That stuff looked old, and smelled like someone had REALLY flooded the engine at some point since the oil was last changed.

I drove it to and from work today. My heater decided to piss everywhere (thats another post). When I got home, I popped open the hood because it was getting a titch warm. I discovered that oil had sprayed over the hood. Not badly, but it had sprayed.

Is there some trick to putting the oil filler back on?

Never mind. I should retitle this. Blowing COOLANT out the top of the radiator??? the back lip of the top of the radiator is discolored, and the line running across the bottom of the hood lines up with that.

I checked the coolant yesterday. It was full. Brownish, but full. Could taking the cap off cause this? The gasket still looks fresh on the cap.

So you might have gas in the oil, and oil in the coolant?
Or is the coolant "rusty"?

8) start by draining and flushing the cooling system, and refilling with fresh coolant. often times the brown color comes from rust in the system.

Also hope you checked the oil again for any change in level(possible gas) or color. Coolant does sound like rust.

Coolant looked brown. I thought rusty, my father (used to be a Ford regional service manager) said Motorcraft antifreeze is (was?) brown in the past. Definitely doesn't look like oil in the antifreeze.

The new oil looks OK so far. I'm draining the coolant tonight to bypass the heater coil - I had the joy of that going last Friday too. I'll see what goes on after that. I'm planning to idle the car with the cap off, to wait and see if the thermostat ever kicks in. I'm a bit suspicious of that. Once we've validated the thermostat, I'll put the cap on and see if it holds pressure or if it sprays out.

When watching to see thermostat opening watch for bubbles-----

I started pulling the heater out this morning. I got as far as disconnecting everything but the cables and *almost* getting the console out of the way (Need to get the plate off around the C4 shifter). I noticed when I pulled the heater hoses from the engine that one had a huge buildup of gunk both in the hose and just inside on the fitting. I'll post some pics tonight after I've re-read the picture posting guidelines in more detail.

I'm thinking at this point I need to flush the system, replace all the hoses, and probably pull the radiator and send it off to get boiled. Should I replace the hoses before or after the flush?

Flush before you replace the hoses

I just finished running the flush through. Two things - the thermostat never got to halfway up the dial. I even drove it up and down the road. Is it normal for the car to run cooler when its mostly water? I seem to recall a post saying antifreeze isn't as effective at thermal transfer, but my brain doesn't exactly commit things to memory like it used to...

Second thing - I didn't get a leak out of the radiator. I didn't drive it to the freeway (20 minutes each way, didn't want to risk it RIGHT NOW). I'm pretty sure I had the cap on correctly before, but now I'm wondering. Could the higher speed of freeway driving have caused it? Or could it have been caused by coolant being hotter? I'd prefer to get to the bottom of this sooner than later.

Frreeway speed driving temp would be less except for the thrmostat regulating.
At about 40 mph air rammed through radiator is about equal to what the fn moves.
Over 40 mph there is more and a fan is not even needed.

If you had a leak somewhere in the system it could cause it to overheat from coolant/water loss as well as loss of pressurization. A pressure leak somewhere in the system will cause it to boil over at a lower temp. Good luck

Yeah, I definitely had a leak in the heater core. Replacement core, seals, radiator hoses, heater hoses, thermostat and gasket came in the mail today. Replacement defroster plenum and duct kit yesterday. I'm just waiting on the heater core end caps and figuring out what to do about my punky heater core brace and it'll all be back together. I figured I have it apart anyways to replace the core so might as well go through everything that looks suspect.

Core was original (or OEM replacement). But no end caps.

I'm going through the rest of the car while I'm waiting for those parts knocking off the other items on my list to get the car inspectable. My list is parking lights (there was a short. not my fault. don't get me started), horn, high beams, exhaust leak (I think around the manifold seeing as exhaust was coming in the heater motor hole when I drove it last week after pulling the heater and flushing the antifreeze), parking brake, and instrument cluster lights. I'm hoping the last is just a blown fuse (radio is out too, but when it's just an AM, who cares???)

But I digress.

I'll post results on the heater as soon as the end caps come in and I can put the heater back together and install in the car.