Here's how an empty plastic bottle can be used to filter the oil from the CCV gasses before they are admitted into the intake tract. It started as a temporary experiment to determine the cubic volume necessary for an effective CCV filter. After a thousand miles of use, a white tissue can be inserted into the tube that feeds the intake without picking up any color, leading me to believe it is big enough. I can see some oil film on the filter media inside but there is not enough to pour out of the bottle yet when I invert the bottle for a minute or two. The orientation of the bottle is such that the air flowing out of the bottle leaves out the top and the oil can collect at the low point. Even though the materials it's made of become soft when exposed to under hood temperatures, I am going to use it as-is till I have a good reason to replace it. The bottle has deformed slightly where it touches the vacuum pump.

     The bottle is one that originally contained Chevron fuel injection cleaner. Brake cleaner took off the label. The black tubing is 3/4" polyethelene used for carrying water underground as in a sprinkler system. I put a slight crook in it with a heat gun in the longer piece. The elbo is Help #47043 sold in the smog fitting section of Autozone as is the Help #42052 grommet that holds the CCV valve to the bottle. I could see no reason the CCV valve had to remain on the valve cover as I could not reason whether it was more related to the air coming out of the valve cover or the air going into the intake manifold. Since I can blow and suck both ways through it, I regard it as an inadequate factory oil seperator. I can't see why they would put a valve in this location. I used a heat gun to soften the bottle so that I could make a flat spot for the grommet and cut the hole with my pocket knife. Everything just slips together. It mounts via one wire tie which goes through a small and unused hole in the vacuum pump flange next to the front vacuum mounting bolt. The tubing helps to keep it in place too. It fits with the engine cover on.

     The filter media consists of the contents of a three pack of scrubber pads I got at the hardware store. One is steel wool, one is copper wool and the last is plastic wool. I inserted them into the bottle in that order so that the plastic is the last to touch the air before the intake.

All the factory pieces are used and kept intact and unaltered so returning the system to original is merely a matter of rearrainging a few parts and removing a few others.

6 Aug. 01 - I cleaned it out 500 miles ago to mark the start of testing. I just took it out to dump any oil out that had accumulated and there was none. The filter media had visible oil on it but none had drained to the bottom. The tube that goes to the intake is still clean when given the white tissue test. My longest period of operation during this time has been about an hour. I discovered it can be removed with the engine cover left in place, by unplugging the CCV from the bottle and then slipping the bottle out of the wire tie, but only after it cools down an hour or so.

Last fiddled with 18 Aug. 01.   Click here to go back one page.