Have been chasing a small oil leak for some time now, finally noticed that there was a drop of oil on the hose clamp on the intake hose to the Turbo. Hose clamp was a little loose and I was able to tighten the hose clamp a couple of turns. I then pulled the connection for the PCV lines out of the hose and notice a very small amount of oil in the hose. Question is, is this normal or is my Turbo on the way out. and what could cause the oil to be in the hose, car has 137K mile on it. Thanks

 

Two ways to look at it. I would consider it normal as the PCV system is designed to let crank case pressure escape from the block. Volvo decided to reintroduce this pressure back into the intake. The PCV system is designed to capture the airborn oil particles and drain them back into the block while at the same time releasing the pressure. Some particles make their way through the system and end up being dumped into the intake. The turbo path introduces the pressurized flow of air into the intercooler at the bottom of the intercooler. If you were to look at the bottom of your intercooler you will notice a small pin hole. Its design is to drain off the excess oil that makes its way into the system. So Volvo knew there would be some oil that made its way back into the intake side of the engine. I believe there was a recall of the first 850 turbos to change the intake path into the intercooler as it used to enter from the top letting that oil coat the intercooler. We now pay to have our Volvos modified like this, its called a RIP. There are still some of these floating around out there. I saw one on this site. Back to the subject, Some oil entering the intake is expected. Determining how much is too much is another story. Best place to start is to do a compression test. Low compression means blowby and excess case pressure.

 

BOXPIN ...thank you... for your very informative reply. I' ll wait to see if tightening the hose clamp stops the leak down the engine.