OutdoorKing Repair Forum Forums Restoring, Customising and Modifying Tech Talk how do I fix my mower

Thanks charmaine, I think I follow what you have told me - now let's look at what it means. Here are some pictures of another (scrap, temporarily removed from the garbage) GXV120 with the cylinder head removed. I have put a red arrow on each view in the same position as you had put your green arrow:





Note the green oval on the third picture. That is surrounding the pushrod cavity: one of the potential sources of oil which could leak past a faulty cylinder head gasket. Note also the yellow oval in the same picture. That is surrounding the oil return passage: perhaps the worst possible place to develop a leak, because it would release a large quantity of oil.

All of this is consistent with your problem being a faulty cylinder head gasket, provided the oil is coming from the joint between the cylinder head and the cylinder/crankcase. I need you to look at that joint in the area in the red oval shown on this picture, and see if oil is coming out from it:


Then look at that joint in the area of the yellow arrow in this picture (underneath the cylinder head, adjacent to the oil return passage) and see if that is the source of the oil:


If we can verify that the oil is coming out from the gasket-edge surrounded by that red oval or above that yellow arrow, we will know you have a failed head gasket, and that is the source of the oil leak.

Here is why I have been harping on the subject of cylinder head gasket failure for some time now. I think I have already described your Rover engine as a made-in-China imitation Honda. Imitation Hondas are in some respects accurate copies, and in other respects, some corners may have been cut. Here are three replacement-part cylinder head gaskets for the Honda GXV160, which is the engine which inspired the design of your engine:




All three of these gaskets have provision to keep them from leaking gas from the combustion chamber. This is the raised-up ring surrounding the cylinder (the large round hole in the center). However only two of them have sealing material around the oil passages - the third one does not. Because of the raised-up ring around the cylinder, if there is no sealing material around the oil passages, there is a risk of it leaking oil - the cylinder block and cylinder head may not be touching the gasket anywhere except right around the outside of the cylinder.