the breather is breathing out pretty hard
Yeah, your rings are probably not sealing. That's going to heat up your oil with blowby gases and contaminate
your oil pretty quickly, requiring more frequent oil changes.
Hopefully it's just carbon deposits around the piston rings/lands. I would do a ring wash which consists of
filling up the cylinder with solvent and gently forcing it by hand past the rings (to dissolve the deposits) into
the crankcase, after which you change the oil to get rid of the mixture of oil and solvent in the crankcase.
That's a very effective and well-known procedure for high time engines - search it.
This is Mike's version:
https://www.savvyaviation.com/wp-conten ... -flush.pdf
This is Ed's version
https://vansairforce.net/attachments/oi ... pdf.24816/
That's going to work a LOT faster at freeing up the rings, than putting a solvent like Avblend into the oil.
Note that modern car engines, with their low-tension rings - to reduce friction and increase gas mileage -
badly suffer from ring carbon deposits, requiring similar treatment to reduce the carbon on the rings. Also
with direct injection, the carbon deposits on the intake valves can be horrible. A different story for another
time.
Back to aircraft engines. They have three major problems:
1) valve sticking due to guide/stem deposits
2) valve / seat deposits (non circular heat pattern on exhaust valve)
3) deposits on rings (excessive oil consumption, poor compression)
If you can learn to clean 1/2/3 above, you can really improve the performance and longevity of your
aircraft engine.
Of course, it helps to operate it to reduce deposits, but that's another story. One of the biggest things
you can do to help your engine is to operate it frequently. You let it sit 6 months, deposits are going
to cause you problems. And internal corrosion will take it's toll.
Maybe I'm kidding myself, but after a flight I like to open up the oil cap/dipstick on the top of the engine
and let the convective heat carry out the airborne moisture in the engine that didn't get burned out the
crankcase breather. Get the moisture out of the engine!
Funny. With my data logging engine monitor, I can see that my oil temps are actually highest after I
touch down after a flight, and the air stops moving through the engine as I roll out on the runway and
taxi in. I like that high temp - it aggressively boils off moisture in the engine.
I hate seeing an emulsification - or even straight water - coming out my crankcase breather tube. I
feel like a bad parent.