Kohler Courage 20HP gushing oil out

[bchannell]

A pal of mine brought over his Husqvarna mower with a single cylinder 20HP engine. The engine, and the inside of the engine compartment are dripping with oil that looks to be coming out of the top of the engine. Major league oil leak! I pulled the fan cover, flywheel, etc and the top crank seal is dry as a bone and in good shape. This tractor has 200 hours on it, and is WELL maintained, it looks new, including the engine, (if it weren't dripping with oil!!). The motor has a top plate, kind of the reverse of most mowers, so you can practically rebuild it without removing the block, so I've ordered the top cover gasket to check out where the leak might be, but it seems that's the only logical leak. The breather is working right, but everything is so soaked that I can't tell what's going on. I'm in the process of cleaning it up, but with the oil filter on the top plate and pressurized oiling, I just feel that it's got to be that top gasket.
Anyone ever had any trouble with these leaking oil?

 

[Barkleymut]

just a thought, is the oil level ok on the dipstick?

 

[Eddie]

+1 oil over filled or fuel running into the oil. #2. Oil cap loose (happened to me.

 

[bchannell]

OK, here's my thinking, because I don't know if it was run with too high oil level or the dipstick out/loose.
There was very little oil on top of the flywheel, it seems to me that the air movement from the flywheel vanes is what caused so much oil to get scattered everywhere. Wouldn't it seem plauseable that the dipstick loose or oil level too high and oil coming out of the dipstick would have to get on the flywheel? The underside of the flywheel only had a light coating of oil, which again, looked to me like air flow did it. Kind of like it sucked a mist of oil over time underneath.
I dunno, what might have happened, but the owner is pretty good about maintenance, certainly no abuser, but yes, anyone can make a mistake and leave the oil cap off. I would have thought he would have caught it and understood what happened. When he brought the tractor to me, the oil cap was is place and tight, so I'm kind of ruling that out until I talk with him again.

 

[jeepman3071]

I've seen the top cover gasket fail on a few of them, that may be a likely culprit.

 

[JTK]

I was going to suggest loose crankcase cover bolts, but it looks like you addressed those. If those loosen, the crankshaft can wobble and trash the engine.

 

[motorcity]

Take a look at the breather also. If I recall their was an issue with the oil breather on one of Kohlers motors. Amy want to check over on mytractorforum.com. in the small engine section.

 

[NeilR]

I have one of these engines. It's likely the sump cover gasket but also check if any of the oil passage plugs are missing.

Neither of those things have failed on my engine, but it's certainly possible considering the Kohler Courage/SV engines are full pressure lube.