Well I got an early Christmas present the other day. Noticing a stain of oil growing on my garage floor I brought my VX in to my local trustworthy mechanic friend to see what's what. Long story short, it looks as though the rear main seal is shot. Probably, it happened because I've been negligent in keeping the old girl topped off with oil. I have kept the EGR valve updated and changed the valve cover gaskets recently (not fun). So I've been trying to keep the VX running well.

But as we all know, monitoring oil consumption is nothing less than a full time (must ALWAYS do) job. And I wasn't as vigilant as I probably should have been. And so the consequences are now coming to pass. Nobody's fault but mine. Hey I love my VX. And, with only 145K on the dial, I am not soon letting it go. But sometimes I wish it didn't need quite so much babysitting.

Anyway, I am putting all this down on (virtual) paper because I wondered if any of you folks encountered a similar set of events. Also, just out of curiosity, assuming you had a professional R&I the job, what costs did you encounter. Any and all feedback will be more than welcome....