jackra_1, what are you considering "cheap" when it comes to an oil catch can? I am seeing prices all over the place (from $12 to over $300). Is there a manufacturer that you would say builds a quality part?

I would think that for our cars, we shouldn't need to big of a catch can unless one is seeing excessive oil consumption. My car does really well between oil changes (less than 0.25 quart every 7500 miles). I am thinking I will need to go out and look at my car to see where the PCV hose runs and then determine if there is a good spot to mount the catch can.

 

Its been a while but I think I paid about $95 for my catch can.The better ones have internal baffles that help extract the oil drops in the gases that pass thru.

Space is a problem of course so you probably want as small a one as possible. The one I have is way more than I really need but I do not have to empty
it very often at all. But then I only do a couple of thousand miles a year if that.

You can see where I positioned mine and it has a transparent tube on one side that gives you an indication as to the oil level in the can.

 

Do you get much liquid?
Smell like oil or fuel?
.
.
.

 

After about 1,000 miles I get a few cc worth of oily condensate and it smells like old oil. Its not something I would want back in the sump.

 

 

On my car there is a low load breather as well as the high load breather. I did have an oil catch can on the low load breather which did not catch any oil.

The low load breather simply routes from the top of the left hand valve cover directly into the air intake pipe. Whereas the high load breather routes from the PCV valve
back into the elbow below the throttle body.

So I only get the oil on the high load breather side.

I dont know about the breather/PCV set up on your car.