Mitsubishi Repair: 93 Galant LS Rough Idle and Loosing Oil, air intake hose, timing belts

Question
My daughters car has 114k miles on it.  She has had it for about 2 years now. A little history, tranny was replaced before we got it, and a complete tune up including timing belts etc.  Car ran good for the most part until about 6-8 months ago when we noticed that it started to use a lot of oil.  Id say 1 quart every 700-1000 miles.  Initially we thought it was time for a new engine or new car...  Anyway took it to a shop and had them check it out.  Engine compression is fine, loosing some oil at the rear seal (bad tranny replacement I guess), but mechanic said not enough to worry about replacing it yet.  We have noticed some blue smoke from the exhaust in the am and sometimes when you excelarate hard, not much leaking out on driveway etc.

Anyway we have been keeping and eye on the oil and adding as needed.  About 2 weeks ago the idle which was always a little rough got really bad.  I replaced plugs and it was a little better.  Found a post on the net about cleaning the trottle body and I have done that, which fixed the rough idle although guess what, I found where all that oil is going...

On a 93 galant there are two vacumm lines coming off the valve cover.  One has the PCV valve, which I have relaced twice now, and the other runs off the left side of the engine and plugs directly into the air flow between the air filter and the TB.  I found tons of oil in the hose as well as in the TB. Since this line connects in between the air filter and TB (bad design) oil has been spraying out of the engine and directly into the TB.  No wonder it would not idle well.  

Getting to my question, what is wrong?  The PCV valve is fine.  I did come accross a post on the net somewhere about cleaing out the oil galleys or something like that.  As a work around I have put a vacumm plug on the inlet side of the air intake hose and just left the hose coming off the left side of the valve cover to blow out its junk under the car.  Obviously its still blowing oil out that side but at least its not going back into the TB and other places it doesnt belong.  

What is my long term fix for this? Have you heard of this problem before?

Thanks in advance.

Answer
Shaun,
On a 12 year old car, it's almost inevitable it may leak and/or burn a little oil.  Your mechanic was right in saying it's not that bad yet if you're only loosing about a quart every 1000 miles.  Replacing the rear seal is pretty labor intensive and can be costly.

You are correct in seeing those two lines coming off the valve cover.  The line that comes off the valve cover and connect between the air filter and the TB is called the breather hose.  It's common on every fuel injected car sold.  The reason it reconnects is for emissions purposes.  As you have done, it is ok to disconnet that hose, plug up the inlet between the air filter and TB.  But you should not just let that hose hang free in your engine bay.  I would recommend going to any auto parts start and getting a breather filter.  It's a little filter you can attach to that hose that will prevent oil from accumulating in your engine bay and will also prevent foreign material from entering your cylinder head.  Now, the same thing can be done with your PCV valve hose.  You can plug up the inlet nosal on your intake manifold and attach another breather filter to the hose coming off your PCV valve hose.  That will prevent oil from accumulating back into your intake manifold and throttle body.  But it also violates emissions laws in just about every state.  So if your state requires regular emissions tests, you either should not try that or reattach the hose to the intake manifold before you go in for the inspection.  I usually recommend replacing the PCV valve every 6-12 months.  And get it from the dealership.  They are not much more (if any) getting from the dealership rather than your local auto parts store.  I've actually bought some duds from the auto parts store, so I now always get mine from the dealership.

The oil that blows into the intake from those hoses is normal for any car.  Some cars more than others.  But try those methods I suggested and you should prevent a lot of that oil from accumulating.
Good luck!