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They really should have put somewhere in the shop manual that leaving the breather tube off while starting the car will quickly empty your crankcase

That's what I get for working on the car for 8 hours straight. Filled it back up, put the tube back in place and .....click....battery dead. 9pm. The universe is telling me to go have a drink or 8.

I am confused by what you are describing as the breather. Do you mean the 90 degree road draft tube which goes down the rear and side of the engine and connects to the top cover of the lifter chamber just behind the intake manifold? If so, and you are losing oil out of that opening I would think something else is the issue.

The breather tube just provides an air exit for engine ventilation and crankcase blowby. Air enters the oil filler cap and circulates thru the crankcase and lifter chamber. Due to the shape and position of the opening on the draft tube, movement of the car creates kind of a vacuum at the opening to draw that air out the bottom of the tube. Other than maybe a few small bounced off droplets from other components in the valve chamber oil should not be able to reach that opening and surely not enough to be running out.

I meant the oil filler cap, I had that and the oil filler tube off the top of the engine while I worked on it. Pulled out the old oil and filled it back up through there and forgot to put the oil filler tube back on. I didn't see it coming out but when I turned off the engine (cuz I saw oil pouring on the floor) the lifter valley cover was covered in oil which is why I am assuming it came from where the oil filler tube was supposed to be.

Probably came from the oil filter return port which drops the filtered oil into the lifter chamber and is fairly close to the oil filler tube opening. With the tube out air flow from the fan could have caused some turbulence at the opening and the filtered oil stream at the return port could have been blown out.

Ah. Thanks for helping me understand how that happened Clearly still learning. I was terrified at first that I just wrecked the car....which is always my immediate go to when I mess something up lol

Found the true culprit....a busted line from the oil filter to the lifter valley....now to figure out if i can fashion one myself from materials at Autozone or Walmart or if i have to buy one....and it's already clear that it's going to be a PITA to R&R.

Or you can buy new ones in steel or stainless from Classic Tube.

Even better.

While I sort that out I thought I'd share a picture of the lifters I pulled out. New ones are up front and clearly unused. But if you look at the ones I pulled out... there's multiple types. I think by my count it's 3 different kinds. Curiouser and curiouser.

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Even here "down under" it's hard to view the photo so I've rotated and reposted it.

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Ha! Thank you!