ES300MM

I have been making a few repairs on my 2000 ES300. I have recently developed a moderate oil leak which appears to be from the rear main seal. The problem is up until recently this car didn't leak a drop of oil. Now all of the sudden within the last few weeks it is leaking probably "30 drips?" or so every time it is parked back in the garage. In the past I had this happen because the PCV valve was bad. I recently replaced the oil control valves and they are not leaking at all. No oil coming from the top of the engine. It has been through a car wash to hose off anything that leaked out from changing those as well. I also recently replaced the PCV valve again. Does anyone have other ideas as to what could cause such a rapid leak? I wouldn't think a seal would just fail that quickly and leak that much. Also I have been using the same type of oil for the last 100k miles (Mobil1 synthetic extended performance)

PFB

I don't know if it's your rear seal leaking or not, but in my case it was.

It was fine all along, no leaks at all, and than one day out of the blue, a major leak started.

LeX2K

The oil pressure sending units fail and can leak a lot of oil. Now you are saying the oil is near the front of the transmission/back of engine so probably not that. The sending unit is about the crank pulley, quite difficult to get to but watch that area when the engine is running.

BDSL

Similar thing happened to me a few months ago on my 97 ES300 with 480k km (280k miles). I suspected it was the rear main seal because it was never replaced. I never got around to investigate. I got another ES instead.