I own a 2002 Kia Rio RXV and my husband decided to change my spark plugs. When he pulled them out of the engine, they were all covered in oil. What would cause this and is it worth fixing?

If the tips is full of oil its bad news the head needs to be removed,but some models of cars have like a sunk in sparkplug that goes deep in to a hole where the tappet cover is located so make sure its on the tip if not it can just be the tappet cover leaking oil onto plugs.hope this helps

SPARK PLUGS WITH OIL ON THEM COULD BE WORN PISTON RINGS, WORN VALVE GUIDES AND WORN VALVE SEALS. DO A COMPRESSION TEST.IF COMPRESSION OKAY I WOULD REPLACE VALVE SEALS REPLACED AND HAVE THE WHOLE CYLINDER HEAD RECONDITIONED IF CYLINDER BLOCK PISTONS ALL OKAY.IF ENGINE IS SMOKING A LOT OF BLUE SMOKE OR YOU HAVE TO KEEP ADDING A LOT OF OIL, WHOLE ENGINE NEED REPLACING OR REBUILD.

You have a 4 cylinder and there are seals in the cover around the spark plug holes. You can replace these with a rocker arm cover gasket set. Costs about $25.00. The oil does not hurt the sparkplug, but over time it will affect the plug wires/ boots and cause a misfire. these are not hard to replace. Your call.