overfilled the DODGE 2003 GRAND CARAVAN during oil change

Your Honda "Service Mangler" is either full of it, or he doesn't know what he's talking about.

Either way, I would find another place to have my car serviced and repaired.

With a 3-quart overfill, I can picture some damage being done, including blown seals (penguin/ice cream jokes notwithstanding).

Bill Putney (To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my address with the letter 'x')

High school was an awfully long time ago. ;)

As I remember it, there are three basic states of matter. Gaseous, liquid, and solid. Well four, but plasma is irrelevant here. Liquids are not easily compressed but should enough pressure be applied (definitely beyond anything occuring inside an engine) but there is a compression factor. Why do you think there are specific hydraulic oils?

Kip Adotta you ain't.

Ted

The original overfill under discussion is 1 to 1-1/2 quarts..........

True enough, but then you chose to question another poster regarding his experience with a 3 quart overfill on his Honda.

Why would you picture damaged seals? It does not matter how much you overfill the system... the oil pressure will not go up. Think of a gas pump at the gas station. There could be 300 gallons of gas in the underground tank or 3000 gallons of gas in that tank. It makes no difference in the amount of gas coming out of the nozzle at your pump until the level gets low enough that the pump starts sucking air.

With a 3 quart overfill you should picture bearings destroyed by a lack of lubrication. With that much overfill the crank will whip the oil in to a froth and the oil pump can't pump froth effectively so your oil pressure goes down until you stop or the engine stops.

The seals aren't subjected to any serious pressure. They mostly just keep the splashing oil from leaking out. Worst case scenario is a seal would be sitting in oil and might leak a little until the oil level drops back under it.

Steve B.

BTW,

I was the original poster. and after a few days, I took it to WALMART and got the oil changed for 18$. As I did not have the time/energy to try to drain out accurately I quart.

My van works fine, I hope so.

I think I drove only 20-30 miles with the extra quart... I hope I did not cause any damage.

Exactly!

Bill Putney (To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my address with the letter 'x')

Never heard of him, but a Google search shows him as the apparent inventor of the joke.

Bill Putney (To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my address with the letter 'x')

I suspect if you put enough oil in most engines and rev. them high enough some seal or gasket will let loose from dynamic localized pressure (I just snuck the word gasket in there). :)

Bill Putney (To reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my address with the letter 'x')

Seems to me that if you filled an engine right up to the top and started it up there would be some increase of pressure. I have never actually tried filling an engine until it was full, but I would be extremely surprised if all the oil stayed contained inside the engine when it was started up.

But that is not what he said happened. He said he got a new engine and that the service rep explained that Hydraulic Lock was the cause of the engine failure. This sounds believable (why would they lie). What he probably got confused about is what valve was involved. It probably wasn't the engine valves but the PCV valve that caused the failure. I can imagine, under the circumstances described, a geyser of oil being sucked into the engine thru the PCV valve.

-jim

There are diffferent hydraulic oils for several reasons, but the amount of compression each exhibits is a very minor (at best) factor. It's more a matter of temperature tolerance/stability and lubrication requirements. But anyway..., for all intents and purposes (and certainly in the context of *this* discussion), the fact remains that liguids are not compressable. We are, after all, discussing a car engine, as you said above.

Are you sure you had an extra quart in the crankcase? I typically see an overfill on the dipstick after changing oil and filter. I add the exact amount specified in the manual and it always looks overfilled. I've noticed the same thing on several cars I've owned and never had a problem.

cavedweller wrote in article ...

....who was posting that one could experience a hydraulic lock due to pressurized oil getting past his valve seals and locking up the piston - which is what I questioned.

The poster discussing the 3 quart overfill never uttered a word about blowing out seals.

He just claimed that Jiffy Lube replaced the engine after I questioned him about hydraulic lock caused by pressurized oil bypassing the valve seals into the cylinder.

Yet another poster posed the theory of a large overfill generating enough pressure to blow seals - not necessarily blow the engine - but I would think the standard crankcase ventilation system would absorb any pressure developed.

Hi...

Does it still check over-full after running it long enough to fill the filter?

Take care.

Ken

| > Are you sure you had an extra quart in the crankcase? I typically see | > an overfill on the dipstick after changing oil and filter. I add the | > exact amount specified in the manual and it always looks overfilled. | > I've noticed the same thing on several cars I've owned and never had a | > problem. | | Hi... | Does it still check over-full after running it long enough to fill | the filter? | Take care. | Ken

Good question Ken . Yes it does. I always start the engine and run it for a few minutes at idle just to make sure there are no leaks. Then I check the old level and it usually reads high by at least a half quart, maybe more. I don't even wait for oil to drain back into the crankcase, I just check the level to make sure it's okay and I didn't do something stupid. I like to see the nice clean oil on the dip stick. :-)

Well, I read all that after the thread got hijacked. What I didn't find was your advice to the OP and who seems to have resolved his problem.

Things do get lost though. I offered a wild theory to sort of support the idea of a hydrostatic lock in the bottom end of the Honda engine that may have blown some end seals but it didn't appear in this group thread. Instead it ended up as a cross post into the group that the OP included in his original post.

Was that all? An extra quart? I thought it was more than that!

I fill my Toyotas (and my GR Vger when I had it) with the proper amount of oil, less one-half quart; then I put in a quart of Marvel Mystery Oil. No probs, until I did this on the Honda (same one with the blown engine...I started doing my own oil changes after that!) and the car wouldn't start!