Oil Change observation

Yep. It's always the variables that promise the most fun.

doc

Nice figuring, Ted, but it doesn't work that way. In 5 or 10 seconds of running, the engine does not get to the point there is no oil, and it does not build up any heat. Although it is not a smart idea to run the engine without oil, the chances he has done ANY harm to the engine are EXTREMELY remote.

The oil has not been wiped off the surfaces, and even if it has, the extreme pressure additives in the oil are there for that purpose. Used to be Zinc, not sure what they use now that zinc has been implicated in catalyst failure when the engine starts to burn oil.

At idle, that engine ( the Pontiac 2.0) may well have run for several hours before it failed.. Damage would have begun within the first minute or so, depending on the condition of the engine, the oil that HAD been in the engine, etc.

Again, what quarts - or liters???

USA Quarts

This seems to be consistent with other Chrysler vehicles. IIRC, my 3.5L owner's manual says 5.0 U.S. quarts, but I generally need to put in a full 6 after I drain the oil and change the filter to bring the oil to the top of the full dipstick. Our 3.8L also takes slightly over 5 US quarts, consistent with your finding here.

Bob

That was the main point of my original post. I thought it unlikely that

WVK

Bob Shuman wrote:

Remember, 4.5 Canadian quarts is very close to 5.25 US.

WOW! Great posting. Could this be a newsgroup equivilent to "War & Peace"? :-)

Suffice it to say WVK's hand has been thoroghly smacked and he stated that he would discontinue this practice.

Now onto the PFTE (PTFE? - whichever - TEFLON) additive portion of this saga - without getting into details a fleet mechanic recently told me to "NEVER use a teflon additive to an internal combustion enigine" as a few years ago they received a bulletin from DuPont stating that teflon was not intended for use in an ICE. DuPont does NOT use it in any of their fleet vehicles. Teflon is a solid and will settle into the oil film space required the keep mulitple pieces of metal from becoming one. Additionally it can and will restrict oil flow throughout the motor.

I know of folks who have used it with no ill effects but this is what I was told.

And you need to learn to post at the bottom rather than the top. Top posting is for newbies and WebTV users.

Matt