Help - Oil light coming on !

No, no don't do that. The engine might blow up.

Quite. I think it is a faulty dipstick, as the oil shouldn't be that low.

Could the oil be moving about inside the car in some way? It's not underneath, which rules out the oil emerging from the car as obviously it would end up on the drive if that happened.

Have you checked to see that it isn't getting into the tyres, for example?

Just pleased I could help.

Why do new cars use oil? My old 1985 vintage 1.3 nova didn't use a single drop, never needed to check the oil at all between services.My 24v s6 Vauxhall didn't touch a drop either, but the modern stuff seems to drink it like crazy! The Vectra uses about 0.5l every 3k miles. Every week in the Telegraph there is a story about oil usage on new cars, in fact last week I think there was a guy who seized an engine!).

What with Concord going and the worlds inability to build an oil holding engine things are going backwards.

Will

Are you sure the Metro wasn't losing most of it out the gear linkage? That's where it tends to go most often, in my experience. Never had many that smoked, worst was probably a 1098 I had with worn bores on 2 and 3, and very tired valve guides. Even that didn't get through all that much oil, and the smokescreen was only at startup and over-run.

The message from snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.co.uk contains these words:

Why? We still don't know the age or condition or use of the engine - so we've no idea whether that amount of oil consumption is normal.

The message from "Will Reeve" contains these words:

Mostly because the bores aren't bedded in so there's an appreciable film of oil left behind which burns off. As the rings wear to match the bore the fit better and better, incidentally work hardening both surfaces which is why they need roughing up again when you've disturbed the rings.

The message from Adrian contains these words:

No - he asked what he should check first and I told him - and it turned out I was right, too.

The message from "Stuffed" contains these words:

Easy to fix, too. Drive out the roll-pin, slip the shaft extension off, pull old seal, wipe and insert new seal, refit rod and pin.

How many miles have you done since then? Is it a fairly new car, with low mileage?

You don't help us by not mentioning a single detail of what the car is, its age/mileage etc., but if it's a fairly new engine then it's expected to burn oil whilst running in. If it's an Alfa TwinSpark then it's expected to burn oil all the time, it's a "feature" of those engines. Engines burn oil - albeit some more than others. Get used to it.

And as a recommendation, for a much easier to read dipstick reading, check the oil first thing in the morning when the car's been standing all night - it'll be a lot clearer (and particularly make it easier with fresh clean oil).

Also, don't just chuck any oil in your engine - make sure you top it up with the same grade oil as it's currently got in there - if you're not sure, look on the receipt from the garage who last serviced it, or ask them. Mixing oil grades isn't a good idea - my Mk5 Fiesta TDi van used a fair amount of oil when I'd mixed the grades (can't remember why the hell I did that), but when I next changed the oil, using the same grade to top up (though I don't remember needing to top it up), it barely used a drop.

-- Peter

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The message from "AstraVanMan" contains these words:

And on level ground.

Yep. Checking oil with a car sitting on a cobbled street is a big no-no.

:-)

-- Peter

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The message from "AstraVanMan" contains these words:

There's few places round my house which are level enough to check the oil properly. So I've notched the dipstick where "full" is when it's parked facing downhill on the slope out the front.

Check you've got enough oil in it.

No. It blew so much out the exhaust it was obvious that's where it was going and the gunky black oily plugs confirmed it.

When I stripped the head off it was possible to stick a 40 thou feeler between the pistons and bores - I then understood what the book meant about "piston slap"

Aggravatingly I did have to swap the seal on the replacement engine that I installed!

And if the seal doesn't come out easily a self tapper in each side and a gentle tug fixes it no bother.

Live in Sheffield do you? That's what I did when I was there - no level ground anywhere near me!

The message from Chris Street contains these words:

Teflon, the non-stick town.

Harsh but true. Anyone who has to post on here about their oil light coming on and hasn't thought to at least check the oil level first has got to be fairly low down on the food chain. As my friend the CNC engineer says "you can't educate pork".

-- Dave Baker - Puma Race Engines

Dave Baker (Pumaracing(NoEmails)@aol.com) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying :

And then expressed surprise that it could possibly be low, since it was serviced "only" four months ago...

Let's hope the new pratical side of the theory test brings the new drivers up to speed.