Oil Warning Light

[smokie999]

my oil warning light has recently started to come on .I live in the scottish highlands and it can get a little cold up here to say the least .I start the car and no oil light ,l then pullout on to the main road which is a steep down hill gradient.the oil light then comes on but after a few minutes driving goes off and all is then ok for rest of the journey.Could it be the cold thickening the oil and the down hill gradient causing the oil light to come on briefly

[alan333]

First thing is check the oil level. If it's low it could starve the pump (especially on steep hills) and it could throw the light on.

[TomdeGuerre]

Is your car a diesel? If so you may have dilution of the engine oil with diesel fuel (related to Diesel Particulate Filter regeneration).

[smokie999]

The car is deisel,do not think it is dpf related as this would mean that the oil level would increase and would this then not bring on the spanner light , just a thought .l know very little about cars just what l have read up on this morning.I am going to top up the oil and see if that cures the problem .I have checked the oil and it looks very black to say the car was to supposed to have been serviced in august of this year

[smokie999]

should also have said Ionly bought the car in august and it should still be covered by the 5 yr warranty if it is DPF related but how would l find out

[Parts-King]

should also have said Ionly bought the car in august and it should still be covered by the 5 yr warranty if it is DPF related but how would l find out

By booking it in at a Toyota dealer and have them diagnose it, after all it is fairly new. No amount of members speculation will help in this situation

[TomdeGuerre]

The car is deisel,do not think it is dpf related as this would mean that the oil level would increase and would this then not bring on the spanner light , just a thought .l know very little about cars just what l have read up on this morning.I am going to top up the oil and see if that cures the problem .I have checked the oil and it looks very black to say the car was to supposed to have been serviced in august of this year

Don’t worry about the oil being black, diesel engines are inherently dirtier than petrol engines so they require a high detergent oil which keeps the soot etc in suspension. Even new diesel engines will quickly turn the oil black so you can’t tell anything about the condition of the oil from the colour alone. Short of getting an oil analysis done you’ll just have to trust the service record.

You may ask why don’t they flush the engine when they change the oil and filter and in my experience flushing oil has been the destruction of more engines than it ever saved. By its nature it’s very thin and even after draining it out, some of it remains in the internal oil galleries etc – in my book it doesn’t take much flushing oil to dilute the proper oil.

If I ever was to use it again, after draining the flushing oil out, I would be prepared to do a sacrificial oil fill ie proper fresh oil and filter, take it for a leisurely run then drain it again, preferably something like overnight to make sure it all drains out before fitting a new filter and filling it up with proper oil.

Re the DPF, as Parts King says, no amount of member guessing will tell you whether you have a DPF problem so you’d be best to go back to the dealers to make sure.

[smokie999]

set off today and did a 50 mile round trip at an average of 60/70 mph.The light never came on .l have picked up some oil to top up with and in the morning will start up and set off down the hill to see if the light comes on again .Hopefully it was the oil being slightly low. will let you know the outcome in the morning many thanks for the advice .what is the opinion of the forum re the urban cruiser are they reliable other than the dpf

[g7jtk]

You could try freewheeling down to level ground, let it sit a minute then start the engine to see if it is the oil laying at one end of the sump

[smokie999]

topped up the oil and took the car down the hill this morning and no warning lights at all so it looks like it was just a shortage of oil