Wife Ran Celica No Oil Advice Needed

[Anastie]

I wrote in the Skoda forum this thread http://www.briskoda.net/forums/t29459-.html Which tells the tale of my wife driving her Celica with almost no oil in!!!!

I was directed to this forum for the following question:

When my wife drove her Celica with almost zero oil in it Well we had no nasty noises etc and thought she had got away with it. She still may have done so but I have another question.

It was serviced soon after that incident about 6 weeks ago. I now make sure she checks the oil weekly but yesterday noticed that the level is now down to minimum. It was obviously at max after the service. Is this level of oil usage normal? She covered 1800 in the 6 weeks.

Should we be worried? The oil on the dipstick looked fresh not mucky black

I could use this as an excuse for her to change her car But then we need to know if the engine is showing signs of bu**ery

As ever advice appreciated as its only done 37,000 miles.

[GT4 BOOSTER]

this is a gen 7 i take it - no its not normal somethings wrong with the car.top up the oil once more and see how many miles it lasts , then you'll know for sure.

[Anastie]

this is a gen 7 i take it - no its not normal somethings wrong with the car.top up the oil once more and see how many miles it lasts , then you'll know for sure.

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Thanks for the reply its a "Y" reg if that answers the generation question.

[Black Knight]

How low was low?

If it was showing off the bottom of the dipstick then she could well have screwed the engine up. If it was below minimum but still showing oil then she may have gotten away with it.

As mentioned above top it up with oil and see how long it takes to use it up again

[gordypix]

Take it to TOYOTA - They will (they did this for me when I was unsure about oil consumption) Top it up with OIL and tell you to come back in about 1000 miles - They will then check the level of oil and tell you if the usage is excessive or normal and if so what may be wrong with it - Don't try and diagnose it yourself - Chances are you could be wrong and risk damaging the engine.

[Anastie]

Take it to TOYOTA - They will (they did this for me when I was unsure about oil consumption) Top it up with OIL and tell you to come back in about 1000 miles - They will then check the level of oil and tell you if the usage is excessive or normal and if so what may be wrong with it - Don't try and diagnose it yourself - Chances are you could be wrong and risk damaging the engine.

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Thanks for all the advice. When she drove it with little oil in, after I let the car cool down on level ground it showed about 2mm from the very bottom of the dipstick. I then refilled it and it was serviced 2 weeks later. Fresh oil etc. That was less than 6 weeks and 2000 miles or so ago.

If we take it to Toyota will it show on record if she goes to part ex it against another Toyota?

[cookci]

so maximum of dipstick to minimum on dipstick in 2000 miles??

if so thats fine!

[sotal]

Toyota say 1litre / 1000 km is acceptable useage. The dipstick is 1.2 litres on my car - it will be similar on yours so 2000 miles is good going (just not perfect)

Just top it up every time you fill the fuel up. Gets to be a pain doesn't it!

[mikeb]

Toyota say 1litre / 1000 km is acceptable useage. The dipstick is 1.2 litres on my car - it will be similar on yours so 2000 miles is good going (just not perfect)

Just top it up every time you fill the fuel up. Gets to be a pain doesn't it!

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1000 miles/pint of oil around about what is considered acceptable for the 3s-ge and 7a-fe engines. But the 1zz-fe of the gen 7 should do much better than that. I would say anything less than 2000 miles/pint would be abnormal. Some modern engines consume no oil at all.

If the oil pressure light didn't come on, then oil starvation probably didn't cause the problem. But running with low oil also causes the oil to overheat as it doesn't get enough time to cool down in the sump. Modern engines are usually quite resilient to abuse, do you know for sure that it is using more oil than it did previously?

[Anastie]

Toyota say 1litre / 1000 km is acceptable useage. The dipstick is 1.2 litres on my car - it will be similar on yours so 2000 miles is good going (just not perfect)

Just top it up every time you fill the fuel up. Gets to be a pain doesn't it!

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1000 miles/pint of oil around about what is considered acceptable for the 3s-ge and 7a-fe engines. But the 1zz-fe of the gen 7 should do much better than that. I would say anything less than 2000 miles/pint would be abnormal. Some modern engines consume no oil at all.

If the oil pressure light didn't come on, then oil starvation probably didn't cause the problem. But running with low oil also causes the oil to overheat as it doesn't get enough time to cool down in the sump. Modern engines are usually quite resilient to abuse, do you know for sure that it is using more oil than it did previously?

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Afraid the oil light did come on and she drove it for 7 miles home :(

[sotal]

Some modern engines consume no oil at all.

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and some morden engines consume more! The Honda Civic Type R uses 1 litre/1000 miles as standard when it leaves the factory. Some of the Audi Diesels also use a similar ammount as standard.

Granted I was talking about the 3s-ge/7a-fe but I'm sure Toyota would try and use the same rule for any engine! Anastie - Look in the handbook it tells you in there what the max it should use is

Afraid the oil light did come on and she drove it for 7 miles home :(

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7 miles at 30mph shouldn't be a problem. At 70mph it may cause a problem. It looks like a chicken/egg problem.

The problem must have been there before to make you have such low oil, so it isn't the fact of having low oil once which is making you have low oil again.

I reckon your wife did little or no damage to the engine by running low on oil, the damage/problem would have already been there and may even not be a problem. Do you have any signs of oil useage? Check the following 3:

> Blue Smoke from exhaust on Startup or when working the engine very hard

> Oil on the floor under your parking spot

> Stuff that looks like mayonaise in your coolant or in your oil

You could also check your spark plugs to see if they are oily.

None of the above should occur on a Y reg vehicle but it may be worth a look??

My car uses a fair amount of oil and I can't find where it goes - it "just gets used" Worn valve stem seals seem to be the most likely explanation but at £800 just to look to see if it's them I'd rather just pay for the oil!!

[mikeb]

Some modern engines consume no oil at all.

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and some morden engines consume more! The Honda Civic Type R uses 1 litre/1000 miles as standard when it leaves the factory. Some of the Audi Diesels also use a similar ammount as standard.

Granted I was talking about the 3s-ge/7a-fe but I'm sure Toyota would try and use the same rule for any engine! Anastie - Look in the handbook it tells you in there what the max it should use is

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Quote me out of context why don't you. ;) We're not talking about a civic type r engine or an audi oil burner here! There's a reason the civic type r can use up to 1000 miles/pint, just compare it to other Honda engines - I doubt most of them consume oil at that rate.

The 1zz-fe is not a particularly high performance engine (it goes in the avensis as well remember). My Mum's gen 7 does well over 2000 miles/pint, and I think that's the rule rather than the exception.

Driving 7 miles with no oil could well have made things worse, but we don't know if there was a problem before because we don't know when the oil was last changed/topped up.

[Anastie]

Thanks for all the advice folks. The car is serviced as per schedule by a Toyota dealer. The car was problem free and did not use oil at this rate before her mishap. I cannot see the dreaded blue smoke coming from the car at high revs. But this oil usage seems high. Then again compared to my vRS it is but thats diesel :)

[paseoGT4]

I know on my old paseo, when the oil became too low - it wouldnt start - thier is a sensor that stops it I believe. Id be suprised if the celica didnt have the same or similar sensor to stop you from damaging the engine. If it wasnt making much noise when ran it low I wouldnt worry.

[T600]

Anastie; Welcome to TOC.

2000 Y reg means that it is a Gen 7. That can have either the VVLi, or in the 190 or T-Sport versions, the VVTLi engine.

Both engines are essentially the same 1.8 litre unit, but the 190 has high lift cams and revs to a higher limit.

My Gen 7 190 used very little oil - hardly any at all; checked it every week or so and rarely had to add any oil between services. And it had done over 50K Miles when I sold it.

If there was any oil on the dipstick when you re-filled it then I would say it's unlikely that any damage resulted from the incident.

However, I would back up Gordy's recommendation that you get it checked out properly by Mr T.

[Black Knight]

That's not quite true.

2ZZ in the 190 uses a SIMILAR block (some differences but generally slight) but a completely different head (the important bit)

I'm pretty certain that you're in trouble here now.

If the oil warning light's come on then oil pressure has dropped very low and I'm pretty certain she'll have started to damage the con-rod bearings. The Oil warning light is a last gasp warning to tell you to get off the motorway at 70mph before your engine seizes. You should stop as soon as it comes on.

The main oil system pressure should be running at about 3bar as usual (can be up around 5bar when cold). Oil pressure switch triggers down at around 0.5bar I think)

Might be worth getting checked out by the dealer/friendly garage if you have one.

If nothings damaged then it'll probably be a few hundred quid to have it checked and confirmed.

If it has damaged the bearings it shouldn't cost too much more to have new bearing shells fitted (and when I say not much more I mean in the order of tens of pounds and no more than 100 since the engine is already open)

If you chance it and it does go wrong at best you'll need new pistons/rods, new crank and at worst it'll put a rod through the block and you'll need an entire new engine at cost of a couple of grand I'd think