Took the above in - making slight rattle from the engine.
Dealer tells me - £13.5K for a new engine! - crank shafts gone.
Apparently no oil in the car. This I refute, checked regularly & added when appropraite. Last time it was checked , approx 3 weeks prior to taking it in.
No Oil pressure warning lights etc came on - no loss of performance.Gauges all normal ( & still when I videod it in their yard where it still is)
Where has the oil gone? - they haven't done a full diagnostic but tell me they can't see any.
Incredibly they tell me it's not covered on warranty!
Are they trying it on do you think? surely it doesnt need a complete new engine - what about a short block or just replacing the crank shaft?
Either way - I'm not paying - it's their problem not mine.
Grateful for any advice.
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Blimey! That's a remarkable case.
Personally I would get the vehicle out of there as quickly as possible (on a low loader) and get it independently inspected. There is a lot of money at stake.
Obviously I don't know the details. Was it burning oil? Maybe the sump got holed?
I would have thought that a crank and all bearings would have fixed it - but again, not enough info really. Swarf might have got into oilways and wrecked the cams etc etc...
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This doesn't by any chance use the Merc 2.7 diesel, does it? I ask because there's no dipstick on mine, so the only way I'd know is by dashboard warning. It holds 6.5L and you get a warning when it needs (I think) 1L to be added.
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Yeah, 2.7Merc engine.
Things is theres no low oil warning light - but correct me if I'm wrong, but if my car is "bone dry" wouldn't the on board diagnostic system bring it to my attention - not to mention the Oil Pressure Guage - surely this would have material movement?
Whats your opinon - Cheers.
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Impossible to give an opinion without inspecting the vehicle. Get an independent inspection organised.
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I'm not sure what an independent inspection is going to show? Presumably the Jeep dealer isn't lying and there really isn't any oil in the engine, so the issue is why did the (various) systems not tell you of this? That's surely their problem, not yours.
If you have a video of all the gauges and warning lights looking normal, then what else could you have done?
Does this car have an engine oil dipstick? As I said earlier my Merc C270 doesn't and, as far as I know (I've never had to add oil yet) it'll tell me when it needs more oilt. On the Merc, you?re only supposed to add oil in quite large qty's (1L, I think), as this extends the service interval - you?re not supposed to keep topping it up.
What does the user manual say about checking oil? Make sure your answers fit in with whatever's in there!
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He needs an independent inspection because the facts as related by the dealer just don't add up.
If he checked and added oil regularly then there is no way that a relatively new engine could consume enough such that the crank would be wrecked. Furthermore, if the crank is in a bad way then I would expect to hear thumping bearings and lots of knocking from the engine. He needs to find out where the oil has gone (has it gone out through the turbo?) and why the warning light didn't come on. I suspect that there is more to this than meets the eye. The stakes are high so spend £500 on getting it properly looked at by a Chartered mechanical engineer.
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Thanks for the comments guys - think I will take your advice.
What thoughts about the oil pressure gauge - should this have moved if there is no oil - surely this should have shown a decrease in pressure?
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When you say "no oil", was this just observed by there being no reading on the dipstick?
If so, then there was probably some oil left in the engine - enough to register pressure on the oil gauge when the vehicle was stationary. Driving it would be another matter though, whereby the oil would be sloshing about and the oil pick up pipe in the sump *may* well have sucking up nothing when going round a bend for instance.
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Thanks Dave,
there was oil on the dipstick alarmingly - minimal though.
Prior to taking it in the evening before we were out on a Motorway for about an hour or so and then through stop / start traffic across Town & finally 3 miles through country lanes - car taken in first thing the next morning.
Absolutely no movement what so ever in the gauge on this trip or the next morning - again three miles through lanes to the dealer.
Where can this oil have gone? Any ideas why no indiactions?
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Thanks Dave, there was oil on the dipstick alarmingly - minimal though.
Yes, but how much? On the 'minimum' indication, or below it? It needs to be drained and the quantity measured. Also sieved to see what is in there (swarf, bearing metal).
Oil just doesn't 'disappear' - either it leaked out or was burnt. It all needs properly looking at - its not much use us speculating from a distance.
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Just been told that there was a touch over 2 litres of oil drained from the car - whcih in my reckoning is over 30% of the capacity of the 2.7crd - and nowhere near an amount (lack of ) that would cause damage.
Also - delaer tells me it's now not the crankshaft!!! - they are still investigating.
Any more ideas?
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Id say that isn't very much. My Merc C270 holds 6.5L, but there a hidden menu that allows you see the actual sump contents (mines at 5.8L currently). The (mildly) interesting thing is that you can drive with this displayed, and it drops to around 3L. Therefore (as someone else mentioned elsewhere in this thread) there's a fair amount of oil circulating in the engine while it's running.
What surprises me about your case is that I would have expected some serious alarms to be going off - not just routine low pressure /level warnings, but urgent warnings.
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The jeep On board diagnostic hasnt given any warnings at all - surely or the engine warning light - surely if you've got a "catstrophiic" failure as this seems to be you would expect some kind of warning.
The manual says that the engine warning light should start flashing to indiacte a problem that needs attention.
Could the warning system be faulty?
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Where can this oil have gone?
You did say in your message right at the top of the page that "Apparently no oil in the car. This I refute, checked regularly & added when appropraite. Last time it was checked , approx 3 weeks prior to taking it in."
So, you hadn't checked the oil level for 3 weeks? That's not checking it regularly IMHO.
You also then went on to say "Incredibly they tell me it's not covered on warranty!"
I don't see what's incredible about that. The engine was low on oil and the level hadn't been checked for 3 weeks. It's not their fault that basic checks weren't carried out by the owner.
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I disagree, I check my oil level fairly frequently, in addition my C5 has a pessimistic dashboard oil level guage.
How much oil has your car used previously? If it never needed more than a drop, it couldn't have used the amount between max and min in 3 weeks.
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Totally agree with Dynamic Dave the fact it had not used much oil previously is no excuse not to check at least once a week for the very reason that has occured.
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Not sure I understand how the oil could be checked without a dipstick. Other than reading a level gauge. By all accounts, it tells you when oil is required: if that indicator fails, you're snookered. So, how were the oil checks made?
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Not sure I understand how the oil could be checked without a dipstick.
OK, some confusion here. Further up Bill Payer asked if it was the 2.7Merc engine as that doesn't have a dipstick.
lyd confirmed it was the same engine, but further down mentions there was oil on the dipstick alarmingly - minimal though.
So if it is the same engine, how come it's got a dipstick?
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The latest c class mercs do not have dip stick ,my e class(2001) does and so do Jeep cherokees.
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>>if that indicator fails,
Then get it sorted asap,anything can happen after last check,and as you are supposed to check all levels once a week.just because it has not used a drop of fluid does not mean it wont after the check,it is often taken for granted that it wont happen.But it does
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Steve
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