Hello All,
The Mondeo was serviced a few weeks ago, normally exemplary service from the dealer, I subsequently did perhaps 100 miles over a week or so then checked the oil prior to a 250 mile round trip and found it to be well over "max" on the dip stick.
I did not have time to call into the dealer prior to the trip though telephoned them explaining that I had a longish journey to make, they stated that all would be OK though said that they would prefer to correct the level at my convenience.
Subsequently I have not had time to call into the dealer (30 mins away) and have done perhaps another 3-400 miles.
Between "min" and "max" on the dipstick is about 15-20mm and the level is currently about 5-7mm over "max".
Should I be worried? Should I get it corrected?
Regards.
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Hi Cheddar - I think we have previously established that we have similarly discerning taste ! Mine always seems to show overfull but doesn't seem to suffer any ill effects. I queried it once with my servicing garage and they were adamant that they had only put in the correct amount of oil. Being sceptical I expected to see smoke or something but it always seems fine and the level doesn't move between services. Maybe the dipstick is inaccurate or something on these ?
Edited by Pugugly {P} on 11/12/2007 at 17:54
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Sorry - please insert "have" between "we and similarly" and it becomes English. My apologies, only been writing for 45 years ! ;-)
pleasure !
Edited by Pugugly {P} on 11/12/2007 at 17:55
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Thanks shoespy, yes I am sure I have noticed it a little over before and it always seems to be on "max" even 10 to 12k after a service. It seems perhaps a little bit too over "max" this time however.
I will check it again in the morning when properly cold.
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Mines been more overfull on occasions and is now still running well after 136k miles
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I read often, only post occasionally
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Running on overfill may not seem to be having any effect on the engine but what it could be doing is washing seals that were not designed to be submerged in oil, thus creating oil leaks in the long term. The "MAX" mark is there for a reason. The technicians who say that they put the correct amount of oil in are probably telling the truth, but what they don't tell you is that they didn't drain ALL the old oil out. Ask anyone (myself included) who changes their own oil on a Mondeo TDCi, oil is still dribbling out of the drain hole after 20 minutes and these technicians have done the job in 5 minutes.
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2005 Ford Mondeo Zetec 2.0 TDCi 130ps
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My car's listed capacity is 4.5 litres of oil. When I drain it (and I leave it to drain for half an hour at least), I always fill it up with a 4L container of oil.
That always brings it to around midway between midpoint and max. I leave the level like that. If I added another half a litre, I'm sure it would read over the max mark.
A max mark is a max mark at the end of the day. If the designers wanted the max mark to be 5mm further up then they would have put it 5mm further up. The fact that they do want the car in to correct it shows that they know they were in the wrong to put that much in (imo). Haynes DIY manuals suggest topping up the last of the oil slowly, checking the dipstick to make sure you don't overfill. But I doubt the dealer had time to do a proper job...
The handbook of my car is very clear. The optimum amount of oil is a level midway between min and max. It discourages topping it right up to max and certainly discourages overfilling!
Edited by pendulum on 11/12/2007 at 21:11
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>>a Mondeo TDCi, oil is still dribbling out of the drain hole after 20 minutes and these technicians have done the job in 5 minutes.>>
Well it has gone 125,000 miles being done that way :-)
Reckon I will take it back though, not many miles to do this week so will leave it until i next pass the dealer.
Thanks all.
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Taguchi, who probably understands more about sensible tolerances, states that tolerances are not absolute limits, simply that there is an ideal dimension and that variance from this costs.
Now the engineer who sets the limits for the dipstick will do so very conservatively. Indeed, the dipstick itself will have a tolerance on the max and min marks. As will the piece of plastic that supports it. Now if there is too little oil in the sump then there's a chance of oil starvation as the pump may not always have a supply.
Too much and it will start getting perturbed by the crankshaft and will end up foaming in the sump and causing drag on the crankshaft.
Quite where the real damage limits are I don't know. You'd certainly need to include such factors as:-
road camber, which will have some obvious effects on where the oil lies in the sump
engine temperature, which will vary the sump capacity and probably have other effects
oil viscosity, including the viscosity at the operating temperature, as this will determine how quickly oil falls back to the sump.
Dipstick tolerance, and the tolerance of the support for it.
There's probably several more that I've missed. I'm an electronic engineer not a mechanical one, but hopefully I've given enough of a clue that if the oil is slightly outside the limits indicated on the dipstick then catastrophic failure isn't imminent.
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I read often, only post occasionally
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states that tolerances are not absolute limits,
You can see that Cheddar's micrometer has quite a bit of tolerance too.
"Between "min" and "max" on the dipstick is about 15-20mm and the level is currently about 5-7mm over "max"."
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Re jbif my figures are not actuals, I didn't get the ruler out, rather they just give an indication of the over fill relative to the difference between "min" and "max".
Thanks all.
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I noticed mine (petrol mk 3 Mondeo) was 3-4mm overfilled after service, However I noticed that on level ground, it was 3/4 way up dipstick when Engine had been left for 5 mins after switch off. It was back above max after 1 hour. The other issue with Mondeos (and other fords) is the dipstick is at front of engine, so makes it more susceptible to slopes. Even a slight slope can drop a couple of mm on the dipstick with these cars.
Anyhow, Drained the excess with windscreen washer tube and 50cc syringe (down dipstick tube) to 1mm over the max mark. Probably the slow draining (maybe different for diesel), time pressure, slopes and residual oil makes it difficult for technicians to get spot on without spending more time rechecking etc.
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well over "max" on the dip stick. (...) Subsequently I have (...) done perhaps another 3-400 miles.
If damage were to be done, it'dve been done by now. That's a long way. For the small amount of excess oil, I wouldn't do anything at all about it now.
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When my car was overfilled on one occasion I siphoned out the excess with some 4 mm bore PVC tube via the dipstick tube ~ and I do mean siphoned, not sucked with a pump. You need a lot of patience for this method though.
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L\'escargot.
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You need a lot of patience for this method though.
And a taste for drinking old engine oil.
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And a taste for drinking old engine oil.
With clear PVC tube you can see the level of the oil in the tube and stop sucking well before it reaches your lips.
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L\'escargot.
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Although I don't doubt that oil overfill can affect engines, it's hard to imagine that a bendy bit of steel with impressed measuring points, fairly flexible abutting points, the vagaries of human eyesight & the guesstimate needed when looking at the withdrawn dipstick for the oil high tide mark ,makes for infallible engineering telemetry.
If I were a dipstick designer(!) , the mark for 'low' & 'high' would be calibrated to encompass all the above variables & +/- 10%. That is, if you can see any oil on dipstick it's safe & no oil coming out of dipstick hole means it's not overfilled.
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My father's hillman minx (iirc), bought from new, drank oil. As fast as he poured oil into the car, it spat it out the back. Fed up with this, as the dealer offered no solution, he let it run down to see what would happen. It settled just below minimum on the dipstick, and never used more than the odd drop of oil again.
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ABout 8 years ago , the day after a service and the first time on a fast road my Vectra DTi decided it wanted to accelerate hard all on its own when I was already doing 70ish, a bit interesting to say the least.
Having got it stopped on the hard shoulder (declutch, hazard lights, brakes, lots of smoke) it was taken to the offending dealer and the lease company got Vauxhall to send one of their own technicians. The reason they came up with was that it had been overfilled with oil at the service and some had got in to the engine via the air intakes or whatever.
Obviously you haven't been overfilled to that extent but I am now still fairly neurotic about the oil level in a diesel car, not something to take lightly, I would get it removed back to proper levels sooner rather than later.
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Whilst there will always be a tolerance on the dipstick measurement, it is there for a reason.
Too much oil will have an impact. 1st likely thing to suffer will be the cat! Followed by general leaks etc.
If it was a turbo (especially diesel) you would be worrying about major engine blow up!
Already covered good mileage so no reason to panic; but too much oil is as bad for an engine as too little.
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Leave the oil filler cap off. I found about 1 mile per 1mm dipstick is about the right oil level dropping rate
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< Ulla>
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I had my car overfilled during a main dealer service once. I phoned them up about it, and they asked me to bring it in to drain the excess. Took the car in, sat in the waiting room.... after a while the service receptionist comes through and says "There's been a problem with your car"... their greasemonkey had managed to shear the head off the drain plug! Ended up forking out for a new sump (fitted free) :-(.
Started getting it serviced at an independent garage after that :-)
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