No oil

Topic: No oil (Read 3280 times) previous topic - next topic

No oil

January 27, 2005, 06:18:21 PM

Well aparently my oil pan gasket was leaking a little more then I thought. About a mile from college my car started knocking and the oil light came on. I get to school and check the oil and suprise, no oil left. Or at least not enough to see on the dip stick. With all the that is wrong with my cat I think it might be time for a new car. :shakehead It had a good run but I think it is done for. Oh well I guess I'll throw some oil in it and hope it makes the 60 miles back home.

Re: No oil

Reply #1 – January 27, 2005, 06:31:50 PM

Dude... don't give up on the whole car. If you have the space, put it away till you can get a new engine, even a 5.0, possibly. If there's no rust on the body then the car's definitely worth saving. Don't go T0x1k on me!

Re: No oil

Reply #2 – January 27, 2005, 06:54:45 PM

Quote from: Ifixyawata

Don't go T0x1k on me!

Hahaha

That was great!

Hey, I'm not getting a new car because I can't change spark plugs!

Re: No oil

Reply #3 – January 27, 2005, 07:30:15 PM

Alright, ha ha ha, it's old now.
Your cat can't be as bad as mine, so don't give up, I haven't given up on mine yet. My goal is to turn the odometer to 300K miles.

Re: No oil

Reply #4 – January 27, 2005, 07:55:03 PM

Ok I just put some oil in and it still knocks... Alot. It sounds terrible and my oil light is still on. I am pretty sure something is f'd up but I have no idea what.

Re: No oil

Reply #5 – January 27, 2005, 08:00:28 PM

My guess is, if it's a knock, then wrist pins (piston slap) or just the good old rod bearings. Use some heavy oil to get you by for now. Sounds like the motor maybe on the way out. Oh, didn't think of this, could also have been the oil pump.

Re: No oil

Reply #6 – January 27, 2005, 08:03:43 PM

spun bearing, bent rod?

Re: No oil

Reply #7 – January 27, 2005, 08:10:23 PM

It might be the oil pump. This is what happened. I was driving down the highway and everything was fine, no check oil light, no knocks, nothing. I get off the highway and make a left onto the road my school is on. While making the left the oil light came on and a few seconds after that it started knocking. I drove about .75 miles with the engine knocking. On break I went out and put oil in and started the car. The oil light is still on and it still knocks. If the oil pump went out then it would make sense that the oil light is still on. If that is the case I am screwed because I am 60 miles away from home.

Re: No oil

Reply #8 – January 27, 2005, 08:18:18 PM

Hmmm, well, I'm assuming it's pretty cold in Maryland. The only bit of good news is that the oil pump on the 3.8 is relatively easy to change. It's on the outside of the engine, somewhere near the oil filter, I think. Probably best to call a tow, though. You really don't wanna screw with changing an oil pump in a cold parking lot.

Re: No oil

Reply #9 – January 27, 2005, 09:29:48 PM

I called my dad who is a mechanic and he seems to think it is a spun bearing. I don't really know what that is but he said the motor is probably trashed. I hope it is only the oil pump, but things don't look promising.

Re: No oil

Reply #10 – January 27, 2005, 10:13:15 PM

You've spun a rod bearing, unfortunately. Your father';s right - the engine is pretty much trashed. It can definitely be rebuilt (you'll need a crank, bearings, gasket set and at least the one rod resized at the very least), but it'll cost ya. If you do intend on rebuilding it, DO NOT DRIVE IT ANY FURTHER!!! The reason you still don't have oil pressure is that the clearances in the spun bearing are now so great that the oil is simply spraying out, so the pump can't maintain pressure. Even with oil in it you will destroy other components because the metal filings from the ruined bearing are now acting as sandpaper on everything inside your engine. Combine that with the low oil pressure and you're asking for trouble.

The engine might make it that 60 miles home but it would most certainly be trashed beyond rebuilding by then, and you could even end up actually "blowing" the engine. If that bad rod gets worse it could actually break and will come right through the side of the cast iron cylinder block and probably snap the crank in two. It's actually pretty cool to see, but can be very costly :D

Depending on the condition of the car and the mileage on it you might want to consider a junkyard engine. If you've got 300,000 miles it would be expensive to rebuild because you'd need to bore it, which would mean new pistons in addition to the crank, etc.

Re: No oil

Reply #11 – January 27, 2005, 10:34:55 PM

Well looks like I will have fix my 1990 XR7 so I can get it tagged. I am not looking forward to driving that 120 miles everyday. :shoothead

Re: No oil

Reply #12 – January 28, 2005, 12:19:33 AM

yeah man, dont ditch the car, fix your XR7, drive it, and save the money to do what you want with the LS

thats what im going to have to do with the TC

kinda funny, we have 3.8L cars, and we dont want to put our fast cars on the road...

Re: No oil

Reply #13 – January 28, 2005, 12:47:01 AM

Ok, you guys are probably not going to believe this but after I put a full 5 quarts in... it still knocked like crazy. But that is not the part you won't believe. So my dad drove all the way to where I go to college to take me home. He gets there and tells me to start the car so he can hear it. I start the car and it knocks. We decided to try to limp it home. After the car was running for about 10 minutes then the oil light went off and the knocking quieted. 5 minutes after that the knocking went away completely.

It made it the whole way home with no more noise at all. I think I got really lucky this time, but I am going to check it out some more tomorrow morning. I am going to change that oil pan gasket as soon as possible!

Tbird232- Yeah that is kinda funny. The XR7 is so much nicer than my LS but I keep putting off fixing it. The only things wrong with it are the emergency brake cable needs to be replace, the roll pin in the shifter broke while I was doing a burnout

, and the negative battery cable needs to be mounted in the right spot.

Re: No oil

Reply #14 – January 28, 2005, 05:26:15 PM

I did the exact same thing in a 80's corolla. except I was on a highways interchange with no exit for more then 4 miles. I was turing it off and coasting until below 30 then I would start it back up floor it until about 65 and then turn it back off and coast. If I had more money for oil I would have made it home that way. The knock got way worse so I stopped at a gas station and called my Dad. My Dad came in wanted to hear it, and it shot the rod through the bottom before it even started. It was kinda sad to see a 1991 crownvic station wagon with a blown head gasket and seveir miss(prolly 3 or more cylinder) tow a 1 ton car on the freeway passing bmw's