Draining oil from car

jillie1974

Being a dumbass i've put too much oil in the car. Is there an easy way to get rid of it? If I leave the engine running idle will it burn the excess oil away but still be OK? The car is an old Peugeot 309 GLDT. The car actually broke down last Tuesday and put a rather large black cloud over the M60, which came from the exhaust. This was just after I'd put the oil in.

this is my DH not me as i cant even drive!!!

Thanks in advance!!

malamute

What happens when an engine is overfilled with oil?

So you topped up the engine when it was warm after getting a faulty dipstick reading, or you put too much oil in when you changed it yourself. What's the worst that could happen? Well the problem with this is that the next time the engine is run, the windage in the crankcase and other pressures generated by the oil pump, etc. place a great strain on the seal on the rear main bearing.
Eventually, often much sooner than the ordinary man in the street might expect, the rear main bearing seal ruptures, and the engine becomes a 'leaker'. If you've got a manual gearbox, this means one thing: this oil goes right onto the flywheel and the face of the clutch disc. A lubricated clutch is A Bad Thing. If this still goes unnoticed, the front seal is the next to go, and the engine then becomes a 'gusher' (or to be more colourful, it starts !!!!ing oil all over the place). As well as smothering the clutch with oil from the rear, the oil now coming from the front leak will be neatly distributed about the engine bay as it hits the front pulley - often propelling it out as far as the brake discs. At the same time as this Hollywood disaster movie is unfolding outside the engine, things aren't working out any better on the inside. As you can see from the diagram, the correct oil level is really close to the rotating crank. Overfilling will mean the crank dips into the oil and churns it into a froth. Froth is good on certain types of coffee but not good in an engine. The mixture of aerated oil will be forced into the bearings and in case you didn't know, air is not a lubricant. Typically this means that bearing damage will follow quite rapidly, especially if you are driving on a motorway. You'll know bearing damage when you get it. The engine smells like a garage mechanic cooking over an open flame and the noise coming from the engine is the sort of thing you'd normally hear in vaudeville plays when a piano is pushed down a flight of stairs. As if that all wasn't bad enough, the excess oil gets thrown up into the piston bores where the piston rings have a hard time coping with the excess oil and pressure. It gets into the combustion chamber and some of it will get out into the exhaust system unburned resulting in a nice patina of oil all over the platinum surfaces of your catalytic converter. This renders it utterly useless for good.
Well, you did ask.



Drain the sump and put the correct quantity in how does it run you may be lucky!!!!!

anewman

A little too much oil should usually not be a problem. However, as the level of oil is high enough to be burning it, I would certainly recommend not running the car until the problem is sorted. When you say broke down what exactly happened?

The most convenient way for you would be to get something like this http://www.justoffbase.co.uk/Vacuum-Oil-Fluid-Extractor-Sealey-TP69?sc=9&category=604 not searched for long so there are probably cheaper ones around. You put the tube into where the dipstick goes and it drains oil out.

However, to ensure no lasting damage has been caused it would be better to get a professional to look at it.

As a tip, there is usually some rules of thumb as to how much oil you need to put in. On my car it's 1 litre from bottom mark on the dipstick to the top, so based on where it is you can make an estimate of how much is needed.

jillie1974

Was going along the mottorway in slow traffic. As the traffic cleared started to pick up speed. Got to 60mph and it gave a quick jerk, followed by another jerk. The engine hit top revs, big black cloud of smoke came out of the exhaust and started to slow down, even though the engine revs were still high (I may have put the car in neutral but can't really remember). Pulled over onto the hard shoulder, turned the engine off, took the key out of the ignition, got out of the car, sat on the saftey barrier and during all this time the car was still revving and throwing black smoke out and continued to do so for the next two minutes. The car eventually shut off. There is diesel in it so I know it didn't shut off due to running out of diesel. When i got towed home by the AA we managed to get it started again with only the smell of burning oil coming out of it and hardly any smoke, but only left it running for about 20 seconds. The guy from the AA though said that the continuous high engine revs was nothing to do with too much oil but was another part that had become too warm and pulled on the accelarator cable. (Not sure what it was, he didn't give me the technical term for it. He just pointed at it.)

anewman

jillie1974 wrote: »

The guy from the AA though said that the continuous high engine revs was nothing to do with too much oil but was another part that had become too warm and pulled on the accelarator cable. (Not sure what it was, he didn't give me the technical term for it. He just pointed at it.)

Probably the exhaust manifold. It's the bit at the back of the engine connected to the exhaust down pipe.

jillie1974

thanks so far..
so am i best getting a mechanic to drain the oil away or is there a way i can do it myself?

anewman

Draining the oil yourself could be done one of two ways.

The traditional way is to get under the car (ramps help), sometimes you need to undo a front under cover (usually with a screwdriver) and undo the sump bolt. Sometimes these are standard bolts that can be undone with a decent socket set with some large sockets in, although some use special bolts which need a special key to undo. You will need a drain pan of some sort, and don't expect to be able to drain just a little, you'd be best letting the lot drain.

Other way is a vacuum extractor type thing like one of these http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Pela-6000-Oil-Extractor_W0QQitemZ120181876262QQihZ002QQcategoryZ15263QQrdZ1QQssPageNameZWD1VQQcmdZViewItem You'd probably be able to get that to drain the amount you need out and then stop the process.

Either method will probably cost you about £50 to bring together the tools required although if you were interested in doing oil changes yourself you'd have all the tools required to do it in future. Easiest way is probably to get a mobile mechanic or get the car taken to a place that does oil changes. They'll drain all the oil and put new oil in to the correct level and probably charge about £30-40 depending on where you go.

If the throttle cable is melted and stuck you will need a new throttle cable, which should not cost too much, although more substantial damage like malamute describes would cost quite alot. Sometimes a throttle cable can be revived with some WD40 applied to it and depressing the accelerator pedal a good few times. Although I am sure a stuck accelerator cable on the road would not be fun so if there's any doubts it's probably best renewed regardless.

goldspanners

do we know how much oil was put in the engine?
average sump should hold around 5-8 litres.
a little extra,i.e. 1 litre to much may not cause any damage,especially to an older car without a catalytic convertor.

thescouselander

goldspanners wrote: »

do we know how much oil was put in the engine?
average sump should hold around 5-8 litres.
a little extra,i.e. 1 litre to much may not cause any damage,especially to an older car without a catalytic convertor.

Not sure about that. I've had tow cars (Both Japanese makes) that only held less than 4 liters of oil.

epninety

Sorry to suggest bad news, but I seriously doubt the AA bloke was correct - it doesn't explain why the engine continued to run after you took the keys out.

Either the engine was running on diesel, which means the accelerator was stuck down AND the shut-off solenoid was stuck or still switched on....

Far more likely the engine was running on sump oil - this is not unheard of, especially if the engine is overfilled with oil. Frothed up sump oil gets into the inlet tract via the crank breather, and the engine starts to run on it, in an uncontrolled fashion. The engine revs are not controlled by the rev limiter (because that works on the injection system) but the engine revs at the highest speed allowed by the supply of oil, or the highest speed the mechanicals can support.

You need to clean any oil out of the inlet manifold, intercooler etc, and the crankcase breather.

Do you *know* you put too much oil in? The other thing that can cause this is a failed turbo oil seal.

If I'm right, I wouldn't spend much money on this car until you've done quite a few more miles to be sure there isn't a major failure waiting to happen - the engine will have been pretty stressed during this.

I really hope I'm wrong...

Wig

I think it was running on oil too, nothing to do with accelerator. But now that it's cold stick a basin under the sump and undo the sump nut with a 19mm ringspanner might be a 17mm though. remove however much oil you need to to get the level down on the dipstick.

Take out at least 2 litres, then put the sump bolt back in the hole and tighten up by hand. Recheck the dipstick level and adjust the oil as necesary, finally finishing off by tightening the sump bolt with the spanner.

The spanner will cost about £4 or £5 from a motor factors. If you want to be sure which size spanner to buy, measure the nut in mm across the flats.

Why did you put oil in the first place? Did you check the dipstick before adding oil?