How much fuel will ruin this engine?

[dtech]

Fill only 5 1/2 quarts oil gives you more room for fuel

There are solutions to most problems, some very simple as you suggest. On the wife's crappy Hyundai Theta engines - several mil were recalled because they routinely seize, one of the solutions was to install a new dipstick allowing for an additional .5 qt of oil, so much for the original owner's manual guidance to not overfill the oil. The other "solution" was to have the knock sensor detect impending crank bearing failure and go into limp mode, marvelous engineering.

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[Samsquanch]

This thread reminded me to go check my oil as it’s been a few months. I’m about 3700 miles on my oil change. I have a clear mark scratched onto my dipstick to help track this issue. At 3700 miles and a ton of cold weather driving it’s a little bit above the mark but not terribly concerning.

One thing I noticed and I think you should keep in mind, it’s a little hard to check the oil level if you do it over and over again. You have to let it settle down the dipstick tube for a few hours to get a good reading. After I checked it about 3-4 times in a row today it was half way up the dipstick. That’s not my oil level of course, it’s just oil getting all jammed up the dipstick tube. I have two black stone kits in my garage at the moment I’ll pull one and post the results in the main thread. I am not terribly concerned about it at this point. I remain convinced that levels around or even a little above 2% probably isn’t a big deal. YMMV.

 

[9zero1790]

Most recent count reported is approximately “0”.

yep..

 

[RedDakooter05]

Trick I found for this is to pull stick wipe it and then leave it out for 5 to 10 minutes. This lets all the residual oil in tube drain down. Think wicking here. Then insert stick and pull and an accurate reading will appear.

Actually, I usually do it that way but eh, I get impatient sometimes.

 

[mailbox4449]

I've always been curious about this..

On my F150 2.7, not only do I have to wait 20 minutes for the oil to drain down(oil check valves), I find myself re-inserting and wiping the dipstick multiple times as I always get false level readings at first(Either too high or low). By the 3 or 4th removal, I get an accurate reading.

I'm assuming the 2.3 also have check valves, so how many people triple check their dipsticks after the first time around?

Agree 100% with this. Most people are not consistent with how long they wait after engine is shut off to check the oil. Or even how long they run the engine before they check the oil. Personally, I run the motor a good 15 minutes to make sure fresh oil is moving around and mixing with any residual old oil in motor, shut it down, and wait 15 minutes before I check level. Oil should still be warm, and most would have dropped down to get a good reading. Sure there's still oil up in crannies etc. but this is a "warm" reading. Most of my vehicles including motorcycles specify this type of reading. I do not own a Ranger....yet. It's on order. But I'm sure its no different than what our family's Honda CR-V four banger turbo oil maintenance is like. Those have been around for a while with very similar "oil dilution" and "10K synthetic" oil changes. As stated by others here, be consistent with the mileage (preferably 5K), type of oil (synthetic), and be consistent on how you check the oil, warm or totally cold, but be consistent. I'm sure you have all heard it before...oil is cheap vs a new motor

Thanks for letting the new kid(old fart) speak his mind before he forgets why he's here in the first place

 

[9zero1790]

some of this stress about dipstick lines and fuel in oil etc. may be from what some us (old) folks heard growing up. idk where i heard it first or who said it but, from the time i was 10 keeping the lawn mower B&S 3.5 going onward, it was always in the back of my mind that too much oil was terrible! the saying went something like = engines are fine if they a little bit low but if you put too much oil in it will %^&@ things up and you will need a new engine. growing up my friends all knew this as well. we worked on various engines. mostly gm, ford, honda, toyota and cummins engines . even a few farm tractors. we always made sure not to overfill the oil as we all expected immediate catastrophic failure if we did LOL! ??. Maybe it was those dang chilton or haynes books. back when folks read books and they were on paper not a touch screen.
now, i no longer fear being a tiny bit over the mark or a tiny bit under. i get it as close as i can without causing a hair lip and i move on. besides, these are direct injection engines. not nearly as much time for the fuel to go "poof" like the old carburetor setups. nature of the machine. get good gas run it hard avoid long idles.

 

[9zero1790]

Most recent count reported is approximately “0”.

i would imagine some poor fella out in the world has had an engine with extreme amounts of gas in the oil and it did nothing good for it. but i bet the vast majority of us will have failures related to other issues ahead of the gas getting in the oil.

 

[mailbox4449]

some of this stress about dipstick lines and fuel in oil etc. may be from what some us (old) folks heard growing up. idk where i heard it first or who said it but, from the time i was 10 keeping the lawn mower B&S 3.5 going onward, it was always in the back of my mind that too much oil was terrible! the saying went something like = engines are fine if they a little bit low but if you put too much oil in it will %^&@ things up and you will need a new engine. growing up my friends all knew this as well. we worked on various engines. mostly gm, ford, honda, toyota and cummins engines . even a few farm tractors. we always made sure not to overfill the oil as we all expected immediate catastrophic failure if we did LOL! ??. Maybe it was those dang chilton or haynes books. back when folks read books and they were on paper not a touch screen.
now, i no longer fear being a tiny bit over the mark or a tiny bit under. i get it as close as i can without causing a hair lip and i move on. besides, these are direct injection engines. not nearly as much time for the fuel to go "poof" like the old carburetor setups. nature of the machine. get good gas run it hard avoid long idles.

Yep, same here. Too much oil leaves little air space for expansion....it has to go somewhere. Path of least resistance...

Own a 20 year old Harley that's carbureted... just like cars, even older, back then, blow by would come out the vents, into the atmosphere, then air filters, catch cans, etc....EPA is what made these things go away and aftermarket products geared towards those old school builds is what helps these newer tightly wound vehicles with even smaller tolerances to breathe or at least help give pressure relief points.

I'm sure most here know Scotty Kilmer on YT. Even though he's a Toyota fan boy, he is correct in his knowledge on how the automotive industry is just tightening down these engines so much to meet all these MPG's, emissions, cost, plastic parts, etc, that eventually something is going to give. I agree with this when it comes to the "internal combustion motor". It's getting pretty close to "end game" IMHO. That's why the push for electric. Totally different ball game.

So if I had a choice between a 200HP V6 naturally aspirated or a 350HP four turbo....which would I pick? For longevity and reliability...the 6. Less stress on motor than the 4. For power and fun...the 4. More power, but won't last as long as the 6.

 

[D Fresh]

I've never seen such a fascination with smelling your oil before joining here.

It's bordering on a fetish for some you folks here.

 

[MotoWojo]

Hello all. I picked up my new 2021 ranger on 12/29/21 with 23 miles on it. Last weekend I changed the oil at 2600 miles because the oil read high on the dipstick and I felt an early change never hurt. I had drained out 7.4 quarts, now not exactly sure how much over filled the crankcase was from the factory, I have been monitoring the oil level every couple of days. So, now I have 2850 and the oil level has climbed from the top of the hash marks on the dipstick to the top hole. At this rate, I would be well over a quart at 5000 miles.

Should I quit driving the truck? I plan on calling the dealer tomorrow to get it in. Is this excessive compared to other brand new 2.3l ecoboosts?

2850 miles and only at the max level hole, I would not be worried about that at all, seems to be normal. The 7.4qts drained earlier seems excessive, but you are nowhere near that now. 3/8in above the twist is about 7.8qts and seems to be as bad as it gets. My truck will climb to that point early on and stay there a few thousand miles, until the next oil change. 7.8qts drain every time. Ford has sent techs to my dealership to go over my truck and they determined the excessive fuel in the crankcase is not harming the engine. For my truck, before coming to this determination, they replaced the HPFP, all 4 injectors, twice, the high pressure fuel lines, and the oil separator system without any improvement. They did however extend my Powertrain warranty to 100,000 miles. I have about 28,000 miles on the truck since I first reported the issue (35,300 total on truck). Still runs fine, for how long, I don't know.

 

[Dgc333]

I have owned (3) 2.3 Ecoboost powered vehicles and have a combined total of 100k miles. What I have learned in the past 6 years is when you check the oil when the engine is cold (sitting over night) and it is at the top of the hash marks it will be at max fill hole when the oil is hot. Even sitting for a couple of hours after being hot it will still be well over the top of the hash marks.

IMHO, the only accurate way to track your oil level is to check in the morning before the first start of the day.

BTW, none of the (3) 2.3 Ecoboost vehicles I have had have ever shown the oil level rising when consistently checked cold in the morning.

 

[McLeadslinger]

Another one of these posts???? ??

Y’all are blowing this way out of proportion.

 

[9zero1790]

i wonder what may be in my transmission fluid...? oh wait owners are not supposed to check that. unless they are anorexic dwarfs with very flexible limbs and asbestos skin....
in defense of some if had bought a new truck and checked the oil and it was too full and stank of unleaded and i didnt know any better id be looking for answers too.

 

[dtech]

Another one of these posts???? ??

Y’all are blowing this way out of proportion.

Yes but thread has potential for morphing into preferred method for checking the dipstick, hot, cold, how many minutes after shutdown , how much above the full mark is an issue. I usually check mine when it's nice and warm - give it a few nice up and down strokes to ensure it's not bending and sometimes the wife will check it out as well.

 

[kieefer]

Personal opinion. Yes! Fuel in the crankcase can be a problem, and Ford does have a fix. But the percentage of folks having this issue is very small, regardless of what you hear!

I’ve never smelled gas or had the dipstick level change, 33k with about 5 oil changes done by myself.

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