'99 C1500 'burban w/ 188k miles and 1qt in crankcase: any damage???

[Islandvic]

To make long story short, I left town for a short vacation with a friend because of huricane rita and we take my truck.

We meet up with some of her family at a ranch in central west texas.

While at the ranch, I drive my friend and her cousins in her mom's 99 Suburban down to the river.

Right away I notice there is no oil pressure. Then it jumps to 20lbs, then 0lbs, the 20, then 0, then 20, then 0.

Then the "check guages" light comes on.

I look at the oil change sticker and it read 183k miles. She has gone 8k miles since her last OCI.

We park and let the burban cool down and check the oil. There is no oil on the stick.

We drive back and inform her of the news. Next day I go to town for ice and beer and oil.

I have to drop in 4 quarts of oil to refill. After I let it idle, I recheck it again, and it looks very dark. The remaining last quart must have been very contaminated.

I told her to get an oil and filter change b/c the filter may be pluged up with sludge and metal from the bearings.

When she left to go back, she got an oilchange at the local shop before driving 450 miles back home. The shop told her that there was " a normal ammount of metal debris in the oil".

I have never seen any metal debris in any of my oil changes!

I estimate her rate of oil consumption to be 1 qt every 2k miles. Not bad, but real bad when you drive for a 8k mile OCI.

I would not doubt if this is a regular occurance.

Was there much damage to her 350SBC?

Thanks.....

 

[Schism]

I'm not surprised, and there is damage i'm sure, however that doesn't mean it won't keep going. I figure oil consumption might increase.

You need to tell her the oil must be checked atleast twice a month or so by someone, And you need to make it clear to her that if it happens again she could be buying a new suburban very soon. Also, you could tell her to get the pcv valve changed and the oil consumption may go down to near zero.(Or atleast it would have, chance is slimmer now.)

 

[Islandvic]

she has a husband that "takes care of that".

I'm glad she got the oil change before the drive home.

I told her to buy the '07 Surburban coming out next summer which will be redesigned.

 

[the_oil_dealer]

Good ol SBC, those things are solid!

 

[AndyH]

quote:

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Originally posted by Islandvic:
she has a husband that "takes care of that".

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Sounds to me like he was asleep at the wheel.

 

[Pablo]

I only thought BMW owners did that. Is the husband a lawyer?

 

[Mud]

The only saving grace for the Burb is that GM V-8's have always had a very efficient oiling system. In many cases the stock oiling system was even used for race applications with no or minimal mods.
Not saying that nothing happened, but if I had a choice of an engine to run low on oil, it would be a SBC.
But ... sounds like maintenance in general was not a high priority if I read right. So maybe there was already wear and debris even before the low oil.

 

[Islandvic]

No, a truck driver.

 

[Ugly3]

I used a company Suburban a few years ago. I had it for several weeks. I changed the oil and filter and was all ready to go on vacation. About 350 miles into Wisconsin a rod bearing let loose. I hobbled into a gas station and sure enough he agreed to install a new 350 Goodwrench crate engine.

The vacation was interesting, especially launching the boat from the back of a taxi cab!

After I got back I found out that the company driver had run out of oil the week before I got to use the truck.

Good luck!