I have had several GM products that went 3-7K with no real oil loss including my current 02 Cavalier Ecotec. On the the hand, my 92 Grand Am with the HO Quad 4 required continual oil topping up. Had I know then what I know now, maybe I would have tried to free the rings with Auto RX of FP, LC, etc.
All saturns burn oil?
- Thread starter cbr600f3
- Start date
- Status
Yeah, I've heard this before. It's pretty much the Saturn party line on oil burning. Here's the problem with the theory: most oil burning doesn't start until several 10s of thousands of miles. Mine didn't start in any significance until 50,000 miles or so. Your theory would suggest oil burning from the get-go, which is not the experience of most.
Here's another problem. The oil burning gets progressively worse, and even Saturn acknowledges that anything more than 1 quart in 2000 miles is a problem. The burning gets progressively worse regardless of the kind of oil, brand of oil, or weight of oil used -- period. Doesn't matter if it has a lot of VII improvers or not.
Finally, anyone who's taken apart one of these oil burning engines will find the same thing: rings baked together into the grooves. After years of chasing the problem, I've concluded the following:
1) You're right: some amount of oil burning is to be expected, and is perfectly acceptable.
2) On Saturns at least, even those that burn ridiculous amounts of oil can do so for literally hundreds of thousands of miles with no ill effect. A couple extra quarts of oil and learning to check the oil frequently is far cheaper than a re-ring.
3) Your best hope is to stave off the problem in the first place. Since I didn't do this, I don't know what might work, but I have some ideas. Some suggest running MMO in the oil for the last 500 miles before every oil change; I wonder if consistent use of Auto RX or Lube Control from the start might do the trick. Whatever the case, the oil burning will begin and worsen regardless of whether you run Redline or Mobil 1, and regardless of whether you change your oil every 3000 miles: other measures are needed, which brings me to my final point:
4) I believe the best solution is a maintenance piston soak done every time the spark plugs are replaced, right from the beginning. I would do this every 20,000 miles. I'll bet this would keep the problem completely at bay, and some have had success reversing the problem through piston soaks done at regular intervals.
Of the four Saturn owners I know they add oil but not sure if that is a good sample. Two have a case in the back of their wagons .
IMHO, consumption is normal and 1.6qt over 4k miles is not bad. You should be checking the oil anyway on any car every other or third fillup. It only takes an extra 30 seconds to add oil and oil is beyond cheap (ie SuperTech or anything else for $1).
I have one oil consumer rare according to a lot of people (1996 Civic with 160k miles 1QT/1500 miles). Unfortunately my wife never looks under hood.
IMHO, consumption is normal and 1.6qt over 4k miles is not bad. You should be checking the oil anyway on any car every other or third fillup. It only takes an extra 30 seconds to add oil and oil is beyond cheap (ie SuperTech or anything else for $1).
I have one oil consumer rare according to a lot of people (1996 Civic with 160k miles 1QT/1500 miles). Unfortunately my wife never looks under hood.
I think both of our posts agree exactly on all points except why do some new engines not begin to burn oil until after several thousand miles. I think one possible answer to that is that it takes a while for some owners to either choose the wrong oil, or for the "slight" amount of oil burning to finally get bad enough to "bake the rings together into the grooves". Did you ever think that it may be the "Saturn party line" because it's the truth? At least you didn't say the rings were worn down to nothing...now that would be a surprise. I bet every one of those engines that burned oil still had visible crosshatch honing patterns visible on the cylinder walls too.
Something must have come over me!
I suddenly find myself refering to every post with Castrol Syntec 10W-40 instead of HDEO! On the other hand the afore mentioned M1 0W-40 European Car Formula would work too.
Gene
I suddenly find myself refering to every post with Castrol Syntec 10W-40 instead of HDEO! On the other hand the afore mentioned M1 0W-40 European Car Formula would work too.
Gene
By Johnny G
"Some amount of oil burning is to be expected, and is perfectly acceptble"
Geez, Did you used to sell Chevy Vega's
I don't see anything Spectacular about these cars that makes the Hassle and Risk of Oil consumtion acceptable.
Spitty, Who are you quoting? I re-read my post several times and could not find that statement in it, including the misspelling. I think you incorrectly gave me credit for kev99sl's reply. Anyway, I'll give you the "hassle" part, but what exactly is the "risk"? It seems that even those that have torn down the engines to repair them indicate that there was no immenent failure indicated. It seems that the greatest risk is poisoning the CAT, so guess what....SM oil comes along. At any rate, it appears that oil usage in some cars will be with us for a while...deal with it as best you can.
My mother's saturn didn't burn oil until about 35k...........since then, it has gotten progressively worse.
- Status
