Oil Hadn't Been Changed in 3 Years

[Olas]

Run it till its hot then stop the engine, fill with diesel and let it sit.

Crack the plUg and drain it, pull the pan off and clean anything inside it, clean the pickup, put it all back together and fill up with cheap syn of choice.

In this scenario I'd let it idle on the new oil for 10 or 15 minutes just so I could listen for any noises - if it seems to run ok then I'd dump the cheap syn and fill up on something stout.

 

[Hondacity]

I just want to see pics...

 

[SwampSurvivor]

I don't think it's a 1999 Focus - there wasn't a 1999 Focus. Could be a 1999 Taurus v6.

I'd just run. Let someone else take the blame when it plugs the oil screen and kills the engine

Currently have a friend asking me to change his oil. It's been 13000 miles or so on whatever the cheapest oil Valvoline Instant Oil Change uses and this is not the first (or 5th) time this has happened. Not going to be responsible for when his engine dies or the timing belt breaks.

 

[bigt61]

3 years is nothing. How many miles did it go in that time? If she kept it topped off, it might not have any sludge. Just give it some SuperTech and an OCD - check back in 3000 miles.

 

[TFB1]

A few years ago one of the wife's cousins came in here from Ohio(around 550mi) in a Neon the hadn't seen a change in close to two years and 29K miles(was almost two quarts low as well)... I wouldn't let her start back till I changed oil... It ran fine for at least a couple more years, not sure what killed it(yeah probably never changing oil)...

I bought my '96 F-150 that hadn't seen a oil change in who knows when... Had maybe a quart in the pan and made the 29K mi oil in Melodie's Neon look like it was changed last week... I did a flush with three odd quarts(far more than what was in it) by running it for 20-30 minutes probably half dozen times... That drain was far darker than anything that comes out of my Mercuries at 10K miles... At that point I refilled and ran approx 5K mi, oil was dark but not nasty... At another 5K mi it's now due for a second change...

 

[TexasTea]

^ dayum, that makes me look down-right religious on my maintenance and i just barely started doing right by my engine 3-4 years ago.

But i DO have to admit i went 12-15,000 miles on 1 oil change in my V8 Silverado around 70,000-80,000 miles, unintentionally, edit: ignorantly.

 

[SirTanon]

I'd say the biggest question here is - how did it actually get to 3 years without a change?

- Was it that it burned or leaked a little oil, and so just regular top-offs with oil and thus the oil in it is not truly 3-years-old (at least not most of it)?

- Was it that it really didn't leak any, and didn't burn much, and so most of the oil in there is really actually that old?


... Also, how black is the oil that's in there? Get a couple dipstick pulls on clean paper towel and look at what you get out of it. If it's pitch black, thick, gritty, etc.. then I'd really be concerned about what's floating around in there.

...

That said, if it were my car, I'd see if I could get some MMO in there and take it for a 15-mile drive, starting with local streets and then out on the highway. Get it up to proper operating temperature for at least 15 minutes.

Let the MMO do its thing for that run, then change _JUST_ the filter, put on a new Motorcraft filter, and drive it again for 15 miles or so.

-- I would also have a look at what the oil filter had in it, so cut it open and have a look at the crud that it's caught. Odds are, whatever is in the filter, there's more of that in the engine.

Then I would drain the oil, fill it with some fresh clean PYB, and drive it for a while, and maybe check the oil again in a few hundred miles to see how much crud it's picking up.

...but that's me.

 

[ccap41]

I like what SirTanon suggested.

And very good point on how it actually got to 3 years. Could make all the difference.