Oil Related Failure at less than 150k Miles

[VNT]

quote:

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Originally posted by Jerry:
I had a LeBaron 4cy Turbo and I did 3-4K OCI w/10W-30 GTX. I did a 3-4 mile blast one morning
on the way to work, where I pushed it hard, ran
100+ about 1/2 throttle or so. Had 110K on it. After that, oil pressure dropped at idle down to about 60% of what is was before. Reving the engine up in neutral, all the rods were fluttering around. Now was this oil failure ? or poor engine design ?

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hard to say, did you have a bad head gasket? These 2.2/2.5 turbo engines are pretty much indestructable provided you dont run them lean or have coolant in oil from bad headgasket. some folks never chaged fuel filters, crank up the boost run lean and pop gaskets.
BTW, my friend has 2.2 T4 engine in his 90 shadow, put down 345 WHP and 386 WTQ on 24 PSI. Have scene many put down over 300WHP with many miles on them. If maintained the engines were good for 200K plus miles.

 

[John_E]

quote:

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Originally posted by VNT:
hard to say, did you have a bad head gasket? These 2.2/2.5 turbo engines are pretty much indestructable provided you dont run them lean or have coolant in oil from bad headgasket. ... If maintained the engines were good for 200K plus miles.

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I had the pleasure of owning two of the 2.5L non-turbo K-car engines, and they were the only completely trouble-free engines I have ever owned.

Others:

1976 Ford 2.3: timing belt snapped @ 37K miles; leaky valve guides

1973 Chevy 350: stripped timing gear @ 63K miles

2001 Audi 1.8T: leaky cam seals @ 22K miles

 

[DaveJ]

I have had many 2.2 and 2.5 Mopars go well past 150K miles IF the oil level is kept up. They WERE the replacements for the Mitz 2.6. My sisters 80 Mustang with a 2.3 4 speed was a hyway only car and had 2 cams and 1 set of valves replaced before 130K. 10W40 Penz and Fram filters was all she would buy and I would change it at a 3500 to 4500 Miles OCI. Engine totaly froze up at 170K miles but that was when an oil filter gasket blew out with 200 miles on the OCI that she had done at a quick oil change shop called Iffey-lube

. DaveJ

 

[kloppilt]

I've had 3 cars (1 Mitsubishi Lancer, 1 Accord, 1 Civic) that were 135-140 k miles range and did not have any oil related engine issues. Well, they didn't have engine issues at all.

I had a Grand Am with 170 k miles without oil related engine issues - it was a blown head gasket.

I have an Accord with 198 k miles without engine issues again.

 

[cousincletus]

I'm a fan of the 2.2 Chrysler engine too. Have known several K-Car owners and the only one I saw fail was run low on oil. The bottom end was still good but the cam bearings seized up.

 

[addyguy]

Anyone got any Chevy Vega or Pontiac Astre stories/experiences? That should be a good source of engine failure stories before 150K miles....

I worked with a guy for a few years who owned a 1986(?) Pontiac 6000 w/ a 2.8 V6. For some reason, even thought he worked at a place that did oil changes (Wal-Mart), he never changed the oil in his engine. On top of that, he drove his car REALLY hard. One day, he decided to change his ways, and start taking car of his engine, by getting it flushed and changed a couple of times in a row, as per the lube place advice.....a couple of months later, coming down the highway, he spun all the bearings in his engine...big suprise. Car had about 190,000k kilometers on it.

 

[uconn1150]

My daddy had a '73 Vega and the head warped 3 years later. That was the best thing that ever happened to that Vega. Replacement engine? 3.8 Buick V6! Loved the torque of that puppy!

 

[Thatwouldbegreat]

Oil related engine failures?

1990 Acura Integra cam bearing failure caused timing belt to jump bent valves [ Mobil 1 5w30 ]
162K ...Replaced with junkyard motor

2001 Golf TDI turbo bearing failure / turbo grenaded [ Amsoil 5W-40 European Formula ] 30K ...rebuilding turbo now

Non oil related:

1989 Subaru GL10 Turbo cracked cylinder head in exhaust valve seat/ threw con rod [ Mobil 1 10w30 ] 80K ...Replaced with used and resealed Japanese motor

1989 Subaru GL10 Turbo head gasket failure block damaged [ Mobil 1 10w30 ] 50K ...Replaced with used and resealed Japanese motor

2001 Golf TDI head gasket failure [ Shell Rotella 5W-40 ] 180K ...replaced head and turbo and went to Racewear head bolts

The Subaru and Acura failures happened at wide open throttle on Colorado mountain passes.

The VW turbo failure happened on the dyno, and the head gasket during normal driving.

 

[beanoil]

I can say I have never had an oil related failure, but have had several HM cars. My father worked at a Shell distributor- I was getting oil for about 5.00 a case....
1998 Pontiac Sunfire 4 cyl, 133,000 on Shell dino,PF-47's every 3k, orig trans, yearly fluid/filter changes.
1995 Merc Villager 212,000 in ten years, Rotella 10-30 every 3-3.5K, cheap Lee filters. Same trans also, no problems, yearly changes with Shell Donax.
1992 Chev Cavalier, 4 cyl, 119,000k on whatever dino the wife put in before we married, and Shell Fire and Ice, PF-47's every 3k after we married at 74,000 miles. Orig trans also, yearly changes after we married.

This isn't a pitch for Shell,but I have had good luck with the products, and feel that regular maintenance is key, maybe even more so than the choice of products to long life.
The company I work for has a fleet of Ford Focus's, all with over 150,000 miles on them. No trans failures, or engines issues (oil related) with service on all of them by either Iffy lubes, Valvoline Instant Oil Change places, or the local tire stores. Since all maintenance impacts the bottom line, it is a guarantee that all the oil is cheap, bulk dino, private branded filters, and at factory recommended 5k intervals. We go through more brakes than anything on the Focus.

 

[Pablo]

Thatwouldbegreat wrote:

quote:

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Oil related engine failures?

1990 Acura Integra cam bearing failure caused timing belt to jump bent valves [ Mobil 1 5w30 ]
162K ...Replaced with junkyard motor

2001 Golf TDI turbo bearing failure / turbo grenaded [ Amsoil 5W-40 European Formula ] 30K ...rebuilding turbo now

---

Glad you put the question mark (?)

I'm not sure how you could say either of these are oil related, without providing further details. Why would M1 "cause" lack of lube to your cam? How could Amsoil Euro oil (which hasn't been on the market that long) cause your turbo to grenade?

 

[TooSlick]

Lubricants don't "cause" engine failures, with the following exceptions:

1) The lube is significantly contaminated with coolant/fuel/dirt.

2) You consistently run service intervals much too long for the capabilities of the particular lube.

3) You use a lubricant that is much too thin or much too thick for the application.

4) You use the wrong spec lube for the application in terms of basestock and/or additive chemistry. For example an API/SM gas engine oil in a HD diesel, or a conventional oil in a European gas engine turbo.

In many cases, it's a combination of the above factors that causes problems, for example combining #2 with #4 can rapidly lead to component failure or engine seizure. In a similar fashion, using a lube that's full of dirt and also marginal in terms of viscosity will quickly ruin valvetrain conponents and piston ring/cylinder clearances.

 

[Dad2leia]

TooSlick, your reasons are "quoted" almost verbatim by dealers for warranty replaced engines too. It seems they'll try saying ANYTHING about the oil, just to get out of something that wasn't the lubricants fault in the first place.

 

[TooSlick]

A $25.00 lube oil analysis will tell you if the oil is contaminated, has been run much too long, is the correct viscosity for the application and has the proper additive chemistry. It can also indirectly give you some clues as to the type of basestock, but that process is a bit more complicated.

 

[Dad2leia]

TooSlick, have you had any experiences with an engine personally "failing" on you to use the oil analysis to get them to take care of it, with costing you your first born child?

I'm sure that the dealer would try to find some way out, even if the analysis proved that your oil was OK. I read and heard too many stories to think that it could be just that simple.

Don't worry, this is all hypothetical for me, as I've personally never had this problem, but was just curious about it. I change my oil WAY too much and often to worry about an oil related failure. My problem would be hitting the redline once to often for the engine to handle!!!

 

[Thatwouldbegreat]

quote:

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Originally posted by Pablo:
Thatwouldbegreat wrote:

quote:

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Oil related engine failures?

1990 Acura Integra cam bearing failure caused timing belt to jump bent valves [ Mobil 1 5w30 ]
162K ...Replaced with junkyard motor

2001 Golf TDI turbo bearing failure / turbo grenaded [ Amsoil 5W-40 European Formula ] 30K ...rebuilding turbo now

---

Glad you put the question mark (?)

I'm not sure how you could say either of these are oil related, without providing further details. Why would M1 "cause" lack of lube to your cam? How could Amsoil Euro oil (which hasn't been on the market that long) cause your turbo to grenade?

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My answers are simple these are the engine failures in 35 years of driving and the ones I listed as possibly oil related failures at less than 150K are just that.

If the bearings fail, and the bearings are oil fed, that is an oil related failure, IMHO.

Did the oil cause the failure? Can't say.

Is there a relationship between the failure and oil? Yes, it is an oil fed part.

On the head gaskets and cracked heads are they:

-coolant related? Yes

-Turbo related? Yes

-Metallurgy or design related? Yes

On the Acura , since the cams run in the head maybe the head started to warp, maybe I was losing a section of the head gasket, maybe the radiator had a crack in a plastic section of the radiator and didn't hold full pressure etc. etc.

I sure could say the failure was cylinder head related, cam related, timing belt related.

One thing I know for sure, the cam 'bearing' failed, the cam didn't rotate, the timing belt jumped teeth on the camshaft gear and valves hit pistons.

Could I have dodged this bullet by running Mobil 1 15W-50 or Redline 10W-40 or Amsoil 5W-40? I don't know, but I have a feeling that a thicker oil might have prevented this failure.

The fill of Mobil 1 5w30 was only 1500 miles old, Pure One filter..so I don't think it was contaminatated,too old, or too thin. The engine ran great for 162K on 5w30 M1. But I think the oil was too thin or didn't have enough EP, AW additives for that day.

On the VW TDI, the bearing failed and the turbo grenaded.

Could this be EGT related? Yes.

Could it be turbo vane balance or vane failure related? Yes

Was this an oil related failure? Yes

Could ANY oil have prevented the failure? I don't think so. At 100,000 RPM and high EGT's turbos fail. If we were going after higher mtbf for the turbo's we'd accept bigger, slower turbo's and lower performance.

We are rebuilding the turbo now and there's a good chance the rest of the engine is still fine.

If the engine internals are in good shape will their survival be oil related? Yes.

I hope this clears up this issue. I don't want to be in a Mobil 1 or Amsoil is good or bad war.

I try to use the best oils that I can for each engine, but that doesn't mean that I can avoid all failures or that the oil can somehow protect the engine when something goes wrong.

[ September 20, 2005, 01:49 PM: Message edited by: Thatwouldbegreat ]

 

[Pablo]

Thanks - it's clearer for me (the big dummy

) when someone attachs a few "why's" and "whats" - and clearly one person's oil related failure does not equal another's. Sounds like in both those cases - the failures would have happened regardless of oil brand.

 

[biscuitboy]

I've posted this sad story in other threads: 93 Accord engine seized up at 100K. Not strictly an oil related failure, as it almost certainly was due to the Fram DoubleGard filter (with PTFE) I used for one OCI.

As if anyone needed another reason to avoid Fram...

 

[BigAl]

Icon 1 posted September 20, 2005 08:14 PM Profile for BigAl Send New Private Message Edit/Delete Post Reply With Quote Well, mine is not really a funny one, but it is on topic.

I had an 74 AMC with the 232 straight 6. It was pretty sludged when I bought it at 60k and at 90k the rocker arm pivots and lifters were worn very badly. I replaced the pivots and ran OK.

I had an 88 Cherokee with the 150 CID 4 cyl. based on the same design. At 120k the lifters were pretty worn. 3-5k oil changes, very clean. I replaced the lifters. The pivots looked OK but I ground .020 off the stems of the rocker pivots to take up the slack the lifters didn't cure. Ran well 50 k later . . . quiet.

Poor design or bad oil?

 

[BUBBA0420]

One thing seems obvious. Most of these engine
failures have been with Chrysler Products. A
small block Chevy should be bullit proof with
normal maintenance so that was probably just
a bad motor to start with. You don't see any
Toyota's or Nissan's listed here.

 

[LarryL]

I have done a lot of software for maintenance tracking and scheduling and most of these fleet managers dump vehicles at 100-150k miles. The failure mode appears to be cooling systems. If someting starts to go bad the car fails before it gets back for service, like a water pump, hose or head gasket. If it's oil related, the car or truck usually makes it back through a service check before enough oil gets burned/leaked off to do any damage. Same with tires. If there is a big leak it's better for the tire. It just goes flat right away and the driver is forced to stop. If it's a slow leak the tire gets destroyed.

So oil related problems are caught more often without damage. Cooling system problems kill the engine. They had a siezed up engine from a pin hole leak in the radiator. The driver would leave the car runing in the parking lot to keep the a/c working (Phoenix and 2 keys) and be inside, getting documents ready for transport and often leave the car running for an hour or two. This driver went out into the parking lot one day to see what all the noise was. The local fire department was there. The car was smoking and other customers in the parking lot thought it was on fire. The car was taken to the shop and the mechanics were unable to get three of the pistons out of the block and the engine and engine compartment was a mess. The engine slowly cooked and the fuel system tried to keep the engine running while it roasted. Cooking time you ask, 2hrs 15min, to well done. Everything plastic nearby was melted and since the car had just over 100k miles it was totaled. The driver now has a new job, somewhere else and employees are asked to to leave engines running while parked.

From what I see, oil related problem are rare, but are more frequent in certain vehicles. This company watches repair frequency and avoids cars with past problems. In other words they buy a lot of Hondas and Toyotas. They do not buy Chrysler products and very few Fords and Chevys. For executives they only buy Lexus and thse purchase rules are based on cost of maintenance and depreciation. On of the biggest costs in maintenance is loss of use of a vehicle for down time, not the cost of a mechanic working on the car or the parts.