Underfill to 80% ok?

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Originally Posted By: HTSS_TR
Actually under-filled 1/4 to 1/2 quarts in winter months is not a bad idea, the less oil in the sump will make it get to operating temperature a little faster if you drive fairly short distance, something likes less than 10-15 miles.

That's exactly what I do with a couple of my cars, in fact I keep the level right at the minimum so it's down at least one litre. I have no problem frequently checking the oil level and topping up in 100 ml increments if necessary.
The other part of the reason for doing this is that I run 20wt oil in my Bimmer in the winter and then add a litre of 40 or 50wt oil in the late spring or summer which will give me a net 30wt oil but not one momment before I need it. I don't drive the car enough to warrant biannual OCIs.

With all cars that I know of, the separation between the min' and max' levels on a dip stick is one litre or qt. The point being that you wait till you're down to the min' level so that you can add a full litre without having to mess with oil volumes of anything less.
 
Living in Texas, why do you have a winter and summer oil? I'd just run the PP year round.
 
I see absolutly no problem. I prefer that the level be no lower that 1/2 way between the add & full, as we want some safety margin. Patman has the good idea. Buy a full 5q jug and dump the whole jug in.
 
Thanks everyone for the feedback. The 5 qt. thing is due to Walmart. Some other places have larger, and I will keep an eye out for them.

I have a summer and winter fill in name only. Calling it the Sep-Mar fill and MarSep fill is just not as easy. I know that PP is great in the car and the remainder of the quart will last me years. In the worst case, If the G loves the M1, I could always have the best lubricated lawnmower in the neighborhood.

Caterham, nice catch. The good thing about getting into deep coprolite is that the cleanup is so much easier.

This whole thing wouldn't be an issue if I had another vehicle to use up the leftovers. Although the lawnmower remark was a bit on the sarcastic side, it wouldn't mind having mongrel synthetic. Right now the G is only dating. When she settles down, cracking that extra quart will be done without an extra thought.
 
Fill it to the full mark and call it a day. You went through the bother to get an oversize filter why not fill it to the proper level?
 
Originally Posted By: Mark_Walk
I'm surprised no one mentioned this...why don't you just stop using an oversized filter?


5 1/8 Qt. is the user manual stated amount. The difference in filter size is negligible between the 14612 and 14610, so I bumped up the estimate to 5.25. My other car uses the 14610 as the OEM size. As I like efficiency and don't want to accidentally grab the smaller filter and put it on the other car, I stock only the bigger filter.
 
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Originally Posted By: CATERHAM

With all cars that I know of, the separation between the min' and max' levels on a dip stick is one litre or qt. The point being that you wait till you're down to the min' level so that you can add a full litre without having to mess with oil volumes of anything less.





Mine is definitely MORE than 1 qt, but my sump's capacity is nearly 10. I can pour a half quart and the line won't even move.
 
Originally Posted By: dparm
Originally Posted By: CATERHAM

With all cars that I know of, the separation between the min' and max' levels on a dip stick is one litre or qt. The point being that you wait till you're down to the min' level so that you can add a full litre without having to mess with oil volumes of anything less.





Mine is definitely MORE than 1 qt, but my sump's capacity is nearly 10. I can pour a half quart and the line won't even move.


Which one has such a huge sump? Is it the original pan?
 
Originally Posted By: dparm
Originally Posted By: CATERHAM

With all cars that I know of, the separation between the min' and max' levels on a dip stick is one litre or qt. The point being that you wait till you're down to the min' level so that you can add a full litre without having to mess with oil volumes of anything less.

Mine is definitely MORE than 1 qt, but my sump's capacity is nearly 10. I can pour a half quart and the line won't even move.

Now dparm lets not exaggerate!
My 928 has a 9L sump, and the difference between the min' and max' is a bit more than a litre. I can add 100 mls and see the increase on the dip stick.
 
Originally Posted By: EricJRoy
Buy oil in 5.28 qt (5.0L) jugs, and your done.

Also, your running your oil level at 95% not 80%

5 / 5.25 = 95.23%


I realized that I wasn't as clear as I could have been on the title/OP. The 80% is referring to the location of the reading on the dipstick from Low to High. The good thing about being a little vague is that it has gotten a lot of people to pipe up with their comments.
 
If you plan on keepin the car for the long term I would not underfill. Underfilling could make your engine more prone to oil consumption. For example Toyota came out with a tsb on the 1ZZ-FE engine for additional oil capacity with the purpose of lowering piston ring temperatures/lessen oil consumption. Therefore logically, fill level could matter.
 
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Originally Posted By: cmf
I would normally say 80% is fine but the G37 has an engine with a notorious history of oil consumption, even when relatively new. It was only some of the VINs and hopefully it's fixed for 2011, but I'd still be weary. There's even a TSB for it:


My 2008 G seems to have zero consumption. I underfill a very small amount, since my jugs are about 100 mL too small. It's still right by the high mark, so I'm not worried. Anyhow, one can never check the oil too often.
 
The dipstick min and max of LS400 and S2000 is 1 quart, but the E430 is more than 2 quarts. I tried fill up 7 quarts after an oil change and it showed 1/3 from min, added 1 quart to 8/10 of the max line. The full capacity is 8.5 quarts.
 
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