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You’ll have to forgive my ignorance... TC meaning timing chain?
Also, is this the o-ring I should be replacing? Is it a big task getting to it? See image with arrow pointing to part #10
About the front cover of the oil pump, I’ll be able to remove it and see if the gear looks like it’s cracked or worn out?
Can the sump screen simply be cleaned? Is it better to just replace the part? We’re talking about LSP100800 - the oil suction strainer pipe, right? If I’m looking at the o-ring, I figure I might as well get that replaced too
Before changing oil, should I flush the system with a cleaning product or is this a big taboo with our engine?
Last edited by neuropathy; 09-11-2019 at 05:34 PM.
You can throw money and time at it trying different things if you want, or you can do some cheap diagnostics and KNOW what the problem is. I recommend starting with a mechanical oil pressure test. Based on your description of the ticking, I suspect you have a low oil pressure problem even cold, and hot it gets worse which causes the light to come on. Oil pump don't HAVE to be replaced, I have two Discos over 200k that have never had the oil pumps replaced. Depending on your mileage, I suspect you have a walked cam bearing causing the low oil pressure. If you test the pressure and post up here we will have a better idea. In one hour you can drop the oil pan and see if you have a walked cam bearing. You can also check your bearing wear visually to see if that could be a problem.
It is possible you have a cracked oil pump, but it is several hours worth of work to determine that because all the front accessories have to come off to get the front cover off. If you have a walked cam bearing it has to come off anyway.
You can throw money and time at it trying different things if you want, or you can do some cheap diagnostics and KNOW what the problem is. I recommend starting with a mechanical oil pressure test. Based on your description of the ticking, I suspect you have a low oil pressure problem even cold, and hot it gets worse which causes the light to come on. Oil pump don't HAVE to be replaced, I have two Discos over 200k that have never had the oil pumps replaced. Depending on your mileage, I suspect you have a walked cam bearing causing the low oil pressure. If you test the pressure and post up here we will have a better idea. In one hour you can drop the oil pan and see if you have a walked cam bearing. You can also check your bearing wear visually to see if that could be a problem.
It is possible you have a cracked oil pump, but it is several hours worth of work to determine that because all the front accessories have to come off to get the front cover off. If you have a walked cam bearing it has to come off anyway.
this is good advice.
this is the order i would do things,
test oil pressure at startup and then at operating temp with an oil pressure gauge.
if the oil pressure is good at startup and then drops at operating temp then change the oil to a 15W40. (i had this happen on one of my '04's and changing the oil fixed it. six months and several thousand miles later all is still good.)
test oil pressure at startup and then at operating temp.
if the oil pressure reads good at startup and then drops when the engine comes to operating temp the next step is to check the oil pump.
if oil pump looks good then check your main bearings and camshaft bearings.
not to be alarmist, but my oil light issue ended up being two (2) walked camshaft bearings on my other '04. when i redid my camshaft and bearings i went with the Crower 229 camshaft and love how the truck drives.
Thank you guys. I’m wondering if I should test the oil pressure with the oil that’s currently in it or if I should drain and change the oil with 15W-40 oil as recommended here. Testing the oil pressure will require buying a test gauge, which I don’t have - any recommendations for one with an appropriate adapter? Which plug or line will I remove to connect the test gauge?
When draining the oil, is it best to have the vehicle perfectly level or maybe slightly uphill since I noticed the drain plug is in the back of the pan? My driveway is very... not level. I’ve got some flattish areas although the truck might be leaning toward the passenger side. Or I could park it in an uphill part of the driveway. I could also go to a more flat area, but if I’m pulling off parts to clean the pickup pipe and sump screen, as well as replacing o rings, I’ve got to pick my place carefully.
Should I clean grime off the underside of the engine?
Would you use mineral spirits, brake parts cleaner, gasoline or something else to clean the pickup tube, oil pan and underside of motor?
Just bought the pickup pipe o ring and the pan gasket from British Pacific - I’ll start inexpensively by doing the oil drain, cleanup, o ring, gasket, oil change. Then I’ll have to drive the car and see how it is and probably test the pressure if needed. I’m trying to avoid buying a gauge for this since things are tough right now with rebuilding my house.
Thank you all. I’d be lost without you. I just replaced my purge valve and that seems to have resolved another issue. I’m feeling good about getting into this oil light issue now!
Thank you guys. I’m wondering if I should test the oil pressure with the oil that’s currently in it or if I should drain and change the oil with 15W-40 oil as recommended here. Testing the oil pressure will require buying a test gauge, which I don’t have - any recommendations for one with an appropriate adapter? Which plug or line will I remove to connect the test gauge?
When draining the oil, is it best to have the vehicle perfectly level or maybe slightly uphill since I noticed the drain plug is in the back of the pan? My driveway is very... not level. I’ve got some flattish areas although the truck might be leaning toward the passenger side. Or I could park it in an uphill part of the driveway. I could also go to a more flat area, but if I’m pulling off parts to clean the pickup pipe and sump screen, as well as replacing o rings, I’ve got to pick my place carefully.
Should I clean grime off the underside of the engine?
Would you use mineral spirits, brake parts cleaner, gasoline or something else to clean the pickup tube, oil pan and underside of motor?
Just bought the pickup pipe o ring and the pan gasket from British Pacific - I’ll start inexpensively by doing the oil drain, cleanup, o ring, gasket, oil change. Then I’ll have to drive the car and see how it is and probably test the pressure if needed. I’m trying to avoid buying a gauge for this since things are tough right now with rebuilding my house.
Thank you all. I’d be lost without you. I just replaced my purge valve and that seems to have resolved another issue. I’m feeling good about getting into this oil light issue now!
Test with the engine oil that is in it, we can estimate change based on heavier oil.
Once you have the pan off, rotate the crank and take photos of the camshaft where it meets the bearings. Then pop a cap off of one of the connecting rods, post a pic of the bearing. Google both terms for photos if you are unsure what I am talking about. I would not recommend pulling the front cover until I see the pictures.
If the pan is coming off, does not matter if it is level when you drain the oil. Don't pull the front cover or put it back together until we see the pictures to avoid wasting time and money.
I don't like working on greasy dirty engines, but there is no fundamental reason you can't. Old school toxic oven cleaner is the best for getting the baked on oil and grease off.
Got it - I found that the oil pressure switch thread size is: M12 X 1.50
so I’ll find a pressure gauge that has that size and I’ll test with the oil currently in the vehicle. I’ve noticed that when I start the vehicle in the same place in my driveway where it shows the red oil light after the mountain drive, the light won’t be on. It also won’t turn on if the car has just been driven a bit through the mountains here. It seems to be the longer drive combined with parking it on an upward slope is triggering the light to go on.
When it comes time to clean the oil pan and everything, I’ll use oven cleaner to get the baked on stuff on the crankshaft, but if there something else I should use to clean out the pickup pipe and the pan? Would mineral spirits be alright for that job? I’ve got a bit bottle of that here.
Oven cleaner is for exterior parts, don't clean the crankshaft - it won't need it. The inside of the oil pan can be washed out with a low flammability solvent - diesel fuel works good and is not very flammable. Or you can use a non-flammable solvent. Gasoline works great but due to fire hazard you should NOT use that.
5W30 means that oil is originally 5 Weight (when cold), but when hot still gives your engine the protection of a thicker 30 Weight oil, even though it isn't really 30 Weight (just 5... well less really since it thins when hot). Heavier Weight oil gives more protection when hot than does lighter oil (ordinarily).
5W40 means 5 Weight when cold, but protection equal to a 40 Weight oil when hot.
Of course, all oil "thins" when it gets hotter. Look at butter. That's oil, but it's really thick when cold. You can slice it! Heat up butter and it flows because it got "thinner."
So ordinarily a 10 Weight oil would soon flow like a 5 Weight once it gets hot enough.
Since thinner oil yields faster flow, the oil pressure gets reduced. Physics!
Anyway, the magic of hybrid oil tech can mean that even a thinner oil still gives your motor a lot of protection. Heck, you can buy a 20W50 oil which is really going to lubricate parts, prevent "shear" from metal on metal square angle intersections, etc even as your motor heats up. That's a 20 Weight oil (when your motor is cold) that still protects like a 50 Weight oil would protect even after that 20 Weight oil thins down due to heat.
As internal components wear, your motor naturally flows oil faster (which means less oil pressure which means less oil protection of metal on metal rubbing). Most people offset that lower oil pressure with thicker, heavier oil.
Eventually internal wear will still result in low oil pressure no matter the oil thickness, at which time you are looking at a rebuild. New bearings and oil pump and you are back in biz with a reset oil Weight clock again.
I rarely get to disagree with you on much! lol and you have it right except for which part is designated as the "norm" viscosity for automotive purposes. Pretty small detail but it's in regards to the automotive industries naming system of oil but I'll throw some other interesting info into the mix for folks to read up on who don't know as much you do, most don't know about shear ratings and such like you're referencing.
The oil viscosity is the SECOND number and it's how the oil will behave at ~212*F. Then they add modifiers that help the oil to stay thin when cold and they call this a "winter rating" as the oil is behaving as though it's a lower viscosity (measured in centiPoise SAE) to provide the ability for it flow easier and do its job when cold.
So if you have a 15w40 oil, you have a 40weight oil that has been engineered so that when it's cold out, it will flow just as easily as a common 15 weight oil would at operating temp. We call this "multi-grade" oil. Mono-grade oil would be straight 40weight for example which when cold would behave just as expected, it'd be thick and wouldn't flow very well at all, in fact, so poorly it might put your engine at risk!
They measure viscosity index in regards to how much an oil changes due to temp, if I recall correctly (and I could have this backwards) a higher index means that the viscosity changes LESS due to heat which is a good thing because it means temp won't effect it and thus the engine is always better protected. Synthetic oils have (generally speaking) a better viscosity index rating.
HOWEVER BE WARNED, there is a draw back to multi-grade oils!!! In race cars and extreme performance machines we very rarely run multi-grade oil without good reason. They have an inherent drawback. When multi-grade oils break down, the modifiers used unfortunately cause an issue and the oil reverts towards the winter rating figure which is much lower and may not provide ample protection! The bigger the gap, the sooner and worse the situation. The 6.4L new Ram Gas motor (cummins 6.7 alternative) runs 0-40, which means when it wears out, it's going to go towards 0weight oil! Yikes. Now todays oil technology is quickly improving and they're doing amazing things so this is less of a problem as time goes on with advancements but still, in a perfect world you'd not use a multi-grade oil and you'd run just the RIGHT oil for each and every day. Since we can't do that, we compromise and that's great but understand the compromise is just that....a compromise. However, in summer, you can probably raise the first number with the W after it because you're not going to see very cold teamps but if you were to run one oil year round in a place like Fairbanks Alaska where it's -50 below 0 and 99 degrees in summer, you're going to need an amazingly well performing oil if you intend to run it all year and frankly, I'd not advise it, run a summer oil and a winter oil. In my car I run straight 40weight oil, the turbo causes excess heat and the engine is making nearly 500hp per liter as a street car!, that's asking a lot for a daily driver and while the oil temp on on the gauge says the car is fine, the oil squirter jets squirting oil on the bottom of the pistons are certainly seeing much higher and the oil on the very thin cylinder walls.... even higher. This also means I never drive the car until it's mostly warmed up because the oil isn't up to temp yet and it's not ready to have a load put to it yet, takes me a few minutes extra before I can just drive off from a cold start. So give your motor a pat on the back and the oil too, they're doing some amazing things by not wearing out in 5 minutes since they are after all, nearly metal on metal contacts.
As for what was described by your analogies, spot on and yes I'd agree thinner oil will naturally create less pressure and therefor throw an oil light slightly sooner. There's one other thing to consider when you up the oil thickness, which is that while you are increasing the pressure, you're decreasing the volume of flow! This can actually be worse as many can imagine because it means that the oil may exist in one (hot) place longer and therefor be super-heated and EVEN THINNER then the thinner oil would have been in the first place. Imagine running 120weight sludge through the motor, sure you'll have high pressure but with so little flow, you'll have very slow moving oil that basically is getting stuck in place and the metal that would have been cooled by the oil, is not being cooled and is now over-heating. Not a good thing, so yes a small step up may band-aid the situation but it may also put the engine at risk at some point too.
Just some more fun facts to throw in the thread for folks who read across it all.
Last edited by 05TurboS2K; 09-27-2019 at 08:48 PM.
09-11-2019, 05:02 PM
but I'll throw some other interesting info into the mix for folks to read up on who don't know as much you do, most don't know about shear ratings and such like you're referencing.