Hello Guys, I was wondering if I have a problem with my 99.5. I just returned home from a 3k road trip through the south pulling a heavy 5th Wheel (13k). Most of the trip was with pretty tall winds, and steep hills. My question is, is it normal that my truck use a quart of oil. I understand the trip was sort of tough on the truck in these conditions. A quart seems much. I am running the Rotella 5/40 Sync. The truck has 71k, no engine mods.

Thanks for any insite.

 

Any signs of oil on or around the engine compartment?

 

I just finished checking for block leaks, no residual anything, anywhere. Would having the motor singing out 27k rpm's constantantly have anything to do with it. The winds were bad last week for the whole trip. Forget about overdrive. Thanks

 

How many miles are on the oil?

 

These engines will use a bit of oil. The harder you work your truck, the more oil it burns. After 3K miles you only used 1 quart so you still had 14 quarts left in there. I think you'll be fine.

That wouldn't be enough to raise any big alarms right now, but keep an eye on the oil levels for a little while. Also try to compare the oil consumption when it's not loaded down and working hard. Do the other usual stuff like looking for unusual smoke, leaks, or excessive blow-by.

 

The only other thing that I've noticed was a steady flow of oil mist coming from the oil filler tube, when the cap is off. From what I've read, and info from shops near me, thats normal. I have not noticed any signs of oil burning. Now that I'm back in town, I will keep a check on it unloaded until July. My last truck was a one ton Chev, 454 with a 456 axle, no overdrive. It ran fine (for a chev) 32k rpm's steady, and used just as much when pulling heavy, around town it was fine. Thanks

 

Yep, that's normal.

 

Normal to me...

 

I think FOMOCO defines high oil usage as over a qt. per 750-1000 miles.

 

John311t. The oil was just converted to sync. 200mi before the trip.

 

165,000 miles on my truck and I average 1 qt. added every 3,000 miles. oil type: rotella 5w 40 syn.

 

Thanks Guys, I feel better now. A 2005 6.0 also went on the same road trip, he pulled a bumper trailer half the weight as mine. He states he didn't use a drop of oil, thats when the concern arose. Altough I lost a quart of oil during the trip, I also got more MPG. Hard to believe being the 6.0 was tow haul and I was out of overdrive. I'm impressed.

 

Keep an eye on consumption that is a sign of injector orings causing oil to be burned in the cylinder.

 

amiller, thanks for the heads up, is there a method that I can check for this? Or, would I have to pull each injector and check the orings. Thanks..

 

If mileage continues to climb and oil consumption increases (smoke will probably start) best to replace all of the orings.