A couple of weeks and 1500 miles ago the F350 got its first engine oil change at my local Ford dealer. Now the oil appears to be way overfilled, but the dippy dipstick does not help. The dipstick is the twisted strip metal version, not the cable type.

The level is over the top hole in the dipstick, but I can't get consistent readings on how much over. Could the oil have diluted that much in 1500 miles, or is it just a problem with reading the dipstick?

Maybe the dealer forgot to drain out the oil before adding 13 quarts!

Does checking the engine oil before starting in the morning yield erroneous readings?

 

Highly probable the dealer overfilled the oil. They are accustomed to the older trucks getting 14 and 15 qt oil changes. My dealer did this the first time and had to drain out a couple of quarts.

There have been no reports of the new 6.7 diesel "making oil".

Regards

 

Check your service order. It should say how much oil they put in.

 

I had experience with this over the summer.
My dealer changed the oil the first time at 5,000 miles.
I didn't look at the paperwork until later and was billed for 15 quarts.
When I called the heavy service manager they realized the paperwork needed to be corrected in their internal systems, which they did at that point.
(I'll get the 2 extra quarts I paid for back in something else later.)

A look at the dipstick (twisted metal) at the time showed there was NOT 15 quarts in my motor, thankfully, but it was overfilled by maybe a half quart.

I personally changed my oil at 10,000 back in January.
13 quarts is half way in the hatched area when the truck has cold soaked for 10 hours or so.
I purchased three 5 quart Motorcraft jugs (simple for the 6.4L because you pour all three in) and I have two quarts remaining in the last jug.

What's strange is Epic mentioned a week or two ago that 13 quarts was at the full line on his dipstick but he has the newer cable dipstick.

At this point these trucks have been on the road long enough no dealer should have an excuse now.

 

If I remember right, the cross-hatched area represents a quart difference from top to bottom. That would be only 2 cups difference between yours and mine and is very reasonable considering oil temps and amount of time allowed to drain. I put in 12 quarts last time and the cable dipstick measures right on the bottom of the cross-hatch. I did that on purpose so I could monitor if there is any increase in oil level over the next change cycle. The last report said 1.5% fuel dilution so I want to see what that looks like on the dipstick when I change the oil next time. At 1.5% that equals .195 gallons or 1.5 cups of fuel in the oil. That should show up as exactly .39 or almost half way into the cross-hatch area when I change.

That, of course is assuming that the engine "uses" zero oil which likely is not the case. So... if the level is still at the bottom of the cross-hatch on the next oil change, I know the engine makes and uses 1.5 cups of oil in 5,000 miles. We'll know in a couple of months.

 

I had my free oil change and DEF refill at the dealer yesterday. Invoice said 14 quarts. I checked the level this morning and the oil was in the crosshatched area. It was not over full. I realize the manual says 13 quarts and the dealer may not have put all of the last quart in. I have the cable dipstick and it still is very hard to read the oil level properly because of the interference of oil in the dipstick tube.

 

14 quarts and still in the cross-hatch? Hmmm... Did they charge by the quart?

FYI - one thing I have found help me read the dipstick more easily is to pull the dipstick out about two inches and give it ten seconds before drawing it through the tube. There's still enough oil on the dipstick to measure but it doesn't drag a bunch of oil into the tube to foul the next reading.

 

Epic,
Thank you for the tip. The only time I could get a clear reading was once in the morning or after it had sat for quite a while. Dealer told me they sell the oil by the quart but my first service was free so it didn't matter for me this time. I plan on changing my own oil like I have done all my life. I feel that the design of the dipstick and tube was a afterthought by ford engineers. My 7.3 was very easy to read the oil level.

 

I took the pickup to the Ford dealer in Silsbee, Texas. Their tech checked the oil and found that it was high. They called the Mankato, Minnesota (home) dealer and the service writer suggested that they just change the filter, which would take out about a quart. Neither Silsbee Ford nor I thought that was a sensible solution, since we really did not know how much over it was. Silsbee estimated two quarts.

The Silsbee dealer changed the oil. I asked if they could collect it to see how much was actually in there, but they said it would not be possible.

They added 13 quarts, and the resulting oil leve was halfway between the two holes at the end of the dipstick.

Supposedly the home dealer will reimburse me for the oil change, but not for certain yet.

 

Just for some information, I recently switched from the flat dipstick to the cable style and the cable dipstick is 1/2" shorter than the flat one. All of the markings are about 3/8" higher as well (ie. top of hatching on the flat one is middle of the hatching on the cable dipstick).

To me this would indicate that an extra 1/2 to 1 quart is really not a big deal otherwise the two dipsticks would have been identical. Now that being said, the cable dipstick allows for less overfilling capacity since it is already allowing for the extra amount of oil.

 

IIRC, Paul Bruckne, Ford 6.7 engineer who shares what he can, posted here that the dipstick was a problem. When everything else was finally positioned, the dipstick had to be routed somehow...what we see is what they had left to work with...

Regards