I did my first oil change ever the other day. I'm a little concerned that the oil on the dipstick is a millimeter or so above the FULL mark. I didn't know how to go about draining just a small amount. Any ideas? Is this potentially hazardous to my engine?

 

Had a recent situation with my 2000 PSD when I took it into the dealership after they replaced the short block. It had been going through LOTS of oil, 3 quarts in less than 800 miles. After I had them change the oil at the first 1k miles on the new short block I had an issue w/ an injector and with less than 150 miles on the oil change I was down a quart and a half. They hadn't bothered checking the oil and the mechanic couldn't believe it was already down that much. No signs of leaking anywhere on the engine and no blue smoke (no smoke at all really), he couldn't figure it out. He dumped in 2.5 - 3 quarts right there and said "well, we may be changing out the short block next, let me know what happens". I put over 3000 miles on that oil change including towing my 5th wheel RV from New Hampshire to Missouri in hot weather and over plenty of mountains, the RV is 12K plus some equipment in the bed of the F250 and when I changed the oil it wasn't even down 1/2 quart... kinda wierd but that's what happened. On the next oil change I went over 4000 miles and was down about 1/2 quart at time of changing. BTW, when I change oil and filter my engine wants 16 quarts to get to the fill line on the dip-stick, anybody else confirm that or do you only need 15 quarts like the manual says?

 

Woops, got to rambling so much I forgot to make the point to answer your concern. After he dumped in the oil, it read at least 1/4 inch above the FULL mark and I asked him about that. His remark was that it wouldn't hurt it a bit, I guess from my experience it didn't although I just had to have the HPOP replaced due to blown O-rings... I don't think that had any connection since I had almost 8K on it since the overfill and from what I understand, the HPOP has a resivoir that is kept full by the low pressure pump in the pan and the excess drains back down into the pan... any one have an idea on that... too much oil cause a HPOP seal failure?

 

If you want to remove a small amount of oil the easy way, we used to use a "rose gun" that was inserted down the dipstick tube to suck out small amounts of oil when I worked in a garage many moons ago. Maybe your local "autozone" type store would have something like that.

 

Thanks for that response. I'm asking because I'm not sure I'm imagining, but it seems like my engine sounds rougher than before the oil change. Not terrible, but just a little edgier sounding. Also, I made the change to Rotella so that could have something to do with it too.

 

No, a millimeter over will make no difference in engine performance, but as to where the limit is, i'm not sure. I wouldn't go more than an 1/8 of an inch over the full mark myself, but I'm thinking you could have up to a quart over safely.

One thing to be aware of though, is dipsticks are not fail-proof, its a good idea to make sure your dipstick tube is fully seated in the engine after you have any work done where the tube may have been removed. I say this because I recently had a new engine installed in my F-150 and when I got it back I noticed some performance problems right away. Whenever I got into higher RPM's I noticed bluish smoke in my exhaust and lack of power. I checked things over and found that the dipstick tube was about an inch and a half away from proper seating. I had to drain about two quarts or more out of my engine before it was back to normal. That's why i don't trust any mechanic to work on my engine but myself! I was lucky not to have blown a seal with that much oil in the engine...

 

Blue-ish smoke means the engine is burning off excess oil?

 

I wouldn't worry about a mm over either. Did you add exactly 15 qts. when you did the oil change?

I would consider installing a Fumoto drain valve so that it would be easy to drain the excess oil if this happens in the future. It will also make your oil changes alot easier.

 

Great idea. I've been thinking about installing that.

 

Hey man, That was your 1000th post!!! Cool!

 

Didn't even notice. Cool!

You'll liike the Fumoto valve - makes my oil changes really easy.