I have borrowed a friend or relative’s pickup 3 or 4 times. I always check the oil and return it with a full gas tank.
The story has become a bit convoluted.
Take a deep breath and lay out in short simple terms how far the car was driven and so on.
At the dealers where I worked we would top off all fluids free of charge EXCEPT for motor oil and transmission fluid.
Those latter 2 items were billed per the customer.
Sure, you make a valid point. But I had to establish this is the situation. I started this journey with a panicked phone call from a wife 5 states away. By no means am I suggesting the dealer should do this for free. But it has been a process to establish what the heck happened. The back and forth w/ the dealer helped in that regard. It would be nice if he leveled with me and had a frank discussion about what details were/were not divulged to us 7 days prior to the engine blowing. His changing story “we don’t do that” to “it says right here we checked the box” didn’t help anything in my eyes. If not topping up the oil, or even telling us it needed topped up, contributed in some way to the demise of the engine, it would be cool if they contributed in some way to the repairs. Not out of a legal threat to sue or anything, but out of good will. If nothing else, just to level w/ me on what happened and provide a clear rationale why they feel it didn’t really cause any significant damage. The bottom line is we need to get the car fixed. Who & how are big questions. Getting to the bottom of this helps guide the answers to those questions.
I do wonder if the engine was already screwed and if dumping oil in 7 days earlier would just delay the inevitable.
@bneff Your last paragraph is completely unnecessary and would you please remove it This is a family forum.
2 Likes
hmmm … so from what I understand the Subie with the damaged engine home is in the Ann Arbor area where the breakdown occured, not 5 states away where OP lives. Given that, three options
- Sell it to the local wrecked-car junkyard
- Sell it to a local shop who’ll fix it in their spare time, and either drive it themselves or sell it
- Hire a local inde shop to replace the engine with an engine from a compatible wrecked Subie
I guess you just have to price out each option, and decide from there. If you choose the last one, be sure to use a shop that is well recommended to you or family members by their friends, co-workers, fellow church-goers, fellow bar-hoppers, etc. Don’t allow a shop to take on this job just b/c they exist or their name appears in the phone book. You need a personal shop recommendation to go down that route.
If I had this problem however, I’d choose one of the first two options. My parents had a Subie years ago that the mechanic couldn’t repair although he tried and tried. Eventually they just gave him the car in lieu of the repair fee. A couple years later they saw it on the road, and asked him what happened. He said he worked on it in his spare time over the course of 18 months and eventually discovered what the problem was.
I have been following this thread, and my synopsis, dealer noted oil low, did the customer decide to pass on paying for the oil thus it was not put in? My only conclusion at this point would be yes.
Yes, running an engine 2.5 quarts low on oil can damage an engine. The remaining oil temperature skyrockets and in turn that can lead to coked up oil control rings on the pistons. That then leads to oil consumption.
Running an engine low on oil also affects the amount of oil being thrown by the crankshaft onto the cylinder walls for lubrication purposes.
Another reason for oil consumption issues.
Odds are if the old engine is disassembled one would find one or more oil control rings seized in the ring lands.
I guess I just don’t see the dealer in this mix at all except on a consultative basis on what to do, what damage was done, and why it happened. So low oil would cause rings to seize and higher oil consumption but still not sure that that would cause the engine to seize. Any time I’ve gotten an inspection report on my car everything is listed as green, yellow, or red and maybe some other notes. Even after an oil change I check the oil before leaving the grounds.
You also have to remember that there is more than one person involved at the dealer, and they may not be talking completely to each other. The service writer would need to check with the person that actually did the work and if it was just checking fluids, it might have been the teenage kid there for the summer. So you really can’t conclude the guy was not telling the truth to start with. One might be the standard company answer, and the other after talking to the kid that put washer fluid in it.
The part I was most curious about was the 30k miles/2-3 years with no oil change business.
It is possible to have an engine seize and destroy itself even with oil in it.
I won’t go into the entire story which I’ve posted here before, but a guy had his Subaru (bought from us brand new) towed in with a seized engine.
The engine was full of motor oil and frozen solid.
The oil had never been changed and had turned to tar.
The car only had 25k miles on it.
The oil had coked the screen on the oil pump pickup tube solid and no motor oil could pass through the screen.
I think Bing’s assessment of fthe legalities of the matter are overly simplistic. The laws vary from state to state. It is never just you borrow it, it gets broken, you have to buy a new one. When you borrow, rent, swap use of, or even let someone leave something at your house a bailment is created and depending on the circumstances you may owe the owner of the property, slight care, reasonable care ,or great care. I don’t think the wife violated even the great care standard. To give an example, if the wife was visiting her mother and the mother went away for a few days, leaving the wife in the house to catch up with some hometown friends. Say a meteoroid strikes the house, destroying it and the mother had let the insurance lapse ( sort of like not getting the oil changed) Would anyone her think the daughter owed a new house?
I don’t think the dealer is off the hook either. The car was at the dealership to be checked and one of the stories from them was that the fluids were topped off. Another time they were told the tech noted that the oil was low in red.
It is a real mess and the husband has my sympathies.
Well, I had a chat with the dealership service manager. He cut us a little slack on the labor, we’re getting a remanufactured engine installed for $4900, and I’m adding in the logical ‘while you’re in there’ replacements on my dime. We were going to replace the blown head gasket anyway, and that would have been a couple grand. So the wheels are turning on resolving the situation. So to speak.
I did leave out some car-irrelevant/situation-relevant information. My mother in law is 85, having non-Alzheimers memory loss, her husband passed ~2 years ago. The 4 siblings in the immediate area are, ahem, enhancing the family drama. 2 days after the engine blew one sibling literally snuck my M.I.L to the bank to pull out a load of money for a grandkid to make rent… He makes $50,000 in the Detroit area. Then she lied about it repeatedly, WTF? My wife was there with our 2 young kids to try to stabilize the situation, take control of finances, and try to prevent mom from ‘going to a home.’ So there are loads of issues for a thread on a family counseling forum somewhere. We did find a receipt this weekend for an oil change from 1.75 years ago.
It was an interesting thread, this is a forum like I have never seen. It did help me figure out what the heck happened, what my options were, upsides & downsides of each. There were some compassionate responses and genuinely helpful, time consuming people that contributed. Easily a dozen of you along these lines, GeorgeSanJose summarized the options perfectly. There was also some flaming, jumping to conclusions, and less than helpful input. I guess if my M.I.L. decides she wants to sue us for damages she now has the necessary legal advice to do so. I guess I offended one guy for using the word “gay” in a family-values environment. And I got the message loud and clear that the dealer has no responsibility and I’m kind of a selfish jerk trying to push blame on other people for even trying to figure out what happened and have a discussion about it.
Ultimately, I’m thankful for all the input, good and bad. I’m new here but I’ll bookmark the forum, between my links to Jalopnik and Bimmerforums.
“Says” Unless the low pressure light is broken then it came on as soon as the oil pump started sucking air. Usually you then will have a few seconds to pull over and shut down without hurting the engine.
Years ago I had a girlfriend who had a bright red Isuzu Trooper. I had always told her that the oil light on is bad, shut right down. I got a call from her saying she had gone to one of those “Quicky” lube places and a week later she got the red light and pulled right over. I told her she had saved her engine by not trying to “sneak” it to a station. They had not tightened the filter and it had fallen off!
Checking the light bulb is easy, just turn the key to on and see if the oil light comes on for a few seconds (bulb test). If you see that light then it did come on for your wife and she just didn’t see it.
Just to be clear, a remanufactured engine will include a new head gasket.
I think you are making a wise choice with the replacement engine. While it is costly, at least you will get some sort of warranty with it which could help you later in the future.
1 Like
10-4 on the head gasket being included. It’s a convenient part of the rationalization for pulling the trigger on the project. And to keep the car my M.I.L. is familiar with and comfortable with. Lots of personal reasons to bite the bullet and write the check.