Overfilled oil

[unsullied_spy]

I just changed my oil the other day and added my usual 4 quarts to the engine then started it up for a little bit to get the oil circulating, then checked the dip stick. Normally 4 quarts is all I need for an oil change and it brings me up to just slightly below the full line (by 3k miles I'm halfway between and add half a quart) but this time my dipstick read below the low line so I added extra oil thinking that the dipstick wasn't lying to me. 40 miles later I go to fill up with gas and I check the oil like I always do and it's way over full, probably added half a quart to a quart more than it should have, hard to tell since the gas station is far from level, but I am over the full line. I understand that going too far over full causes the crankshaft to churn the oil and cause frothing and therefore the oil pump ends up sucking up air and starving the engine of oil. Is this a "safe" amount to be over-filled or should I devote part of my next day off to draining some of my oil out? This is on an '04 EJ251 and I have not noticed any adverse side effects so far (weird noises or whatever).

[Garrison]

Strange. It's supposed to take 4 1/2qt to fill my 2.5 full.
When you check the oil after driving, you need to let the car sit for ~5min and be on level ground to get an accurate reading. If, after doing this, you determine the level to be high, you can always just drain some out via the drain plug.

[chuckthefuk]

drain it. refill to stock level. listen to Garrison and double check your levels.

As you stated too much oil will cause your motor to hydrolock :-(

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrolock

[Dead91silvia]

I had a friend come over to change the oil in his Ford truck... He didnt realize that it only needed 5 qt's. He put in 2 gallons. We drained half of it and put the plug back in and he was set...

If it's over, you can just pull the plug to let out the extra and then quickly put it back in. Frothing and hydro locking are REALLY bad things! I have seen a number of hydro locked motors... lots of extra parts

[greenspeed]

I've never put in the "recommended" amount. Subaru's are notorious for trapping oil in the heads and burning some cause of the flat design. I pick up one of those 5qt sell oil change things and just dump the whole damn thing in.

Even did that on my EJ205 legacy and now my Impreza. Even at -20 it's got no problems. It' can't hurt the bearings because you'd need to have like 6-7 qts in there for it to even remotely touch the crank. You'll be good and just wont have to add another qt for a few extra hundred miles.

[decke48]

I had a friend come over to change the oil in his Ford truck... He didnt realize that it only needed 5 qt's. He put in 2 gallons.
We had a customer come in complaining about her car smoking, and she just changed her oil herself. Pull the stick out and its way to full. So i pulled the cap. She filled it all the way to the rim off the filler neck. I think she said she put 3.5 gallons in to her poor camry.

Any ways check your oil on a level sufface.

[greenspeed]

I had a friend come over to change the oil in his Ford truck... He didnt realize that it only needed 5 qt's. He put in 2 gallons.
We had a customer come in complaining about her car smoking, and she just changed her oil herself. Pull the stick out and its way to full. So i pulled the cap. She filled it all the way to the rim off the filler neck. I think she said she put 3.5 gallons in to her poor camry.

Any ways check your oil on a level sufface.


Darwin Award candidate :smt017

[MonstarMotorsports]

just a tip on draining... its easier to losen the filter and let a little oil drain out and then screw it back tight when you think enough is gone.
pullin the plug out, and trying to put the plug back in while a ton of oil is rushing out... not the easiest. lol

[phi11]

Fumoto valve ftw!

[unsullied_spy]

I've got a vacuum pump so I can suck some out of the dipstick tube if necessary, but I found out last night I've got what looks to be a pretty nasty oil leak anyway (I ended up using a full 5 quart jug, probably leak itself back to the full level anyway). I'm thinking cam seal blew out hardcore but haven't had time to pull it apart.

About the Fumoto valve, is that the drain plug where you just take the cap off then hook up some kind of pump to it to drain the oil? My Mustang came with one of those and I could never figure out what I was supposed to do with it so I just kept pulling it every oil change.

[Odycee]

Fumoto valve replaces the drain bolt, just turn the switch to drain oil fairly slowly but no more oil mess on your hands. No pump needed. I have it on all my cars, nice and clean oil change also can be use as slow drain if you over filled oil. Amazon sell it for $26.

http://www.fumotousa.com/

[MonstarMotorsports]

maybe im over anal, but those things just sketch me out lol. My luck the valve would come open in the middle of a race and bye bye motor, you just wasted 700 bucks in entry fee's lol

[unsullied_spy]

https://sl-i.net/FORUM/images/imported/2012/08/th_472441_484533768231296_983596215_o-1.jpg (http://s140.photobucket.com/albums/r37/Unsullied_Spy/?action=view&current=472441_484533768231296_983596215_o.jpg)

I suspect cam seal. Probably won't have to worry about being overfilled if I can't get it done this weekend.

[harrymaneuvers]

Time for the story topper to come in:

So 5 years ago when I first got my Legacy, I went to do the first ever oil change on it and popped my head under the car. Naturally I see a spin on filter and what looks like a big oil pan... so I spin it off and drain the oil.

I remembered saying to myself... GOD D@MN this oil smells like SH** but not much past that. Anyways, I put the new filter on, put the drain plug back in and fill up the engine wtih 4 quarts of Amsoil.

I simultaneously changed the air filter by the passengers side. Because this was my first time doing this, I didnt know if the filter was in the box right behind the TB or the one by the fender. Found it in the fender box and replaced it.


Got everything back together and went to start it up. Started and died. Started and Died. Started and Died. Hm...


Start it with foot and the gas and it runs... but rough... after letting it run at about 2k rpm for about 30 seconds something smells hot so I get out and look under my car to see my whole exhaust, cat and all glowing.

Hmm... not good.

maybe I overfilled my oil I thought? So I go under the car and drop the drain plug again to let some oil out. NOTHING COMES OUT... UH OH!!!


It was at that moment that I realized that I did not drop the oil drain plug and spin on filter... I dropped the ATF drain plug and spin on filter.


Thus allowing me to fill my engine with an extra 4 quarts (8 quarts total) of oil.


So I dropped the 8 quarts of oil and did it correctly along with filling my tranny back up and taking the oil filter off ($15 Amsoil EAO filter wasted) and putting the correct subaru ATF filter on.


Car still started and died until I realized that I didnt engage the teeth on the bottom of the unused airbox behind the TB allowing unmetered air to come in.

Fixed that and the car fired right up. Never noticed anything other than a slight oil burning smell for the first few miles as I am sure that it had gotten into my exhaust. No o2 issues or CEL's

[Perdue]

Haha the first time I did a tuneup on my first BD, I forgot to plug the MAF back in and freaked put when it wouldnt run. Thanks to Ryan(member from long ago), iirc, I got it figured out pretty fast.

[Patrick Olsen]

I understand that going too far over full causes the crankshaft to churn the oil and cause frothing and therefore the oil pump ends up sucking up air and starving the engine of oil. Is this a "safe" amount to be over-filled or should I devote part of my next day off to draining some of my oil out? This is on an '04 EJ251 and I have not noticed any adverse side effects so far (weird noises or whatever).
You'll be perfectly fine. I use a WRX/STI dipstick with my stock EJ25D oil pan, which gives me a "FULL" level 1qt higher than stock. Even with that extra quart, the oil level in the pan is as far from the crank as the factory deems safe for the turbo cars, so there's no reason to worry.