PhilNotHill

Any way to get a dipstick that works?

Macster

Sigh. The car comes equipped with a nice electronic oil level system. What's the problem using that?

(While my 2002 Boxster came with a dipstick I use the electronic oil level system not the dipstick. My 2003 Turbo doesn't even have a dipstick and I rely solely on the electronic oil level system to monitor the oil level. 125K+ miles and not one issue with the oil level.)

PhilNotHill

the electric system showed overfill before and after I had the oil changed.

Proper oil was (supposedly) put in the engine.

No problems. No warning lights. Why is the elec read showing over fill?

Macster

If the oil change was done properly and the oil level reads overfull then there is a fault with the system and it should be addressed. While rare, the system can develop a fault.

However, when I asked about this the techs told me 1) between them they could only recall one failure; 2) the failure symptom was not an overfilled or under filled reading but no reading.

That the system showed too much oil before the oil change, this can be explained by simply the engine had too much oil. Maybe you -- inadvertently I'm sure -- added too much oil. Or perhaps the oil level was increased by the accumulation of unburned fuel and water (probably water -- my 02 Boxster at an early oil analysis had accumulated 7% oil (that's about 0.6 quarts worth) in its oil after around 4K miles of driving).

However, the tech should have been on alert that the system may have developed a fault and paid particular attention to the oil change process and afterwards if the level was still reading full informed you there was a fault with the system.

You should take the car back to where you had it serviced and insist that if the proper amount of oil was put into the engine the electronic oil level system is defective and should be fixed. I assume the car is still under warranty and you had the car serviced at a dealer. (If a dealer tech let the car go out with too much oil then shame on the dealer and I'd raise a bit of heck with the GM and PCNA. Write a letter to PCNA letting them know one of its dealers is screwing up its customer service. If a indy did this find another indy.)

Ignoring the too full reading before the oil change as being a sign the system was faulty to begin with, what I suspect happened is the wrong amount of oil was put into the engine. In this case you should have some oil removed to bring the level down to at least the max line with the oil at operating temperature.

Be sure you have the owners manual bookmarked to the section that specifically cautions against overfilling the engine with oil.

il pirata

Where is the car currently serviced?

sjfehr

No, I'm with PhilNotHill on this. Newer Porsches only show the oil level measurement with the car idling at temperature and on level ground, which is woefully inadequate; who wants to run their car for 15 minutes after an oil change to know if they've dangerously over/under-filled their oil? Nothing beats a good ole fashioned dipstick. There may be a way to read the e-dipstock with a durametric even when the dash refuses to display it, but shame on Porsche for underhanded BS like this in a cheap ploy to get people stuck in a dealership browsing new cars for an hour or so. Car owners have a right to be able to perform their own maintenance and repairs.

Q. Is there a custom PID for oil level that can be read with any cheap OBDII reader?

Macster

If you are changing the oil in your car's engine and have doubts about starting/running the engine afterwards to get the engine up to temp in order to check the oil because you may not have put enough oil in the engine you have the wrong person changing the oil in your car's engine.

Come on. You can count empty bottles of oil can't you?

Doesn't take 15 minutes of engine running based on my experience with my Turbo, which requires the engine be warmed up and running to check the oil level.

I change the oil with the engine hot and after adding in the fresh oil -- and counting the empties -- I start the engine and drive the car off the ramps and let the engine idle while I gather up the tools and clean up. This is just a matter of convenience as I like to clean up ASAP after changing the oil as I changed it at work in the shipping bay and even though I did this after hours (on the weekend) I still liked to get the bay back to how it was before I pulled the car in. But because the engine was hot when I added the fresh oil it doesn't take hardly any idle time before the oil level check can take place and I could check the oil level after around a minute's idle time.

There is IIRC no extended PID for oil level. There is probably a way to obtain the oil level reading but the procedure is probably Porsche proprietary.

I would expect it would still be filtered based on engine/oil temperature and probably not available until the engine/oil temperature was high enough.

sjfehr

The oil going in isn't the problem, it's the oil coming out. The way 9A1 engines are designed, you can only drain somewhere around 60-70% of the oil; exactly how much depends on just how level the car is and a bunch of other random factors (with a variability of somewhere around +/- 1L), so it's impossible to know exactly how much you need to add. Instead of being able to drain/fill/check/top-off, you have to carefully collect and measure every drop of oil to know what you drained out. And then adjust for what the oil level was prior and hope to hell you didn't make any mistakes in your math. Or worse- spill anything.

A432

Once you do it once, with your method, ie. angle of the car and time to drain, it's close to the same every time.
Mine takes 7L every single time, I've gotten it down now to hitting topped up without adding any, easy.
The first time you est. 1L low (there is 5+L excess at idle) and then just remember how much you topped with and then afterwards it's just repeat + the top amount.
The key is simply be consistent in your method which means angle, warm oil, drain time, and it's like clockwork.

Macster

Well, that's contrary to my info. My info is that as long as the engine is above a certain temperature, and on the level (though how much this actually affects the drain amount is open for discussion) that the drain interval of one hour is sufficient to remove the majority of the oil. A longer drain interval, overnight or 12 hours, removes a bit more.

The variability is zilch. The techs tell me Porsche gives a refill amount for a 1 hour drain and a different (larger natch) refill amount for an overnight/12 hour drain. There is no mention of a range.

I might add there is no measuring the amount of oil drained from the engines. The tech opens the drain plug and lets the oil drain into the drain basin of the collector which is the same style as every other auto service department uses. Then he unscrews the oil filter housing and lets this drop into the drain basin as well. The drain basin's bottom is covered with a coarse plastic mesh that catches big items but lets the oil drain without any restriction.

I do not recall the refill amounts but the difference between the shorter drain interval refill amount and the longer drain interval refill amount was on the order of a liter maybe less. I mean the difference was striking enough to have me believe there is really anything to be gained by a longer -- 12 hour -- drain interval vs. a 1 hour drain interval. The techs told me the longer drain interval is for those cars that can't be finished before closing time. This is to avoid having to have a tech stay late on overtime to complete the oil/filter service. The tech just opens the drain, removes the filter housing and lets the oil drain overnight. Come the next day after he buttons up the engine he just puts in whatever the 12 hour drain interval refill amount is using the amount read out on the oil dispensing gun.

Note I drained my Turbo (and my Boxster) backed up on ramps and the refill amount was unaffected as near as I could tell by the fact the cars were not level. I have no experience with the newer cars and maybe the levelness is more critical. I doubt it but that's just my well, opinion.

If one feels that the car being level is a critical requirement of an oil change then I would advise him to invest in a nice lift that lays on the floor of the garage and which he can drive the car over and then lift the car safely while keeping the car level.

I stand by my statement I made in a previous post with some modification. If one can't count oil bottle empties accurately, or doesn't want to invest in a large pitcher with graduated levels to be able to measure say 7.8l of oil (what my Turbo engine takes after a drain), can't dump in oil without spilling some, IOWs can't put the right amount of oil in the engine without having a dipstick handy he's not the person who should be doing the oil change.

sjfehr

According to the official Porsche workshop manual, the engine oil fill quantity for a new 9A1 engine is 10L, and the oil change capacity is 7.5L. I've only done one oil change so far in my (fairly new-to-me) 2010 Boxster S, but I drained 8.5L out when I did. Neededless to say, I'm glad I didn't make assumptions and fill initially with 7L like I would have in a dipstick car, or I'd have been idling for 15 minutes while significantly low before finding out.

The dealer can go in with PIIWS and read the level electronically at any point; we don't have that luxury.

FYI, my car was tail-high on ramps when I drained, and more oil came out when I jacked up one of the front corners to a nose-high attitude- the difference being about 1L more than Porsche says should come out. Hence why I say (from experience) that the oil drain amount is sensitive to how level the car is.

Macster

While I have zero experience changing the oil in the newer DFI engines, like I said I have watched this done and the process as best I can tell is about the same as with the older engines.

The biggest difference is the drain interval time increased from 20 minutes to 1 hour. (In both cases there was an overnight drain interval too.)

The refill amount is tied with the car's VIN. While the factory manual may give a refill amount of say 7.5l the actual amount based on the car's VIN can be more (or less). I believe you can visit the dealer's parts department and the person behind the counter can look this up for you with your car's VIN.

As for the levelness of the car, again my experience is with my 2002 Boxster and 2003 Turbo. In both cases I never bothered to measure the amount of oil that drained from the engine all I know is I added the specified amount of new oil to the engine and the oil level was quite OK.

Now in the case of the Boxster -- shortly after I bought the car and maybe at the first oil change I did -- I took the time to lift the front of the car level with the rear tires on the ramps and no more oil came out.

This is as I expected. The engine can't, or shouldn't, trap oil of any amount with the car just a bit out of level. Otherwise these areas would tend to hold oil when going up or down grades, going around corners, braking, or accelerating. Generally the internal surfaces of the crankcase and interior of the engine are designed to ensure oil flows away/down to the sump or the scavenge pump so the oil can be routed to the tank/sump and be available to the oil pump to help ensure the engine has an adequate supply of oil at all times.

In spite of what you report I would have to believe the DFI engines are likewise not that sensitive to being out of level, but maybe I'm wrong.

Ok, so assume I'm wrong. The car has to be level. Then you need to consider getting some kind of lift that you can use to lift the car and in doing so keep the car level so when you drain the oil the proper amount is drained from the engine.

Next you need to learn the correct amount of oil needed to refill the engine properly and to do so from bottles of oil. These are graduated so if one pays attention he should be able to do this with no problems.

Or you can cuss the car for lack of a dipstick. I have to wonder if a dipstick was so important to you why you bought the car without a dipstick in the first place.

extanker

the op is right....................a proper dipstick and we would not have to read the the theory of oil changing.po folk beeezz strange

A432

lol, nobody has to go all ocd even without the dipstick

Marine Blue

I recently changed my oil and used the following procedure.
- Couple hours of spirited driving
- 4 Hour drain while the car was still hot
- Add 7.5 Quarts of Oil
- Start engine until warm and took measurement
- measured at the lowest point so added another .5 Quarts
- measurement shows one line below full so I still need to add another .25 - .5 quarts.

The manual says the car uses 8 quarts in an oil change so I'm clearly over that but not by much.

As far as having a dipstick, we all have to give into technology at some point. My primary concern is the reliability of this device. Accuracy seems to be very good since a .25 quart addition is easily captured on the reading.

My new Volvo uses a similar measuring device but it is not accurate by design. It only tells the owner if the car needs oil or is full, it doesnt' have markers in between full/refill lines.