Oil consumption 1.6 non turbo 55k miles 2018

[Milli8891]

Hi all,

About 1litre per 1k miles. Is this normal or shal i get rid of it. Drives perfectly fine but i know check the oil after every full tank and can see a reduction"(

[GrumpyDad]

1 litre every 1k miles on a 55K engine seems a little bit (but not hugely) excessive to me, but it's certainly not unheard of. I'm new to Hyundai engines and our car is too young for me to have bothered looking into oil usage amounts yet. From a cursory reading session tonight, it seems Hyundai have quite the reputation for drinking oil.

I think the best advice might be to have a proper oil consumption test done, to see whether it is at an excessive level. From what I have been reading, Hyundai engines have seen issues with low pressure piston ring issues causing high levels of oil consumption. I don't know whether the warranty and situation would cover those, but it may be worth looking into. Perhaps have a garage do a compression test on the engine to give you an indication of whether you should be concerned. Unfortunately piston rings are one of those jobs where the parts cost is almost insignificant (about £100 - £120, plus incidental parts like gaskets etc), compared to the the labour cost (expect in the region of £600 - £1,500). It does mean that if you have space to do it, the right basic tools, and the inclination, it can be a cheap repair if you do the work yourself.

This article on the Consumer Reports website made for quite interesting reading: https://www.consumerreports.org/cars/ca ... 065338868/

[PhilHornby]

About 1litre per 1k miles. Is this normal or shall i get rid of it. Drives perfectly fine but i know check the oil after every full tank and can see a reduction"(

I don't believe it is 'normal' for these engines (at least not mine), but in general, it's not unheard of (a Fiat Coupé and a V6 Ford Probe are personal examples I've encountered, with similar oil habits).

Assuming it's not dripping out anywhere(!), then it's presumably going out of the exhaust. The Cat. will tend to mask any visible blue smoke, but the presence of the oil is not kind to the O2/Lambda sensors (or the Cat). You may encounter emissions problems as a result...

Perhaps have a garage do a compression test on the engine to give you an indication of whether you should be concerned.

I'm not sure a compression test would necessarily show a problem, if it was just the oil control rings, but the oil could be entering via the Valve Stem Oil Seals and it might show that. That should be much easier to fix.

Unfortunately piston rings are one of those jobs where the parts cost is almost insignificant (about £100 - £120, plus incidental parts like gaskets etc),

Ford Probe Piston Rings were £300 a set, back in 1997

[GrumpyDad]

Unfortunately piston rings are one of those jobs where the parts cost is almost insignificant (about £100 - £120, plus incidental parts like gaskets etc),

Ford Probe Piston Rings were £300 a set, back in 1997

I'm a little hazy now (the old grey matter is definitely... old), but I have a recollection that back in the late 90s, there was an whole thing about prohibitively expensive spare parts from OEMs (with some being a lot worse than others). I seem to remember it was covered by BBC Watchdog, and then a number of newspapers started exploring this. I remember reading an article about the cost to build a complete car from OEM spare parts, vs the cost of buying the car; and whilst I can't remember the figures, it was something crazy like two or three times the cost. That said, I'm not sure things a that much better today.

By coincidence I was talking with a mechanic yesterday while getting my air-con re-gassed, who was talking about owning a Probe back in the day, and how much he loved that car. I always thought Ford failed the Probe. It was like they just didn't really know what to do with it, and so never really managed to market it well enough to succeed properly. Which is a shame.

[PhilHornby]

I always thought Ford failed the Probe. It was like they just didn't really know what to do with it, and so never really managed to market it well enough to succeed properly. Which is a shame.

It was voted "Car of the Year" in '93 & '94 in the USA. Unfortunately, Ford only sold 30,000 a year and their strategy revolved around selling 300,000 a year!

I had two, so that must have helped a bit

[PhilHornby]

About 1litre per 1k miles. Is this normal...

See: https://static.nhtsa.gov/odi/tsbs/2021/ ... 9-0001.pdf

Although it's actual talking about different engines, Hyundai's definition of 'normal' seems to be >1000miles per litre (well quart)...

Their maintenance procedure sounds a lot like the old "Redex down the plug hole" trick. (A neat way of filling your entire street with smoke!)

Is this car a manual? Would you say you engage in "spirited driving" ... this could apparently have a bearing on oil consumption

[GrumpyDad]

I figure things were worse in the US for the Probe than they were over here. Over here replacing the Capri made a bit of sense, although I think it would have served better to have aimed it at the Sierra market, and let the Mondeo target the Granada drivers. But over in the US they seemed to want it to compete with the Mustang. It was far to "European" in its appearance for the American market anyway, but trying to sell it as a front wheel drive alternative to the Mustang was idiocy.

I don't know what their board room was taking at the time, but low grade meth would be my guess...

[PhilHornby]

It was far to "European" in its appearance for the American market anyway, but trying to sell it as a front wheel drive alternative to the Mustang was idiocy.

There was also the Mazda MX6 - built alongside it, in the same factory, from virtually the same parts. American or Japanese styling was the choice. For some reason, the Probe devalued far quicker than the MX6. I wanted the MX6 but couldn't afford one. It did mean I could take the Probe to a Mazda dealership, rather than Ford though. (Ford dealerships make Hyundai dealerships look really, really good )

[Milli8891]

So i was looking threw the service history which it has a full one but i noticed that there is 3 services that have about 16k miles between them. Done every year but the last owner did diesel miles in this little car without more frequent oil changes and i am now the idiot who will have to fix it. This will teach me for not throughly checking the deets before shelling out 11k for a motor:(