How much oil does yours use?

[davelittlewood]

I had my engine rebuilt in July 2013 and for the first 2.5 years it used no oil at all.

We've recently been on a trip to Pembrokeshire (some excellent new roads and fantastic scenery), so did probably about 600 to 700 miles in total and the oil level had gone down from top mark to the bottom.

Is this a lot?

[shake n bake]

If it's not used it like that before then yes there's a fault somewhere.
Have you checked the underside for leaks? Be sure to check along the length if the chassis as if it's leaking whilst you are driving it like travel the length of the car. Also, is there an oily haze around the exhaust/rear plate area?

[QBee]

davelittlewood said:

I had my engine rebuilt in July 2013 and for the first 2.5 years it used no oil at all.

We've recently been on a trip to Pembrokeshire (some excellent new roads and fantastic scenery), so did probably about 600 to 700 miles in total and the oil level had gone down from top mark to the bottom.

Is this a lot?

You must have exceeded 88 mph? Car now in 2016.....
I see it is a 450. Who did the rebuild?
My car was a 400. Never used a drop.
Changed it to a V8D 500 and I do track days. Uses quite a lot now.
I am told 1) they all do that sir and b) it's not a bad thing as it lubricates things.

[davelittlewood]

QBee said:

You must have exceeded 88 mph? Car now in 2016.....
I see it is a 450. Who did the rebuild?
My car was a 400. Never used a drop.
Changed it to a V8D 500 and I do track days. Uses quite a lot now.
I am told 1) they all do that sir and b) it's not a bad thing as it lubricates things.

Ooopse,
I meant 2011.

Mr Trickett did the rebuild (I'm in Rugby).

There's no oil spill on the garage floor so I think it might be coming out of the exhaust or maybe it only drips when it gets hot.

[QBee]

The best peace of mind will be gained by popping in to see Dom, car up on ramp, have a look together. He will see straight away if it is important. Every car is different, as is every driver and what he/she does with the car.

[jojackson4]

Have you just had it serviced ?
Have they put some pissy thin oil in

[Trevor450]

I've been told that they shouldn't use much. If they are driven hard then a litre in 1000 miles is normal.

I had mine rebuilt earlier this year. Oil consumption was a litre every 200 miles and getting worse and the oil in the bores was pushing past the head gasket. The engine was rebuilt again and it hasn't been right from day one - overfuelling, oil consumption, smoking, misfiring, you name it. It is currently using a litre every 80 miles and the back of the car is covered in oily soot. I am obviously not happy and am taking it elsewhere for a second opinion as the guy who did it twice has had enough chances. I can't really afford to have it done again or new engine and I need a legal battle like a hole in the head but I have little choice as the car is unusable in its current condition.

[phazed]

Trevor450 said:

I've been told that they shouldn't use much. If they are driven hard then a litre in 1000 miles is normal.

I had mine rebuilt earlier this year. Oil consumption was a litre every 200 miles and getting worse and the oil in the bores was pushing past the head gasket. The engine was rebuilt again and it hasn't been right from day one - overfuelling, oil consumption, smoking, misfiring, you name it. It is currently using a litre every 80 miles and the back of the car is covered in oily soot. I am obviously not happy and am taking it elsewhere for a second opinion as the guy who did it twice has had enough chances. I can't really afford to have it done again or new engine and I need a legal battle like a hole in the head but I have little choice as the car is unusable in its current condition.

That is very poor indeed.

It would seem that if it actually had a rebuild and there is no premature wear then It would seem that it wants stripping, bores honed by a proper engineering company, new rings and a new set of valve stem seals for good measure.

Good luck!

[QBee]

Trevor450, YHM

[Trevor450]

QBee said:

Trevor450, YHM

Cheers. Will reply in a little bit.

phazed said:

That is very poor indeed.

It would seem that if it actually had a rebuild and there is no premature wear then It would seem that it wants stripping, bores honed by a proper engineering company, new rings and a new set of valve stem seals for good measure.

Good luck!

It has had that twice. First time I paid for it and second time the guy did it again but rebored out with larger pistons. I suspect there has been a cock up with the honing process both times. He used the same engineering firm for both rebuilds. It is a mess.

[phazed]

You need to use a specialist like Chesman Engineering, most of the specialist engine builders do.

[Trevor450]

For better or worse, the car is going to TVR Power at the garage's expense to rebuild/repair/new engine/whatever it needs.

[zed4]

Mine used to use oil, I think it was leaking from the valley gasket. I did a lot of work on it last year, new cam, valley gasket, sump gasket amongst other things, and it's not used any since.

[Goaty Bill 2]

Trevor450 said:

I've been told that they shouldn't use much. If they are driven hard then a litre in 1000 miles is normal.

That's exactly what I was told to expect from (near) new.
They also said it was because the 500 was a 'big engine'.
Odd how my 454ci BBC used less than that.

But, it remains a fact, about 1 litre / 1000 miles would be about normal for a stocker in good condition.

[ChimpOnGas]

Just for comparison my 4.0 litre used about 500ml of oil every 1000 miles, since running it on LPG this seems to have fallen to 250ml for every 1000 miles.

My guess is the 5 litre cars use a bit more due to their shorter valve guides and possibly greater vacuum on over run?

But anything more than a litre of oil over 1000 miles is definitely excessive unless you're running fancy forged pistons, in which case you've got to accept it'll always get through a bit more oil than an engine with cast pistons.

[2 sMoKiN bArReLs]

All of mine have consistently used 1 litre every 1,000 miles (ish)

[davelittlewood]

We'll I'm off the see Dom on Thursday.

We'll have a look at the motor and I'll get the usual mix of sales patter and verbal abuse

[KateV8]

Do any of the SC owners here have any oil consumption figures to compare against NA? Should it make much difference? I'm currently seeing about half the dipstick (between min and max) every 400-500 miles but don't know what that half dipstick equates to in volume. 450 incidentally.

[TVR Beaver]

Max to Min is 1 ltr... so you are seeing the same as above.. ie 1 ltr every 1000 miles...

TBH I think this is quite a lot... and I wonder how much oil being thrown down the exhaust will cause CAT problems either by blocking it or making it inefective?...

[ChimpOnGas]

KateV8 said:

Do any of the SC owners here have any oil consumption figures to compare against NA? Should it make much difference? I'm currently seeing about half the dipstick (between min and max) every 400-500 miles but don't know what that half dipstick equates to in volume. 450 incidentally.

I believe taking the level from min to max on the dipstick requires about a litre of oil, so if you're finding the level between the min & max marks after 500 miles you should need to add half a litre to bring it to the max mark.

Or in simple terms that follows the thread, your supercharged 450 is consuming a litre of oil every 1000 miles which as we've already established is perfectly acceptable for a normally aspirated Rover V8.

I would imagine achieving oil consumption of a litre per 1000 miles on a supercharged Rover V8 should be considered very good indeed and certainly nothing to worry about.

But it would definitely be interesting to her from other forced induction boys to see what oil consumption they get.

Remember a completely oil tight Rover V8 is a very rare thing so some of the oil loss is just a bit of natural leakage.

Someone once told me a Rover V8 is like an old lady...if you leave her sat in the same spot long enough she'll always leave a stain