My friend had a Toyota Camry XV40, with 200K miles on it.
On a long distance trip, my friend drove this Camry with low oil to no oil, and the engine stalled and died on him. Even a well built car will die with no oil. (Obviously my friend learned his lesson about the oil.). He got it towed to the closet Toyota dealer, and they recommended not fixing it, as the cost would be too much. So he sold it them (or someone at the dealer) for $500 bucks, which he assumed was going to be used for parts.
A few weeks later, my friend got a random guy give him a call out of the blue. It turns out, that someone sold random guy the broken car for $$$ and he got ripped off. Random guy got my friends number from a leftover business card in the trunk. My friend told him the whole no oil story. Random guy was PISSED that he got duped.
I gather the Camry was fixed up just enough to get by a quick glance. But the problem that needed fixing didn't get fixed at all, yet passed on.
So my question is, when looking for at a used car, how do we check that the engine didn't die because of low to no oil? What are the tell tale signs that an engine went through so much.
WOW. Now that's a story, though I have seen this happen.
I can tell you what I do at my dealership. We specialize in exotics/performance cars, so I always have guys coming in with super low mile cars (2011 Ferrari with 3k miles, low mileage Ford GT's, etc.) that want to sell and swear they "only drive on sunny days to church and back." With these kinds of cars, there are additional steps you need to take that I won't waste your time explaining. However, whether you are looking at a Porsche or a pickup, there is one piece of universal advice I ALWAYS give:
You want a mechanic to inspect it. I, like Scotty and many other mechanics, have saved guys from buying a complete junker just by doing a routine inspection. People can hide lots of things when it comes to used cars. But you can not hide from the hard data that a dealer-grade scan tool can find. I can plug my scanner in and within minutes tell you what your fuel trims look like on each bank, what condition your cams are in, and much, much more. The data comes straight from the computer so there is no human interference. I would not suggest someone go and buy the kind of scan tool I'm talking about if they are just buying a used car once every few years. This tool we use costs about $8000 and it would not make financial sense to someone who is not going to use it every single day all day long. However, for a minimal fee, you can pay a mechanic to check out any car you are looking at. I think Scotty usually charges $200 or so which is VERY reasonable. This is the best way to know whether you are looking at a car that needs an engine, or a good car that would make a good purchase.
A small fee might save you thousands in return, so not a bad investment in your potential purchase.
Quite a story indeed! Thanks for the suggestion. I gather my $80 scan tool won't be able to see the problems that an $8000 scan tool will. Good to know there is a way to found out if an engine is totally worn out.
a lot of low grade tools will show you fuel trims. I'm curious how the fancy tools can indicate the general engine wear that running low on oil will cause.
@mountainmanjoe, you're not wrong on your comment. Most tools will show fuel trims and some general items. Your more advanced tools can also tell you misfire history, cam condition, and some other nice info. Some other steps we do here which could help anyone on any vehicle include: having an oil analysis done. Just take a sample and send it to a professional lab (we use Blackstone). This breakdown will tell you A LOT about how the engine has been maintained. We also use a cylinder boroscope to check the cylinder walls for scoring which tends to happen when a car has been run low on oil. And of course, you always do a compression test to make sure everything is good. These steps can all be done by anyone in their driveway and the tools for those items are readily available and not very expensive. Of course, if you are not mechanically inclined or don't believe you can conduct them appropriately I would recommend having a mechanic do it for you. Hopefully this helps someone. Sorry for leaving those out in my original post. That's what I get for posting while tired. 🙂
Thanks for the additional details.
You're welcome. 🙂
@mod_man
Yeah thanks for the info. I have a hunch that most mechanics won't go to all these lengths when inspecting. Lets say a nefarious seller wanted to hide evidence. Does changing the oil hide the signs of a worn engine from the analysis? Also, how does the PCM determine cam wear? How long is misfire info stored? What other goodies does the OBD tell you?
I have a poor man's method of testing engine wear. I live in the mountains and we have some VERY steep roads. When I test drive a vehicle I accelerate hard up those roads. It tells me right away if an engine is in bad shape 😆
Hahaha well I mean the old slope test is dependable! Changing out the oil won't hide the issues because as soon as the car is run for any length of time, literally minutes, if there is excessive wear, you are going to have high levels of various contaminants in the oil. This is because oil gets into all the little spaces and crevices as it lubricates and flushes out any loose, small particles of metal, aluminum, etc. You can't see it with the naked eye, but these labs break down the oil literally to the molecular level and can see everything. It's very impressive stuff. Also, on the PCM/camshaft question, it is in short sensors that tell the PCM where the camshaft should be versus where it actually is. There is also an excellent detailed write up on this here:
https://www.brakeandfrontend.com/tech-feature-hall-effect-sensor-diagnostics/
Beware though, it is a little on the dry side. Lol. Essentially though, when the car is brand new the default settings from the factory are loaded into the PCM. Over time as the cams wear, the values for certain statistics will begin to change and go out of spec. Some wear is expected, but if it is excessive the scanner can tell you that and also exactly how out of spec it is. 🙂
One of the reasons you ask a mechanic to check the car for you before buying it Also, In most states, if you buy s car from a dealer, you will have 30 days warranty on the powertrain which can be very beneficial in similar cases like this.
GTK about the warranty. Thank you!
Just a note on this: Not in Texas. Unfortunately. In my opinion, this should be a law in every state. Some dealers here will do a 3 month/3,000 mile warranty for no charge, which are the dealers I would recommend.
I didn’t know about the Texas. Thanks for letting me know.
Checking oil pressure and basically listening for abnormal noise is about it. There is no scan tool to check for a car going low on oil by any means. You can run low on oil and cause wear on the bearing surfaces but as long as its not prolonged it will just shave off thousands of miles of life only. Some states - used cars are sold "As Is" unless noted otherwise in the sales agreement. And some states have a " Cooling off Period" in which a buyer can bring back a car within 3 days for a refund or in some cases ONLY for an exchange for another car of equal or higher value. Remember car dealers on the whole are their to make money and they will use tricks to try to stealthily remove your money from your wallet without you knowing it. Thats why they have a bad reputation.
Yes, dealers ARE professionals at selling cars. It's their job to do it all day long. As a buyer, while the money is still your hand, YOU are in control of the situation. You always have the power of "no". (subject to market conditions of course). And when you do your research, the tricks start to look very transparent.
They only get out their wiliest salesmen for the most expensive cars anyway. There is a pecking order. 😛
But they can't really go selling crappy cars willy nilly. If they did then word would spread and then Uh oh, no customers. I think a good dealer who cares about his business isn't going to fill his lot with clunkers. It's up to you to judge the dealer. Is he the one on the dark corner by the train tracks with a broken sign and dozen old cars, or is it the dealer with a huge lot, full customers looking at nice cars.
That's been my experience anyway.
So true in what you describe...in my part of town there is alot of retirees which have money and some are not cognisant of the tricks and ploys to get them to agree to contracts and some missinformation to up the price of cars to pad their sales/commissions. This area has one dealer..well hes a mega dealer with like six dealerships under his name. Even though he gets bad write ups in the Better business bureau...that dealer seems hes made of teflon...in a sense its like a town of good old boys....they take care of one another. It's not a small town...Saint George, UT. But I won't name any dealer name....LOL!
I think you have to consider what it is that your buying, a 5 year old car with 60k miles or a 15 year old 200k miles car. Once someone or even a dealer sells off a 200k miles/older car it is what it is. I would always be leary of high miles cars for sale. Most "good" high mile cars people will run until a major failure (engine/trani). And most people selling really cheap cars are like "listen, take it as is and I'm not letting you take it to a mechanic". If thats the attitude, then walk from the car....they are just trying to unload a known problem they dont want found.
