Problems with chaning my oil.

Hi Everyone,

I am having a few problems when changing the oil on my 2002 Volvo Penta 4.3L. I have both a suction pump and a drill operated pump which both experience the same problem. When I go to suck the oil out of the dipstick tube I get a lot of bubbles, but not much oil. In fact it probably takes over an hour to suck all of the oil out of the engine. I do warm the engine up before starting, so that’s not the problem.

What am I missing? I usually place the small tube as far down into the dipstick tube as I can (before it bottoms out). There is just never a even flow of oil being sucked out of the engine.

Any suggestions on what I might be doing wrong?

Thanks in advance,

Mike

Re: Problems with chaning my oil.

Either you've got a small hole in the tube your sticking into the dipstick or it's not in far enough.

Re: Problems with chaning my oil.

DO NOT place a small tube inside the dipstick tube. That dipstick tube goes to the bottom of the pan. Just attach the hose to the top of the dipstick tube.

Re: Problems with chaning my oil.

The dipstick tube on the Volvo already goes to the very bottom of the pan so all you have to do is suck the oil from the top of the tube.

Use a pump that threads into the male garden hose fitting on the top of the dipstick tube or get a hose that pushes over the tube itself.

Re: Problems with chaning my oil.

You say you are getting all the oil out,but takes an hour,so I am thinking the motor isn't warmed up enough.and the oil isn't warm enough.If you had an air leak,you can't get it all out.

Run the motor at least 10 minutes,15 is better.

DHP

Re: Problems with chaning my oil.

Its taking him an hour because he is using those plastic dip stick tube pumps I bet.

Re: Problems with chaning my oil.

Wait - I'm confused. I had an 89 OMC 4.3 and used to drain the oil by inserting the hose end of a manual oil pump into the dipstick tube. It seemd to work just fine. I planned on doing the same for my 94 5.7 Alpha I
erc. Why is that wrong? How else would you use the pump?

Re: Problems with chaning my oil.

That's how it done, you mount the pump or the hose from a pump directly ONTO the dipstick tube. The original poster was inserting a small tube inside of the dipstick tube and pushing it to the bottom of the pan. Then you only have a very small hole in that tube, and if the oil isn't really warm it will take forever to get out.
Even when the oil is warm, with those small tubes it just sputters out and takes a long time.

Re: Problems with chaning my oil.

Yeah I bought the kind of pump that threads onto the end of the dipstick and warmed the engine up for a long time. It worked great. Thanks for the replies.

Re: Problems with chaning my oil.

On my boat (3.0L mercruiser with Alpha 1 outdrive) I check the bottom of the oil pan and found that it has a plug there. Just like the car engine oil pan. If you can work a ball valve or pet-c0ck on it then you can change the oil like in a car but the tube coming out of the bigle hole.

Re: Problems with chaning my oil.

Don said:

The original poster was inserting a small tube inside of the dipstick tube and pushing it to the bottom of the pan. Then you only have a very small hole in that tube, and if the oil isn't really warm it will take forever to get out.
Even when the oil is warm, with those small tubes it just sputters out and takes a long time.

Click to expand...

This is my method...as a once a year hobbiest it works fine. Push the small tube down thru the dipstick to the bottom of the pan, hand pump it out with the $15 plastic POS. 15 to 20 minutes with sputtering splurts of oil and slightly cramped hands/fingers, but only once a year and it's what I have in the garage, so I tolerate it. Yes it takes a while and I fully acknowledge there are better methods, but that doesn't explain why he had mostly bubbles and very little oil. In my case when the bubbles start sucking that's a GOOD thing...that means I'm about done! But he shouldn't be sucking bubbles at the beginning of the pump-out.

I agree it sounds like a leak somewhere in the tube...or a defective pump.