Drove with oil cap off for >200 miles. Lasting damage?
 

Hi all --

New here, hoping to get your advice!

I periodically go home to my parents, who have a 1995 850 as a 2nd car (not used too often). I recently came home, and we were driving it on a few 1 hour trips, but then I took it on a longer trip from NJ to CT.

After I stopped, I noticed some faint acrid smell, so after checking their fill up log and oil change record, just out of curiosity I opened up the hood.

Lo and behold -- imagine I was seeing this like a hundred miles away from home -- I saw the engine oil cap off and sitting on the engine. As in, an open engine, that has now spewed a huge amount of oil up on to the underside of the hood, and onto the hot engine block.

I was shocked -- I thought, this must be the end of this car, right now. It's going to seize up and die. Or catch fire and kill me right now.

Then, I thought, well, I have no idea how long this has been like this, and it survived for >200 miles of whatever condition this is.

So I went and filled it up with regular old 10w-30, and it took 3 quarts, to the halfway between the two lines on the dipstick.

My question: what lasting damage has been done here? I'm not even going to try and figure out how the cap got left that way. Just wanting to know what we should do to salvage or expect now that this has happened.

Have an oil change, at least?

Thanks!

did any oil level warning light show up on the dashboard? you should have waited for the engine to cool down before adding oil to get the correct reading. you might over fill adding oil warm.

No oil pressure warning. There was the check engine, but that has been on so frequently due to other issues (shifter switch, O2 sensor, etc) that we've given up on reacting to that day by day. I will check it when it cools down here.

if the oil the light did not show up then you still had enough oil flowing and enough pressure. was there a ticking sound when you popped the hood? because on some 850s the lifters make a ticking sound when the oil gets really low.

If you did not hear a ticking sound then you are probably ok. 3 quarts is pushing it- but these use quite a bit of oil anyways. I think it took 7 quarts to fill up the first time. If the light works and did not come on, I think you are ok. Did someone else change the oil?

oh, that's hard to say -- I shut down the car before opening the hood, and didn't try starting it before I had replaced the cap. Is it something that could have been heard from inside at the driver's seat?

If you only had to add 3 quarts you're fine. No damage done. Clean up under the hood and drive on.

You're fine.

You may want to consider changing the oil since you probably picked up some road dirt.

+1, if you don't hear a strange noise, you're likely fine. Keep driving these cars have large sumps.

Would be a good idea to take it to a car wash and hose down the engine compartment and the undercarriage to remove those 3 quarts of oil. :eek:

Thanks, everyone!